four o’clock
those three thousand pictures , placed one after the other alongside the walls of all the galleries , including the outer one , deposited also even on the floors , and lying there like stagnant pools , between which the attendants devised little paths -- they were like an inundation , a deluge , which rose up , streamed over the whole Palais de l'Industrie , and submerged it beneath the murky flow of all the mediocrity and madness to be found in the river of Art . And but a single afternoon sitting was held , from one till seven o'clock -- six hours of wild galloping through a maze ! At first they held out against fatigue and strove to keep their vision clear ; but the forced march soon made their legs give way , their eyesight was irritated by all the dancing colours , and yet it was still necessary to march on , to look and judge , even until they broke down with fatigue . By four o'clock the march was like a rout -- the scattering of a defeated army . Some committee-men , out of breath , dragged themselves along very far in the rear ; others , isolated , lost amid the frames , followed the narrow paths , renouncing all prospect of emerging from them , turning round and round without any hope of ever getting to the end ! How could they be just and impartial , good heavens ? What could they select from amid that heap of horrors ?