Here, he owned, were the elements of intellectual delightfulness, but he said their assemblage in such quantity alone denied the salon; there was too much of a good thing.
The French word implied a long evening of general talk among the guests, crowned with a little chicken at supper, ending at cock-crow.

Here was tea, with milk or with lemon-baths of it and claret-cup for the hardier spirits throughout the evening.

It was very nice, very pleasant, but it was not the little chicken--not the salon.

In fact, he affirmed, the salon descended from above, out of the great world, and included the aesthetic world in it.

But our great world--the rich people, were stupid, with no wish to be otherwise; they were not even curious about authors and artists.