n. You flattered yourself that at one stroke you were
establishing justice in your own country and in the universe. You were
a brave man, an honest idealist, though without much experimental
philosophy. But go home to your own heart and you will recognise that
you had in you a spice of malice and that our ingenuousness was not
without cunning. You believed you were performing a fine moral action.
You said to yourself: 'Here am I, just and courageous once for all.
I can henceforth repose in the public esteem and the praise of
historians.' And now that you have lost your illusions, now that you
know how hard it is to redress wrongs, and that the task must ever be
begun afresh, you are going back to your asteroids. You are right; but
go back to them with modesty, Bidault-Coquille!"

BOOK VII. MODERN TIMES

MADAME CERES

"Only extreme things are tolerable." Count Robert de Montesquiou.

I. MADAME CLARENCE'S DRAWING-ROOM

Madame Clarence, the widow of an exalted functionary of the Republic,
loved to entertain. Every Thursday she collected together some friends
of modest condition who took pleasure in conversation. The ladies who
went to see her, very different in age and rank, were all without
money, and had all suffered much. There was a duchess who looked like
a fortune-teller and a fortune-teller who looked like a duchess. Madame
Clarence was pretty enough to maintain some old liaisons, but not to
form new ones, and she generally inspired a quiet esteem. She had a very
pretty daughter, who, since she had no dower, caused some alarm among
the male guests; for the Penguins were as much afraid of portionless
girls as they were of the devil himself. Eveline Clarence, noticing
their reserve and perceiving its cause, used to hand them their tea
with an air of disdain. Moreover, she seldom appeared at the parties
and talked only to the ladies or the very young people. Her discreet and
retiring presence put no restraint upon the conversation, since those
who took part in it thought either that as she was a young girl she
would not understand it, or that, being twenty-five years old, she might
listen to everything.

One Thursday therefore, in Madame Clarence's drawing-room, the
conversation turned upon love. The ladies spoke of it with pride,
delicacy, and mystery, the men with discretion and fatuity; everyone
took an interest in the conversation, for each one was interested in
what he or she said. A great