This time the young man could not possibly refrain from laughing at that reflection.
"Would you like to see the beautiful woman, gentlemen?" asked the lackey who was conducting them.
"Yes, yes," replied Alméric, eagerly. "I should like to see the 'beautiful woman.' Where is she?"
"This way, gentlemen. Be good enough to enter this boudoir."
They passed into a charming room, formed entirely of looking-glasses—the ceiling, the wainscotting, all was of looking-glass, in which one could admire oneself from every point of view.
The beautiful woman was lying upon a sofa. On beholding her, the beggar and Alméric fell back in horror. This beautiful woman was a monstrosity, but believed herself to be a chef d'œuvre.
Every part of her was beautiful, and yet she appeared horrible; because the exaggeration of beauties makes a hideous ensemble; because it is harmony which gives grace to things we admire, movement which gives life; and this beautiful woman had neither grace nor movement.
She had been born very pretty, but the excess of her vanity, and her coquetry, had made her lose all her advantages. She was beautiful as Nature had created her; she wished to be beautiful as beauty is painted: she exaggerated all her graces and changed them into deformities.
She asked for silken hair—she had long locks of silk, without life or colour; she desired to have teeth of pearl, and her teeth appeared horrible: she wished for a wasp-waist, and her body, drawn in by a tight belt, was without grace or suppleness, and looked as if it might snap in two at any moment; she asked for hands of alabaster, and her hands became dull and cold; she desired to have the feet of a child, and these deformed feet were not strong enough to sustain the weight of her body or to permit her to walk. Nothing more hideous was ever seen: it was ideal ugliness.
