discerned but
little of the towers of Westminster. 'Admitting,' added the novelist,
'that a bridge is needed at that point for railway traffic, surely there
is no reason why it should be so surprisingly ugly. However, from all I
see, it seems more and more evident that you English people are very much
in the habit of sacrificing beauty to utility, forgetting that with a
little artistic sense it is easy to combine the two.'

Then, however, he turned slightly, and looked down-stream where the
Victoria Embankment spreads past the Temple to Blackfriars. The
colonnades of Somerset House showed boldly and with a certain majesty in
the foreground, whilst in the distance, high over every roof, arose the
leaden dome of St. Paul's. This vista was rather to M. Zola's liking.
Close beside us, on the bridge, was one of the semi-circular embrasures
garnished with stone seats. A pitiful-looking vagrant was lolling there;
but this made no difference to M. Zola. He installed himself on the seat
with Desmoulin on one hand and myself on the other, and there we remained
for some little time looking about us and chatting.

'This was the only thing wanted,' said Desmoulin, who generally had some
humorous remark in readiness for every situation. 'Yesterday at the
Grosvenor we were in the _fosse de Vincennes_, and now, as they say in
the melodrama of "The Knights of the Fog" ("Les Chevaliers du
Brouillard"*), we are "homeless wanderers stranded on the bridges of
London."'

* The French dramatic adaptation of Ainsworth's 'Jack Sheppard.'

The allusion to the fog roused M. Zola from his contemplation.

'But where is the Savoy Hotel, where I stayed in '93?' he inquired. 'It
must be very near here.'

I pointed it out to him, and he was astonished. 'Why, no--that cannot be!
It is so large a place, and now it looks so small. What is that huge
building beside it?'

'The Hotel Cecil,' I replied.

Then again he shook his head in disapproval. From an artistic standpoint
he strongly objected to the huge caravansary on which builder Hobbs and
pious Jabez Balfour spent so much of other people's money. Soaring
massively and pretentiously into the sky it dwarfed everything around;
and thus, in his opinion, utterly spoilt that part of the Embankment.

'To think, too,' said he, 'that you had such a site, here, along the
river, and allowed it to be used for hotels and clubs, and so forth.
There was room for a Louvre here, and you want one badly; for