retort: "Yes, but I don't like his mouth." His feet were large, his hands
plump and over-broad, but admirably cared for.

And Pierre marvelled at finding him such as he had anticipated. He knew
enough of his story to picture in him a hero's son spoilt by conquest,
eagerly devouring the harvest garnered by his father's glorious sword.
And he particularly studied how the father's virtues had deflected and
become transformed into vices in the son--the most noble qualities being
perverted, heroic and disinterested energy lapsing into a ferocious
appetite for possession, the man of battle leading to the man of booty,
since the great gusts of enthusiasm no longer swept by, since men no
longer fought, since they remained there resting, pillaging, and
devouring amidst the heaped-up spoils. And the pity of it was that the
old hero, the paralytic, motionless father beheld it all--beheld the
degeneration of his son, the speculator and company promoter gorged with
millions!

However, Orlando introduced Pierre. "This is Monsieur l'Abbe Pierre
Froment, whom I spoke to you about," he said, "the author of the book
which I gave you to read."

Luigi Prada showed himself very amiable, at once talking of home with an
intelligent passion like one who wished to make the city a great modern
capital. He had seen Paris transformed by the Second Empire; he had seen
Berlin enlarged and embellished after the German victories; and,
according to him, if Rome did not follow the movement, if it did not
become the inhabitable capital of a great people, it was threatened with
prompt death: either a crumbling museum or a renovated, resuscitated
city--those were the alternatives.*