the horrors of a New Year's Day.

He felt that he would do well to mistrust it and he almost regretted
having admitted, among the scentless plants, this orchid which evoked
the most disagreeable memories.

As soon as he was alone his gaze took in this vegetable tide which
foamed in the vestibule. Intermingled with each other, they crossed
their swords, their krisses and stanchions, taking on a resemblance to
a green pile of arms, above which, like barbaric penons, floated
flowers with hard dazzling colors.

The air of the room grew rarefied. Then, in the shadowy dimness of a
corner, near the floor, a white soft light crept.

He approached and perceived that the phenomenon came from the
_Rhizomorphes_ which threw out these night-lamp gleams while
respiring.

"These plants are amazing," he reflected. Then he drew back to let his
eye encompass the whole collection at a glance. His purpose was
achieved. Not one single specimen seemed real; the cloth, paper,
porcelain and metal seemed to have been loaned by man to nature to
enable her to create her monstrosities. When unable to imitate man's
handiwork, nature had been reduced to copying the inner membranes of
animals, to borrowing the vivid tints of their rotting flesh, their
magnificent corruptions.

"All is syphilis," thought Des Esseintes, his eye riveted upon the
horrible streaked stainings of the Caladium plants caressed by a ray
of light. And he beheld a sudden vision of humanity consumed through
the centuries by the virus of this disease. Since the world's
beginnings, every single creature had, from sire to son, transmitted
the imperishable heritage, the eternal malady which has ravaged man's
ancestors and whose effects are visible even in the bones of old
fossils that have been exhumed.

The disease had swept on through the centuries gaining momentum. It
even raged today, concealed in obscure sufferings, dissimulated under
symptoms of headaches and bronchitis, hysterics and gout. It crept to
the surface from time to time, preferably attacking the ill-nourished
and the poverty stricken, spotting faces with gold pieces, ironically
decorating the faces of poor wretches, stamping the mark of money on
their skins to aggravate their unhappiness.

And here on the colored leaves of the plants it was resurgent in its
original splendor.

"It is true," pursued Des Esseintes, returning to the course of
reasoning he had momentarily abandoned, "it is true that most oft