Artists obeyed the voice of poetry which constrains them, and studied
with pleasure the different delicate tints of these chosen examples of
beauty. Sobered by a thought perhaps due to some emanation from a
bubble of carbonic acid in the champagne, a philosopher shuddered at
the misfortunes which had brought these women, once perhaps worthy of
the truest devotion, to this. Each one doubtless could have unfolded a
cruel tragedy. Infernal tortures followed in the train of most of
them, and they drew after them faithless men, broken vows, and
pleasures atoned for in wretchedness. Polite advances were made by the
guests, and conversations began, as varied in character as the
speakers. They broke up into groups. It might have been a fashionable
drawing-room where ladies and young girls offer after dinner the
assistance that coffee, liqueurs, and sugar afford to diners who are
struggling in the toils of a perverse digestion. But in a little while
laughter broke out, the murmur grew, and voices were raised. The
saturnalia, subdued for a moment, threatened at times to renew itself.
The alternations of sound and silence bore a distant resemblance to a
symphony of Beethoven's.
The two friends, seated on a silken divan, were first approached by a
tall, well-proportioned girl of stately bearing; her features were
irregular, but her face was striking and vehement in expression, and
impressed the mind by the vigor of its contrasts.
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