Love, hate, joy and sorrow is the soil to make the flower of their talent grow, this flower of delicacy and of passion, for which they do not hesitate a moment to kill in themselves all real delicacy and living passion. For a word to speak on the stage, for a phrase to write in a book, this woman and this man would sell their father and their mother—Camille had not even mentioned hers; they would sell their friend, their child, and their sweetest memory. I, who have spent my life in feeling what they express so well, he in black and white, she by gestures and in moving accents, only succeed in paralysing myself with that which exalts these expressive natures; in exhausting myself with that which nourishes these souls of prey. Does destiny then will it that artists, little or great, be of necessity distributed between the two classes, those who transcribe marvellously without feeling the passions which the other class feels without power to transcribe? Was Jacques right in saying that his cruelty to Camille by giving her memories would also give her talent? A fine part! A good play! Really we do not complain at remaining obscure and mediocre, if this obscurity and mediocrity are the condition for real feeling. Besides we have no choice. THE END. PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY WM. BRENDON AND SON, LTD., PLYMOUTH ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ● Transcriber’s Notes: ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected. ○ Phrase corrected: “Une Épopée de ce temps” instead of “Une Épopée de a temps” ○ Unbalanced quotation marks were left as the author intended. ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. ○ Spelling was made consistent when a predominant form was found in this book; otherwise it was not changed. ▪ Miraut instead of Mirant. ○ Inconsistent accents in French words were corrected and regularized. ▪ Barouillére instead of Barcuellère or Bareuillère. ▪ Champmeslé instead of Champmeslè. ▪ Bressoré instead of Bressorè. ▪ Odéon instead of Odeôn or Odeòn. ▪ Théâtre instead of Théatre in names of places. ▪ Éthorel instead of Ethorel. ▪ Élysées instead of Elysées. ○ Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_); text in bold by “equal” signs (=bold=). End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Blue Duchess, by Paul Bourget