FÉCHAIN. Good day, sir. Good day, ladies. [To Brignac] You couldn’t just let me have the money for the railway and my ticket to the meeting? It’s only just a trifle.
HOURTIN [giving him some money] There.
FÉCHAIN. Thank you kindly, sir. [He goes out].
HOURTIN [taking leave] You see! Children who cannot be kept ought not to be born. And I would add that those who are born ought to be properly kept.
BRIGNAC. A pretext that would justify the shirking of all duty. It’s impossible to see ahead like that.
HOURTIN. You don’t ask more people to dinner than you have room for, nor before dinner is ready. It will be time to think of increasing our population when our housing and means of livelihood are up to the mark of our existing needs.
BRIGNAC. But each new generation is itself a means of production.
HOURTIN. Certainly. I only ask that the poor should have few children and the degenerate none. No child ought to be brought into the world handicapped by illness or want.
BRIGNAC. And as the result of your precautions our country would fall in point of population to a fifth or a tenth rate power.
HOURTIN [at the door] History teaches us that not even military supremacy belongs to the largest nations. M. de Marigny’s reflection, not mine. [Bowing to the ladies] Till tomorrow. [Shaking Brignac’s hand] And when you have a moment, just consider how society behaves to the mothers of whom it demands children. You’ll find that an entertaining subject—unless it makes you cry. Goodbye.