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‘D’you mean to say you can look at the painting of that
flesh and say it’s not good?’
‘I don’t say that. I think the right breast is very well paint-
ed.’
‘The right breast be damned,’ shouted Lawson. ‘The
whole thing’s a miracle of painting.’
He began to describe in detail the beauties of the pic-
ture, but at this table at Gravier’s they who spoke at length
spoke for their own edification. No one listened to him. The
American interrupted angrily.
‘You don’t mean to say you think the head’s good?’
Lawson, white with passion now, began to defend the
head; but Clutton, who had been sitting in silence with a
look on his face of good-humoured scorn, broke in.
‘Give him the head. We don’t want the head. It doesn’t af-
fect the picture.’
‘All right, I’ll give you the head,’ cried Lawson. ‘Take the
head and be damned to you.’
‘What about the black line?’ cried the American, trium-
phantly pushing back a wisp of hair which nearly fell in his
soup. ‘You don’t see a black line round objects in nature.’
‘Oh, God, send down fire from heaven to consume the
blasphemer,’ said Lawson. ‘What has nature got to do with
it? No one knows what’s in nature and what isn’t! The
world sees nature through the eyes of the artist. Why, for
centuries it saw horses jumping a fence with all their legs
extended, and by Heaven, sir, they were extended. It saw
shadows black until Monet discovered they were coloured,
and by Heaven, sir, they were black. If we choose to sur-

00 Of Human Bondage