Mrs. Trollope preserves two other words, which first rose into popularity in 1835--the words _rococo_ and _decousu_. All things which bore the stamp of the principles and sentiments of former generations were branded as _rococo_. Whatever partook of the extravagance of the Romantic school was termed _decousu_. Eventually this latter word was abandoned as wanting in vigour, and at first that of _debraille_ was substituted; afterwards that of _Bohemian_, which, despite the injurious insinuation it conveyed, has been accepted and adopted by a considerable school. Mrs. Trollope avers that, when she visited France, it was impossible for two persons to carry on a conversation for a quarter of an hour without introducing the words _rococo_ and _decousu_ a score of times. They turned up as frequently as "the head of Charles I." in Mr. Dick's discourse. And, she adds, with her usual causticity, that if one were to classify the population into two great divisions, it would be impossible to define them more expressively than by these two words. * * * * * That Mrs. Trollope had no sympathy with the Romantic school will not excite surprise. Lamennais and Victor Hugo she stigmatizes as _decousus_ of the worst kind, and places them in the same rank as Robespierre. The genius of Victor Hugo, so vast, so elevated, and so profound, she could not understand; she could see only its irregularities, like a certain "aesthete" who, when contemplating the water-floods of Niagara, directed his attention to a supposed defect in their curve! Her methodical, matter-of-fact mind was wholly unable to measure the proportions of the gigantic genius of the author of "Notre Dame," and hence she discharges at him a volley of denunciatory epithets, borrowed always from the severest classic style--"the champion of vice," "the chronicler of sin," "the historian of shame and misery." She could not believe that in all his writings it was possible to discover a single honourable, innocent, and wholesome thought. Sin was the Muse which he invoked; horror attended his footsteps; thousands of monsters served as his escort, and furnished him with the originals of the "disgusting" portraits which he passed his life in painting. This was plain speaking; but Mrs. Trollope attacking Victor Hugo is one of those rebellions on the part of the infinitely little against the infinitely great which move the laughter of gods and men.