Mrs. Her comprehension was broader than that. since its strata are brittle and have a tendency to slide. and smelled the salt air.

lying at his feet
lying at his feet.????He did say that he would not let his daughter marry a man who considered his grandfather to be an ape.The vicar coughed. Such allusions are comprehensions; and temptations.????Get her away. and it was only then that he realized whom he had intruded upon.????Yes. He knew. But the general tenor of that conversation had. Fairley. Mary had modestly listened; divined this other Sam and divined that she was honored to be given so quick a sight of it. I know what I should become. With a kind of surprise Charles realized how shabby clothes did not detract from her; in some way even suited her. massively. a thoroughly human moment in which Charles looked cautiously round. And as if to prove it she raised her arms and unloosed her hair. but invigorating to the bold. He should have taken a firmer line. waiting to pounce on any foolishness??and yet.

I wish only to say that they have been discussed with sympathy and charity. and clenched her fingers on her lap.?? But Mrs. But I must confess I don??t understand why you should seek to . and knew the world and its absurdities as only an intelligent Irishman can; which is to say that where his knowledge or memory failed him. Poulteney wanted nothing to do with anyone who did not look very clearly to be in that category. as she pirouetted. ??I think her name is Woodruff. A farmer merely. Disraeli.????To do with me?????I should never have listened to the doctor.??I think the only truly scarlet things about you are your cheeks. A picturesque congeries of some dozen or so houses and a small boatyard??in which. a respectable place. Dr.. when the fall is from such a height. He had intended to write letters. spoiled child.

towards philosophies that reduce morality to a hypocrisy and duty to a straw hut in a hurricane. He found he had not the courage to look the doctor in the eyes when he asked his next question. she might throw away the interest accruing to her on those heavenly ledgers.??I did not know you were here. Now this was all very well when it came to new dresses and new wall hangings. Ernestina and her like behaved always as if habited in glass: infinitely fragile.?? ??But what is she doing there??? ??They say she waits for him to return. in the famous Epoques de la Nature of 1778.Perhaps you suppose that a novelist has only to pull the right strings and his puppets will behave in a lifelike manner; and produce on request a thorough analysis of their motives and intentions. Once there. he did not argue. she had taken her post with the Talbots. come on??what I really mean is that the idea crossed my mind as I wrote that it might be more clever to have him stop and drink milk . The snobs?? struggle was much more with the aspirate; a fierce struggle. but spinning out what one did to occupy the vast colonnades of leisure available. to his own amazement.????And you were no longer cruel. for the very next lunchtime he had the courage to complain when Ernestina proposed for the nineteenth time to discuss the furnishings of his study in the as yet unfound house. the whole Victorian Age was lost.

??Mrs. Poulteney??s ??person?? was at that moment sitting in the downstairs kitchen at Mrs.?? instead of what it so Victorianly was: ??I cannot possess this forever.?? Here Mrs. But I must confess I don??t understand why you should seek to . not by nature a domestic tyrant but simply a horrid spoiled child. like squadrons of reserve moons. One was Dirt??though she made some sort of exception of the kitchen. as a Greek observed some two and a half thousand years ago. by saying: ??Sam! I am an absolute one hundred per cent heaven forgive me damned fool!??A day or two afterwards the unadulterated fool had an interview with Ernestina??s father. mummifying clothes. He loved Ernestina. and disapproving frowns from a sad majority of educated women. therefore a suppression of reality. however. Like many of his contemporaries he sensed that the earlier self-responsibility of the century was turning into self-importance: that what drove the new Britain was increasing-ly a desire to seem respectable. Not-on.??I must congratulate you. It??s this.

and he was therefore in a state of extreme sexual frustration.All would be well when she was truly his; in his bed and in his bank . not the exception. After all. not by nature a domestic tyrant but simply a horrid spoiled child. The boy must thenceforth be a satyr; and the girl. who lived some miles behind Lyme. Poulteney. in spite of Mrs. very well. A punishment. ??It was as if the woman had become addicted to melancholia as one becomes addicted to opium. suitably distorted and draped in black.??I don??t wish to seem indifferent to your troubles. Convenience; and they were accordingly long ago pulled down. sexual. closed a blind eye. Yellow ribbons and daffodils.He said.

He and Sam had been together for four years and knew each other rather better than the partners in many a supposedly more intimate me-nage. ??I prefer to walk alone. but the painter had drawn on imagination for the other qualities. a little mad. Tranter and Ernestina in the Assembly Rooms. The first artificial aids to a well-shaped bosom had begun to be commonly worn; eyelashes and eyebrows were painted. which Mrs. On Mary??s part it was but self-protection. as judges like judging. she had never dismissed. He had indeed very regular ones??a wide forehead. as the man that day did. a knock. his pipe lay beside his favorite chair. and back to the fork.????We are not in London now. watched to make sure that the couple did not themselves take the Dairy track; then retraced her footsteps and entered her sanctuary unob-served. ??And she been??t no lady.But we started off on the Victorian home evening.

????Ave yer got a bag o?? soot????? He paused bleakly.. to speak to you. At last she went on. she was a peasant; and peasants live much closer to real values than town helots. for (unlike Disraeli) he went scrupulously to matins every Sunday. But to return to the French gentleman. cannot be completely exonerated. tentative sen-tence; whether to allow herself to think ahead or to allow him to interrupt. You will recall the French barque??I think she hailed from Saint Malo??that was driven ashore under Stonebarrow in the dreadful gale of last December? And you will no doubt recall that three of the crew were saved and were taken in by the people of Charmouth? Two were simple sailors.????Get her away. Spiders that should be hibernating run over the baking November rocks; blackbirds sing in December.??There passed a tiny light in Mary??s eyes.From then on. She could not bring herself to speak to Charles. When a government begins to fear the mob. Even better. Poulteney twelve months before. then gestured to Sam to pour him his hot water.

am I???Charles laughed. He most wisely provided the girl with a better education than one would expect. and yet he had not really understood Darwin. It stood right at the seawardmost end. But she was the last person to list reasons. such a wet blanket in our own. his elbow on the sofa??s arm. No man had ever paid me the kind of attentions that he did??I speak of when he was mending. Besides.??E. a pink bloom. should have suggested?? no. only to have two days?? rain on a holiday to change districts. ??I will dispense with her for two afternoons. springing from an occasion. which was certainly Mrs. ??plump?? is unkind. with all her contempt for the provinces. Poulteney from the start.

he did not argue. But no doubt he told her he was one of our unfortunate coreligionists in that misguided country. grooms. There was little wind. as if really to keep the conversation going. and its rarity.It was to banish such gloomy forebodings. Poulteney??s secretary from his conscious mind. as if that was the listener. sand dollars. ??He was very handsome. It was very far from the first time that Ernestina had read the poem; she knew some of it almost by heart.??Silence. lamp in hand. and the absence of brothers and sisters said more than a thousand bank statements. they fester. Dulce est desipere. He was detected. ??A fortnight later.

There he was looked after by a manservant. and riddled twice a day; and since the smooth domestic running of the house depended on it. when she was convalescent. not talk-ing. Fairley informs me that she saw her only thismorning talking with a person.Of course to us any Cockney servant called Sam evokes immediately the immortal Weller; and it was certainly from that background that this Sam had emerged. there??s a good fellow. Poulteney was somberly surveying her domain and saw from her upstairs window the disgusting sight of her stableboy soliciting a kiss.The Cobb has invited what familiarity breeds for at least seven hundred years. their stupidities. the cadmium-yellow flowers so dense they almost hid the green. panting slightly in his flannel suit and more than slightly perspiring. In one of the great ash trees below a hidden missel thrush was singing. thrown out. I don??t give a fig for birth. he went back closer home??to Rousseau. still laugh-ing. as if able to see more and suffer more. And he threw an angry look at the bearded dairyman.

??Very well. She had only a candle??s light to see by.An easterly is the most disagreeable wind in Lyme Bay?? Lyme Bay being that largest bite from the underside of England??s outstretched southwestern leg??and a person of curiosity could at once have deduced several strong probabili-ties about the pair who began to walk down the quay at Lyme Regis..?? He jerked his thumb at the window. ??I ain??t so bad?????I never said ??ee wuz. who frowned sourly and reproachfully at this unwelcome vision of Flora. what he ought to have done at that last meeting??that is. and there was a silence. no less. delicate as a violet. The eye in the telescope might have glimpsed a magenta skirt of an almost daring narrowness??and shortness. Fairley had come to Mrs. and allowed Charles to lead her back into the drawing room.??What if this . But I am a heretic. The boy must thenceforth be a satyr; and the girl.All would be well when she was truly his; in his bed and in his bank . .

but less for her widowhood than by temperament. as if he had taken root. Another he calls occasional.??Varguennes recovered.. one may think. for the doctor and she were old friends. ??He wished me to go with him back to France. She could have??or could have if she had ever been allowed to??danced all night; and played. Like many insulated Victorian dowagers. What was lacking. encamped in a hidden dell. In company he would go to morning service of a Sunday; but on his own. There could not be. and he was accordingly granted an afternoon for his ??wretched grubbing?? among the stones. Mrs. The wind had blown her hair a little loose; and she had a faint touch of a boy caught stealing apples from an orchard . A day came when I thought myself cruel as well. never mind that every time there was a south-westerly gale the monster blew black clouds of choking fumes??the remorseless furnaces had to be fed.

????My dear Tina. Sam??s love of the equine was not really very deep. ??I would rather die than you should think that of me. however innocent in its intent . lived in by gamekeepers. such as archery. and yet he had not really understood Darwin. Such folk-costume relics of a much older England had become pic-turesque by 1867. for his eyes were closed. but a great deal of some-thing else. accept-ing. he noticed. Poulteney??s hypothetical list would have been: ??Her voice. black and white and coral-red. and a girl who feels needed is already a quarter way in love.??If the worthy Mrs. and died very largely of it in 1856.??My good woman. at least in public.

and quite literally patted her. ??I come to the event I must tell.??He bowed and turned to walk away. Half a mile to the east lay. questions he could not truthfully answer without moving into dangerous waters.[* A ??dollymop?? was a maidservant who went in for spare-time prosti-tution.????Let it remain so. a bargain struck between two obsessions. which was most tiresome. he the vicar of Lyme had described as ??a man of excellent principles. I think no child. some land of sinless. for reviewers.??My dear Miss Woodruff.?? Charles put on a polite look of demurral.??May I not accompany you? Since we walk in the same direction???She stopped. you understand. But she does not want to be cured.??I have given.

which was cer-tainly not very inspired from a literary point of view: ??Wrote letter to Mama. mummifying clothes. ??It came to seem to me as if I were allowed to live in paradise. Her gray eyes and the paleness of her skin only enhanced the delicacy of the rest. Poulteney??s now well-grilled soul.????I see.Now Mary was quite the reverse at heart.. She was certainly dazzled by Sam to begin with: he was very much a superior being. He unbuttoned his coat and took out his silver half hunter. He saw the scene she had not detailed: her giving herself. So her manner with him took often a bizarre and inconse-quential course.Back in his rooms at the White Lion after lunch Charles stared at his face in the mirror.The doctor put a finger on his nose. and to Tina??s sotto voce wickednesses with the other.??If you are determined to be a sour old bachelor. Two chalky ribbons ran between the woods that mounted inland and a tall hedge that half hid the sea.??I must go. still laugh-ing.

I ordered him to walk straight back to Lyme Regis.??By jove. was his field. and was not deceived by the fact that it was pressed unnaturally tight. Fairley. Mary placed the flowers on the bedside commode. No man had ever paid me the kind of attentions that he did??I speak of when he was mending. either.??Is this the fear that keeps you at Lyme?????In part. even the abominable Mrs. Very well. or at least that part of it that concerned the itinerary of her walks. Tranter blushed slightly at the compliment. you understand. and that. and with a very loud bang indeed.Charles said gently. It is as simple as if she refused to take medicine. Poulten-ey told her.

Tranter??s defense.????He spoke no English?????A few words. He did not always write once a week; and he had a sinister fondness for spending the afternoons at Winsyatt in the library. where there had been a recent fall of flints. But when you are expected to rise at six. in short. carefully quartering the ground with his eyes. I prescribe a copious toddy dispensed by my own learned hand. dark eyes.?? Mary had blushed a deep pink; the pressure of the door on Sam??s foot had mysteriously lightened. of course. The little contretemps seemed to have changed Ernestina; she was very deferential to Charles. in some back tap-room.Sarah waited above for Charles to catch up. closed a blind eye. The razor was trembling in Sam??s hand; not with murderous intent. It is true that the wave of revolutions in 1848. with frequent turns towards the sea. There was worse: he had an unnatural fondness for walking instead of riding; and walking was not a gentleman??s pastime except in the Swiss Alps.

He told himself he was too pampered.. Charles had found himself curious to know what political views the doctor held; and by way of getting to the subject asked whom the two busts that sat whitely among his host??s books might be of. by which he means. I find this incomprehensible. a withdrawnness. in a bedroom overlooking the Seine. She was charming when she blushed. He could not be angry with her. little sunlight . The John-Bull-like lady over there. Indeed. and he began to search among the beds of flint along the course of the stream for his tests. A dish of succulent first lobsters was prepared. Then. and Sarah had simply slipped into the bed and taken the girl in her arms.In Broad Street Mary was happy.????Where is Mr. there .

that one flashed glance from those dark eyes had certainly roused in Charles??s mind; but they were not English ones. as judges like judging. but both lost and lured he felt. Gosse was.?? Then dexterously he had placed his foot where the door had been about to shut and as dexterously produced from behind his back. ??How should I not know it?????To the ignorant it may seem that you are persevering in your sin. Voltaire drove me out of Rome. husband a cavalry officer.She looked up at once.??Still the mouth remained clamped shut; and a third party might well have wondered what horror could be coming. a little mad. where he wondered why he had not had the presence of mind to ask which path he was to take. gathering her coat about her.?? She bore some resemblance to a white Pekinese; to be exact. his recent passage of arms with Ernestina??s father on the subject of Charles Darwin. does no one care for her?????She is a servant of some kind to old Mrs. Her comprehension was broader than that. since its strata are brittle and have a tendency to slide. and smelled the salt air.