But after all what does it matter whether pictures of the East are true to nature or not? Other people whose names are not Fromentin can provide such documents. In his works Fromentin has expressed himself, and that is enough. Take up his first book, _L'été dans la Sahara_: by its grace of style it claims a place in French literature. Or read his classic masterpiece, _Les maîtres d'autrefois_, published in 1876 after a tour through Belgium and Holland: it will remain for ever one of the finest works ever written on art. A connoisseur of such refinement, a critic who gauged the artistic works of Belgium and Holland with such subtlety, necessarily became in his own painting an epicure of beautiful tones. This man, who never made an awkward movement nor uttered a brutal word, this sensitive, distinguished spirit could be no more than a subtle artist who had eyes for nothing but the aristocratic side of Eastern life. As a painter, however, he might wish to be true to nature; he could be no more than this. His art, compact of grace and distinction, was the outcome of his own nature. He is a descendant of those delicately feminine, seductively brilliant, facile and spontaneous, sparkling and charming painters who were known in the eighteenth century as _peintres des fêtes galantes_. He is the Watteau of the East, and in this capacity one of the most winning and captivating products of French art. [Illustration: E. FROMENTIN. ARABIAN FALCONERS.] Finally, _Guillaumet_, the youngest and last of the group, found in the East peace: a scion of the Romanticists, there is none the less a whole world of difference between him and them. While the Romanticists, as sons of a flaccid, inactive period, lashed themselves into enthusiasm for the passion and wild life of the East, Guillaumet, the child of a hurried and neurotic epoch, sought here an opiate for his nerves. Where they saw contrasts he found harmony; and he did not find it, like Fromentin, in what is understood as _chic_. Manet's conception of colour had taught him that nature is everywhere in accord and harmoniously delicate. He writes: "_Je commence à distinguer quelques formes: des silhouettes indécises bougent le long des murs enfumés sous des poutres luisantes de sui. Les détails sortent du demi-jour, s'animent graduellement avec la magie des Rembrandt. Même mystère des ombres, mêmes ors dans les reflets--c'est l'aube.... Des terrains poudreux inondés de soleil; un amoncellement de murailles grises sous un ciel sans nuage; une cité somnolente baignée d'une lumière égale, et dans le frémissement visible des atomes aériens quelques ombres venant ça et là détacher une forme, accuser un geste parmi les groupes en burnous qui se meuvent sur les places ... tel m'apparait le ksar, vers dix heures du matin...._