formed, intellectual face. Then he went on eagerly: "I shall scarcely be
wrong in the inference that you, the creator of the Fig-eater, had
experienced a far-reaching mental change before your unfortunate loss of
sight?"

"I had to struggle hard," replied Hermon, "but I probably owe the success
of the Demeter to the circumstance that I found a model whose mind and
nature correspond with those of the goddess to a rare degree."

The monarch shook his fair head, and protested in a tone of positive
superior knowledge: "As to the model, however well selected it may be,
it was not well chosen for this work, far less for you. I have watched
your battle against beauty in behalf of truth, and rejoiced, though I
often saw you and your little band of young disciples shoot beyond the
mark. You brought something new, whose foundation seemed to me sound,
and on which further additions might be erected. When the excrescences
fell off, I thought, this Hermon, his shadow Soteles, and the others who
follow him will perhaps open new paths to the declining art which is
constantly going back to former days. Our time will become the point of
departure of a new art. But for that very reason, let me confess it, I
regret to see you fall back from your bold advance. You now claim for
your work that it cleaves strictly to Nature, because the model is taken
from life itself. It does not become me to doubt this, yet the stamp of
divinity which your Demeter bears is found in no mortal woman.
Understand me correctly! This is certainly no departure from the truth,
for the ideal often deserves this lofty name better than anything the
visible world offers to the eye; but hitherto you have done honour to
another truth. If I comprehend your art aright, its essence is opposed
to the addition of superhuman dignity and beauty, with which you, or the
model you used, strove to ennoble and deify your Demeter. Admirably as