‘Shut up!’ resumed a comrade, a very irascible little painter with a fair complexion. ‘You surely don’t want to make us swallow such a turnip as that?’ Yes, yes, a turnip! They all repeated the word in tones of conviction--that word which they usually cast at the very worst smudges, at the pale, cold, glairy painting of daubers. ‘All right,’ at last said Fagerolles, clenching his teeth. ‘I demand the vote.’ Since the discussion had become envenomed, Mazel had been ringing his bell, extremely flushed at finding his authority ignored. ‘Gentlemen--come, gentlemen; it’s extraordinary that one can’t settle matters without shouting--I beg of you, gentlemen--’ At last he obtained a little silence. In reality, he was not a bad-hearted man. Why should not they admit that little picture, although he himself thought it execrable? They admitted so many others! ‘Come, gentlemen, the vote is asked for.’ He himself was, perhaps, about to raise his hand, when Bongrand, who had hitherto remained silent, with the blood rising to his cheeks in the anger he was trying to restrain, abruptly went off like a pop-gun, most unseasonably giving vent to the protestations of his rebellious conscience. ‘But, curse it all! there are not four among us capable of turning out such a piece of work!’ Some grunts sped around; but the sledge-hammer blow had come upon them with such force that nobody answered. ‘Gentlemen, the vote is asked for,’ curtly repeated Mazel, who had turned pale. His tone sufficed to explain everything: it expressed all his latent hatred of Bongrand, the fierce rivalry that lay hidden under their seemingly good-natured handshakes. Things rarely came to such a pass as this. They almost always arranged matters. But in the depths of their ravaged pride there were wounds which always bled; they secretly waged duels which tortured them with agony, despite the smile upon their lips. Bongrand and Fagerolles alone raised their hands, and ‘The Dead Child,’ being rejected, could only perhaps be rescued at the general revision.