" With these words he went over to the piano, pressed a button, and there sprang forth—no other words were adequate to the occasion—a table fitted with benches at which three guests could sit with plenty of room.

"Very ingenious, " Michel observed.

"Necessity is our mother, " the pianist replied, "since the exiguity of the apartments no longer permitted furniture! Have a look at this complex instrument, an amalgamation of Érard and Jeanselme[17]! It fills every need, takes up no room at all, and I can assure you that the piano itself is none the worse for it. "

At this moment the doorbell rang. Quinsonnas opened the door and announced his friend Jacques Aubanet, an employee of the General Corporation of Maritime Mines. Michel and Jacques were introduced to each other in the simplest manner possible.

Jacques Aubanet, a handsome young man of twenty-five, was a close friend of Quinsonnas, and like him reduced in circumstances. Michel had no idea what kind of work the employees of the Corporation of Maritime Mines might do; certainly Jacques brought with him a remarkable appetite.

Fortunately dinner was ready; the three young men devoured: after the initial moments of this struggle with comestibles, a few words managed to make their way through the less expeditive mouthfuls. "My dear Jacques, " Quinsonnas observed, "by introducing you to Michel Dufrénoy I allowed you to make the acquaintance of a young friend who is one of us— one of those poor devils Society refuses to employ according to their talents, one of those drones whose useless mouths Society padlocks in order not to have to feed!"

"Ah! Monsieur Dufrénoy is a dreamer, " Jacques replied.

"A poet, my friend! and I wonder what in the world he can be doing here in Paris, where a man's first duty is to make money!"

"Obviously enough, " Jacques replied, "he's landed on the wrong planet. "

"My friends, " said Michel, "you're anything but encouraging, but I shall take your exaggerations into account. "

"This dear child, " Quinsonnas replied, "he hopes, he works, he loves good books, and when Hugo, Musset, and Lamartine are no longer read, he hopes someone will still read him! But what have you done, wretch that you are—have you invented a utilitarian poetry, a literature to replace compressed air or power brakes? No? Well then! Gnaw your own vitals, my son! If you don't have something sensational to tell, who will listen to you? Art is no longer possible unless it produces a tour de force! These days, Hugo would have to recite his Orientates straddling two circus horses, and Lamartine would perform his Harmonies upside down from a trapeze!"

"Nonsense, " exclaimed Michel, leaping up in indignation.

"Calm down, child, " the pianist replied. "Just ask Jacques whether I'm right or not. "

"A hundred times over, " Jacques opined. "This world is nothing more than a market, an immense fairground, and you must entertain your clients with the talents of a mountebank. "

"Poor Michel, " Quinsonnas continued with a sigh, "his Latin verse prize will turn his head!"

"What will you prove by that?" demanded the young man.

"Nothing, my son! After all, you're following your destiny. You're a great poet! I've seen some of your works; only you'll allow me to remark that they're hardly suited to the taste of the age. "

"Which means?"

"Which means that you deal with poetical subjects, and nowadays that's a poetical fault! You sing of mountains and valleys, fields and clouds, love and the stars—all those worn-out things no one wants anymore!"

"Then what should I sing?"

"Your verses must celebrate the wonders of industry!"

"Never!" Michel exclaimed.

"Well put, " Jacques observed.

"For instance, " Quinsonnas continued, "have you heard the ode that was given first prize by the forty de Broglies cluttering up the Académie-Française?" "No!"

"Well then, listen and learn. Here are the two last stanzas:

And coal was shoveled into blazing fires:

Through glowing tubes the pressure it requires

Is driven to the monster's heart; it pumps

In pulsing fury and in frenzy thumps

Till, bellowing, it emulates the forces

of eighty horses!

 

Now with his heavy bars, the engineer

Opens the valves! Within the cylinder

The double piston runs! The wheel has slipped

Its cog! The roaring engine's speed is up!

The whistle blows!... Hail to the Crampton System:

the locomotive runs!

"Dreadful!" Michel exclaimed.

"Some nice rhymes, " Jacques observed.

"There you are, my boy, " continued the pitiless Quinsonnas. "May heaven keep you from being forced to live by your talent! Better follow the example of those of us who recognize the present state of affairs for what it is, at least until better days. "

"Is Monsieur Jacques, " inquired Michel, "similarly obliged to ply some rebarbative trade?"

"Jacques is a shipping clerk in an industrial company, " Quinsonnas explained, "which does not mean, to his great regret, that he has ever seen the inside of a ship. "

"What does it mean?" asked Michel.

"It means, " Jacques replied, "that I'd have liked to be a soldier. "

"A soldier!" Michel betrayed his astonishment.

"Yes, a soldier. A noble profession in which, barely fifty years ago, you could earn an honest living!"

"Unless you lost it even more honestly, " Quinsonnas added. "Well, it's over and done with as a career, since there's no more army—unless you become a policeman. In other times, Jacques would have entered some military academy, or joined up, and there, after a life of battle, he would have become a general like a Turenne, or an emperor like a Bonaparte! But nowadays, my handsome officer, you'll have to give that all up. "

"Oh, you never know!" said Jacques. "It's true that France, England, Russia, and Italy have dismissed their soldiers; during the last century the engines of warfare were perfected to such a degree that the whole thing had become ridiculous—France couldn't help laughing—"

"And having laughed, " Quinsonnas put in, "she disarmed. "

"Yes, you joker! I grant you that with the exception of old Austria, the European peoples have done away with the military state. But for all that, have they done away with the spirit of battle natural to human beings, and the spirit of conquest natural to governments?"

"Probably, " remarked the musician.

"And why?"

"Because the best reason those instincts had for existing was the possibility of satisfying them! Because nothing suggests battle so much as an armed peace, according to the old expression! Because if you do away with painters there's no more painting, sculptors, no more sculpture, musicians, no more music, and if you do away with warriors—no more wars! Soldiers are artists. "

"Yes, of course!" Michel exclaimed, "and rather than do the awful work I do, I ought to join up. "

"Ah, you fell for it, baby!" Quinsonnas crowed. "Is there any possibility that you'd like to fight?"

"Fighting ennobles the soul, " Michel replied, "at least according to Stendhal, one of the great thinkers of the last century."

"Yes, it does, " the pianist agreed, but added, "How much brains does it take to give a good thrust with a saber?"

"A lot, if you're going to do it right, " Jacques answered.

"And even more, if you're going to receive the thrust, " Quinsonnas retorted. "My word, my friends, it's likely you're right, from a certain point of view. Perhaps I'd be inclined to make you a soldier, if there was still an army; with a little philosophy, it's a fine career. But nowadays, since the Champs-de-Mars has been turned into a school, we must give up fighting.