Flaubert had done his utmost to produce something that resembled ancient Carthage. He was artist enough, however, to know that the main point was not the outward truth, but the inner truth which makes probability. His descriptions were to many unconditionally convincing. A doubt concerning their conformity with a long since vanished reality, was once answered in my presence by one of the first critics in France with a simple "I am quite sure it is true." Flaubert himself came out openly and boldly against the doubters, in his defensive reply to an attack of Sainte-Beuve, with the following words: "I believe I have produced something that resembles Carthage. But that is not the question. I don't care a straw for archæology! If the colors are not harmonious, if the details do not accord, if the morals cannot be traced to religion or the occurrences to passion, if the characters are not well sustained, if the costumes do not correspond to the customs, or the buildings to the climate, then my book is, of course, untrue. Otherwise it is true." These words hit the nail on the head; we are impressed by them with the master's good conscience and the authority with which it invests him. His work was not, as were so many later archæological novels, a masquerade, in which modern emotions and views of life are brought forward in antique costumes. No; everything here was on a par, and had the same wild, formidable stamp. Love, stratagem, revenge, piety, strength of character, all were unmodern.