However, he declared himself very hard to please in that matter; he dreamed of an Egeria, a superior mind.

What he did not tell them was, that a dressmaker's little errand-girl, with whom he had tried to converse as he left the law-school, had surveyed him from head to foot and threatened him with the police.
Upon some new joke of Maurice's, the lawyer gave his amorous programme in the following terms: "Understand me, a woman must be as intelligent as Hypatia, and have the sensibility of Heloise; the smile of a Joconde, and the limbs of an Antiope; and, even then, if she had not the throat of a Venus de Medicis, I should not love her." Without going quite so far, the actor showed himself none the less exacting.

According to his ideas, Deborah, the tragedienne at the Odeon--a Greek statue!--had too large hands, and the fascinating Blanche Pompon at the Varietes was a mere wax doll.
Gustave, after all, was the one who is most intractable; excited by the Bordeaux wine--a glass of mineral water would be best for him--he proclaimed that the most beautiful creature was agreeable to him only for one day; that it was a matter of principle, and that he had never made but one exception, in favor of the illustrious dancer at the Casino Cadet, Nina l'Auvergnate, because she was so comical! "Oh! my friends, she is so droll, she is enough to kill one!" "To kill one!" Yes! my dear Monsieur Gustave, that is what will happen to you one of these fine mornings, if you do not decide to lead a more reasonable life--and on the condition that you pass your winters in the South, also! Poor Amedee was in torture; all his illusions--desires and sentiments blended--were cruelly wounded.

Then, he had just discovered a deplorable faculty; a new cause for being unhappy.

The sight of this foolishness made him suffer.