42. "M. Manet Studying Beautiful Nature," Le Charivari, April 25, 1880. The anonymous review of the show published by Le Temps praised the exhibition, espe- cially the pastels, but found one of them unspeakable: "In this seductive genre there are choice morcels. I am not speaking of the Toilette of this coarse fille leaning over and pulling up a stock- 90 ing of white silk." Again, then, an abrupt dismissal of an otherwise modest picture whose only departure from the standard iconography of woman at her toilette is the expansive and com- pressed bosom. A caricature of the work was published in Le Charivari at the time of La Vie Moderne exhibition (fig. 42). The cartoon, entitled "M. Manet Studying Beautiful Nature," connects the extremity of exposed breasts to vulgarity and ugliness as did the remarks of Bertall 91 and Sebillot, by mocking any connection between this toilette and decorous feminine beauty. Unsurprisingly, The Toilette was the only work in Manet's private show that Huysmans found worth mentioning in his account of the 1880 art season. The consistency of his enthusi- asms is apparent. He is delighted to find another prostitute: "One, la Toilette, representing a woman with a low neckline, the top of her chignon and the tip of her nose are gaining ground on her departing chest, while she attachs a garter to a blue stocking, fills one's nose with the prostitute who is dear to us. To envelope his people with the scent of fashion to which they 92 belong, such has been one of M. Manet's most constant preoccupations." Huysmans put his expert finger on the issue: Manet's use of a vulgar "fashion vignette" enabled commentators of all stripes to discover a prostitute without the aid of a suggestive picture title, because they all knew that a respectable woman would not have been shown that way. Another instance of a painting that displays female sexuality as something of a threat, and that locates this threat specifically in the realm of modern fashion, is Henri Gervex's Rolla (fig. 43). Sent to the Salon of 1878, this painting was abruptly removed by a Beaux-Arts administrator more than a month before the opening of the exhibition because of its inconvenance, or impropriety, in spite of the fact that the twenty-six-year-old Gervex had 95 been exempt from jury deliberations since winning a prize in i874. Like Manet's Nana, Rolla, 79