with winning simplicity. The son of a stonemason of Plassans, he had
achieved great success at the local art competitions, and had
afterwards come to Paris as the town laureate, with an allowance of
eight hundred francs per annum, for a period of four years. In the
capital, however, he had found himself at sea, defenceless, failing in
his competitions at the School of Arts, and spending his allowance to
no purpose; so that, at the end of his term, he had been obliged for a
livelihood to enter the employment of a dealer in church statues, at
whose establishment, for ten hours a day, he scraped away at St.
Josephs, St. Rochs, Mary Magdalens, and, in fact, all the saints of
the calendar. For the last six months, however, he had experienced a
revival of ambition, on finding himself once more among his comrades
of Provence, the eldest of whom he was--fellows whom he had known at
Geraud's boarding-school for little boys, and who had since grown into
savage revolutionaries. At present, through his constant intercourse
with impassioned artists, who troubled his brain with all sorts of
wild theories, his ambition aimed at the gigantic.

'The devil!' said Claude, 'there's a lump.'

The sculptor, delighted, gave a long pull at his pipe, and blew a
cloud of smoke.

'Eh, isn't it? I am going to give them some flesh, and living flesh,
too; not the bladders of lard that they turn out.'

'It's a woman bathing, isn't it?' asked Sandoz.

'No; I shall put some vine leaves around her head. A Bacchante, you
understand.'