So it was that one could observe in the series big vases covered with figures of mandarins, porringers of shot reddish-brown, pots adorned with Arabian inscriptions, drinking-vessels in the style of the Renaissance, and large plates on which two personages were outlined as it were on bloodstone, in a delicate, aerial fashion. He now made letters for signboards and wine-labels; but his intelligence was not high enough to attain to art, nor commonplace enough to look merely to profit, so that, without satisfying anyone, he had ruined himself.
They were both taking a view of these things when Mademoiselle Marthe passed.
“So, then, you did not recognise him?” said her mother to her.
“Yes, indeed,” she replied, bowing to him, while her clear and sceptical glance—the glance of a virgin—seemed to say in a whisper: “What are you coming here for?” and she rushed up the steps with her head slightly bent over her shoulder.
Madame Arnoux led Frederick into the yard attached to the works, and then explained to him in a grave tone how different clays were ground, cleaned, and sifted.
“The most important thing is the preparation of pastes.”
And she introduced him into a hall filled with vats, in which a vertical axis with horizontal arms kept turning. Frederick felt some regret that he had not flatly declined her offer a little while before.
“These things are merely the slobberings,” said she.
He thought the word grotesque, and, in a measure, unbecoming on her lips.
Wide straps ran from one end of the ceiling to the other, so as to roll themselves round the drums, and everything kept moving continuously with a provoking mathematical regularity.
They left the spot, and passed close to a ruined hut, which had formerly been used as a repository for gardening implements.
“It is no longer of any use,” said Madame Arnoux.
He replied in a tremulous voice:
“Happiness may have been associated with it!”
The clacking of the fire-pump drowned his words, and they entered the workshop where rough drafts were made.
Some men, seated at a narrow table, placed each in front of himself on a revolving disc a piece of paste. Then each man with his left hand scooped out the insides of his own piece while smoothing its surface with the right; and vases could be seen bursting into shape like blossoming flowers.
Madame Arnoux had the moulds for more difficult works shown to him.
In another portion of the building, the threads, the necks, and the projecting lines were being formed. On the floor above, they removed the seams, and stopped up with plaster the little holes that had been left by the preceding operations.
At every opening in the walls, in corners, in the middle of the corridor, everywhere, earthenware vessels had been placed side by side.
Frederick began to feel bored.
“Perhaps these things are tiresome to you?” said she.
Fearing lest it might be necessary to terminate his visit there and then, he affected, on the contrary, a tone of great enthusiasm. He even expressed regret at not having devoted himself to this branch of industry.
She appeared surprised.
“Certainly! I would have been able to live near you.”
And as he tried to catch her eye, Madame Arnoux, in order to avoid him, took off a bracket little balls of paste, which had come from abortive readjustments, flattened them out into a thin cake, and pressed her hand over them.
“Might I carry these away with me?” said Frederick.
“Good heavens! are you so childish?”
He was about to reply when in came Sénécal.
The sub-manager, on the threshold, had noticed a breach of the rules. The workshops should be swept every week. This was Saturday, and, as the workmen had not done what was required, Sénécal announced that they would have to remain an hour longer.
“So much the worse for you!”
They stooped over the work assigned to them unmurmuringly, but their rage could be divined by the hoarse sounds which came from their chests. They were, moreover, very easy to manage, having all been dismissed from the big manufactory. The Republican had shown himself a hard taskmaster to them. A mere theorist, he regarded the people only in the mass, and exhibited an utter absence of pity for individuals.
Frederick, annoyed by his presence, asked Madame Arnoux in a low tone whether they could have an opportunity of seeing the kilns. They descended to the ground-floor; and she was just explaining the use of caskets, when Sénécal, who had followed close behind, placed himself between them.
He continued the explanation of his own motion, expatiated on the various kinds of combustibles, the process of placing in the kiln, the pyroscopes, the cylindrical furnaces; the instruments for rounding, the lustres, and the metals, making a prodigious display of chemical terms, such as “chloride,” “sulphuret,” “borax,” and “carbonate.” Frederick did not understand a single one of them, and kept turning round every minute towards Madame Arnoux.
“You are not listening,” said she. “M. Sénécal, however, is very clear. He knows all these things much better than I.”
The mathematician, flattered by this eulogy, proposed to show the way in which colours were laid on. Frederick gave Madame Arnoux an anxious, questioning look. She remained impassive, not caring to be alone with him, very probably, and yet unwilling to leave him.
He offered her his arm.
“No—many thanks! the staircase is too narrow!”
And, when they had reached the top, Sénécal opened the door of an apartment filled with women.
They were handling brushes, phials, shells, and plates of glass. Along the cornice, close to the wall, extended boards with figures engraved on them; scraps of thin paper floated about, and a melting-stove sent forth fumes that made the temperature oppressive, while there mingled with it the odour of turpentine.
The workwomen had nearly all sordid costumes. It was noticeable, however, that one of them wore a Madras handkerchief, and long earrings. Of slight frame, and, at the same time, plump, she had large black eyes and the fleshy lips of a negress. Her ample bosom projected from under her
