He held by the hand the fine boy with the beaming eyes, whom you used to
admire. His head was erect, his movements slow and eloquent, his whole
carriage that of a superior being. A little way behind was Madame
Vedrine pushing a perambulator, in which was a laughing little girl,
born since their visit to Touraine.

'That makes three for her, counting me,' said Vedrine, with a wave of
his hand towards his wife; and the look of Madame when her eye rests on
her husband really does express the tender satisfaction of motherhood;
she is like a Flemish Madonna contemplating her Divine Child. Talked a
long time, leaning against the parapet of the quay; it did me good to
be with these honest folk. That is a man, anyhow, who cares nothing
whatever for success, and the public, and the prizes! With his
connections (he is cousin to Loisillon and to the Baron d'Huchenard), if
he chose--if he just put a little water into his strong wine--he might
have orders, and get the Biennial Prize, and be in the Institute in no
time. But nothing tempts him, not even fame. 'Fame,' he said, 'I have
had a taste of it. I know what it is. When a man's smoking, he sometimes
gets his cigar by the wrong end. Well, that's fame: just a cigar with
the hot end and ash in your mouth.'

'But, Vedrine,' said I, 'if you work neither for fame nor for money----
yes, yes; I know you despise it; but, that being so, I say, why do you
take so much trouble?'

'For myself and my personal satisfaction. It's the desire for creation
and self-expression.'

Clearly here is a man who would have gone on with his work in the desert
island. He is a true artist, ever in quest of a new type, and in the
intervals of his labour endeavours by change of material and change of
conditions to satisfy his craving for a fresh revelation. He has made
pottery, enamels, mosaics, the fine mosaics so much admired in the
guard-room at Mousscaux. When the thing is done, the difficulty
overcome, he goes on to something else. At the present moment his great
idea is to try painting; and the moment he has finished his warrior, a
great bronze figure for the Rosen tomb, he intends, as he says, 'to put
himself to oil.' His wife always gives her approval, and rides behind
him on each of his hobbies. The right wife for an artist taciturn,
admiring, saving the grown-up boy from all that might spoil his dream
or catch his feet as he goes star-gazing along. She is the sort of woman
dear Germaine, to make