Albano, a stranger in the company and in the eyes of this class of men, looked upon the gulf between himself and Luigi as much less deep than it was; it was merely annoying and uncomfortable to him, as it is to certain people, when, without their knowledge, a cat is in the chamber. The progress of moral enervation and refinement will yet so cleanse and equalize all our exteriors,--and according to the same law, indeed, by which _physical weakness_ throws back the _eruptions of the skin_ and drives them into the _nobler_ parts,--that verily an angel and a satan will come at last to be distinguishable in nothing except in the heart. Alban had already brought with him from Wehrfritz, whom he always heard contending for the right of the province against the prince, an aversion to his successor; so much the more easily flamed up in him a moral indignation, when Luigi turned toward the pictures and drew aside the curtains or aprons from several of the most indecent, in order, not without taste and knowledge, to appraise their artistic worth. A copied Venus of Titian, lying upon a white cloth, was only the forerunner. Although the innocent hereditary prince made his _voyage pittoresque_ through this gallery with the artistical coldness of a gallery inspector and anatomist, and sought more to show than to enrich his knowledge, still the inexperienced youth took it all up with a deaf and blind passionateness, which I know not how to vindicate in any way, not even by the presence of the princess, and so much the less, because in the first place she busily divided her soul only between the gypsum-bust and its copy, and because, secondly, in our day, ladies' watches and fans (if they are tasty) have pictures on them which Albano would want other fans to hide. The two flames of wrath and shame overspread his face with a glowing reflection; but his awkward honesty of scorn contrasted with the ease of the Lector, who with his cold tone, quite as precise as it was light, preserved independence and protected purity. "They please me not, one of them," he said, with severity: "I would give them all away for a single storm of Tempesta's." Luigi smiled at his scholar-like eye and feeling. When they stepped into the second picture-chamber, Albano heard the Princess going away. As this apartment threatened him with still more rent veils of the _un_holiest, he took his leave without special ceremony, and went back without the Lector, who had to-day to give a reading.