cafés on the way and heats up his courage with cups of coffee and thimblefuls of cognac. In vain!
Introduced into the reception room, stuffed with books, pictures, reliquaries, saints and cases of curios, he finds it already filled with callers, attending the Master's leisure. The Great Man sits at his desk, formidable in dressing gown, felt slippers and silk skull cap.
In his hand are a drawing and a reading glass. He makes a little collective bow to the newcomers, who arrange themselves around the room. . . . "You come at the right moment, gentlemen," Anatole France goes on, "you shall decide the question. We are in need of your judgment. Should a painter of religious subjects have faith? The other day I bought this lovely face from my friend Proute: it is a Virgin by Boucher. This Virgin, it is clear, is not a model of virtue. Perhaps the artist painted it from his own wife and baby."
The young man from the country, aghast at the discussion of matters so much beyond the depth of provincial scholarship, takes refuge behind the library ladder and at the first opportunity retreats, without presenting his letter of introduction or making himself known. One sees at a glance that the young man understands the artistic value of innocence!
A private meeting is arranged. Anatole France explains to his new secretary that his business is to hunt up learned references for "Joan," in order to shut the mouths of critics who contend that he is only a novelist. Then he examines a little the innocence of M. Brousson. He wishes to know first whether the young man has been religiously emancipated. His own
