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At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honoré de Balzac
page 19 of 73 (26%)
living picture before him, he naturally passed to a profound
admiration for the principal figure; Augustine seemed to be pensive,
and did not eat; by the arrangement of the lamp the light fell full on
her face, and her bust seemed to move in a circle of fire, which threw
up the shape of her head and illuminated it with almost supernatural
effect. The artist involuntarily compared her to an exiled angel
dreaming of heaven. An almost unknown emotion, a limpid, seething love
flooded his heart. After remaining a minute, overwhelmed by the weight
of his ideas, he tore himself from his bliss, went home, ate nothing,
and could not sleep.

The next day he went to his studio, and did not come out of it till he
had placed on canvas the magic of the scene of which the memory had,
in a sense, made him a devotee; his happiness was incomplete till he
should possess a faithful portrait of his idol. He went many times
past the house of the Cat and Racket; he even ventured in once or
twice, under a disguise, to get a closer view of the bewitching
creature that Madame Guillaume covered with her wing. For eight whole
months, devoted to his love and to his brush, he was lost to the sight
of his most intimate friends forgetting the world, the theatre,
poetry, music, and all his dearest habits. One morning Girodet broke
through all the barriers with which artists are familiar, and which
they know how to evade, went into his room, and woke him by asking,
"What are you going to send to the Salon?" The artist grasped his
friend's hand, dragged him off to the studio, uncovered a small easel
picture and a portrait. After a long and eager study of the two
masterpieces, Girodet threw himself on his comrade's neck and hugged
him, without speaking a word. His feelings could only be expressed as
he felt them--soul to soul.

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