South Wind

eremony? I am particularly anxious for you to come to-night. Can't you really manage it? I want you to meet Malipizzo and

you mean

you like to spend a week or two in gaol? He will have you there one of these days, unless you have placed him under some kin

e. I have nothing

ter. Your sentiments are English. They will never do in a co

signifying favouriti

retty state

n only live under a

with you a

yourself in the wrong. You remember how I warned you about that li

ired Eames, with a tinge o

ld be tactful, on occasions. He preten

ted the bibliographer, fear

c

balloon bu

he was not a man at all but an old boarding-house keeper who had very good reasons for assuming the male disguise, that he was a morphinomaniac, a disfrocked Baptist minister, a pawnbroker out of work, a fire-worshipper, a Transylvanian, a bank clerk who had had a fall, a decayed jockey who disgraced himself at a subsequent period in connection with some East-End mission for reforming the boys of Bermondsey and then, after pawning

good many more, had be

ds had see

nation. It consoled Mr. Eames slightly to reflect that he was not the only resident singled out for such aspersions; that the more harmless a man's life, the more fearsome the legends. He suffered, none the less. This was why he seldom entered the premises of the Alpha and Omega Club where, quite apart from his objection to Parker's poison and the loose and row

tages of ruffianism as a mode of art, and a mode of life. Only think: a thousand wrongs to every right! What an opening for a man of talent, especially in a country like this, where frank and independent action still counts its admirers. You have done nothing, of late, worthy to be recorded in the CHRONIQUE SCANDALEUSE of Nepen

o the ideals of a man like Keith whose sympathy with every form of wrong-doing would have rendered him posi

from one batch of visitors to the next. He knew that whenever his name was mentioned this unique indiscretion of his, this toothsome morsel, would likewise be dished up.

believe, of course. She overdoes things, the good woman. All the same, there's no smoke without fire. You know wha

ad hap

hs of infatuation he neglected, he despised, he derided his idol Perrelli. He put on a new character. While the dust was accumulating on those piles of footnotes, Mr. Eames astonished people by becoming a society man. It was a transfiguration. He appeared in fancy ties and spats, fluttered a

er her like a dog. He made a perfect ass of himself, heedless of what anybody though or said of him. The men declared he was going mad-breaking up-sickening for an attack of G.P. "Miracles will never cease," charitably observed the Duchess. Alone of all his lady acquaintances, Madame Steynlin liked him all the better for this gaucherie. She was a true woman-friend of all lovers; she knew the human heart and its queer little vagaries. She received the couple with open arms and entertained them royally, after her manner; gave them a kind of social status. U

LON CAPT

mention of balloons, or even aeroplanes, would make him wince and feel desirous of leaving the room; he always thought that people introduced the subject with malicious purpose, in order to remind him of this unforgettable peccadillo, the "balloon business," his one lapse from perfect propriety. Mr. Keith, who confessed to a vein of coarseness in his nature-prided himself

arried her off in the nick of time to save Mr. Eames from social ostracism, mental dotage, and financial ruin. Her mere appearance had made him the laughing-stock of the place; her appetite had led him into out

ey would! He wished balloons had never been invented. None the less he stuck it out bravely, threw him

reflected. "SEMPER ALIQUI

se nothing was without interest for him. He took all learning to his province. He read for the pleasure of knowing what he did not know before; his mind was unusually receptive because, he said, he respected the laws which governed his body. Facts were his prey. He threw himself into them with a kind of piratical ardour; took them by the throat, wallowed in them, worried them like a terrier, and finally assimilated them. They gave him food for what he liked best on earth: "disinterested thought." They "formed a rich loam." He had an encyclopaeic t

tions, reflexes, adjustments and stimuli. For all his complexity there was something so childlike in his nature that he never realized what an infliction he was, nor how tiresome his conversation could become to people who were not quite so avid of "disinterested thought." Living alone and spending too much

the most atrocious things in correct and even admirable English. Chaster than snow as a conversationalist, he prostituted his mother-tongue, in letter-writing, to the vilest of uses. Friends of long standing called him an obscene old man. When taxed with this failing-by Mr. Eames, for instance, who shivered at what he called PRAETEXTATA VERBA-he would hint that

ways disagre

itiveness as to what is morbid or immoral, is by no means a good sign. A healthy man refuses to be hampered by preconceived notions of what is wrong or ugly. When he reads a book like that the either yawns or laughs. That is because he is sure of himself. I could give you a long list of celebrated statesmen, princes, philosophers and prelates of the Church who take pleasure, in their moments of relaxation, in what you would call improper conversation, literature or corres

back to that point. What

s always denying himself this or that. One by one, his humane instincts, his elegant desires, are starved away by stress of circumstances. The charming diversity of life ceases to have any meaning for him. To console himself, he sets up perverse canons of righ

ay," Eames would assent. "But I f

aving never done a stroke of work in my life, I can talk freely about my money. My grandfather was a pirate and slave-dealer. To my certain knowledge, not a penny of his wealth was honestly come by. That ought to allay your scruples about accepting it. NON OLET, you kn

; sufficient to pay for th

ch

now and then. I see

n no harm in it? Don't you really believe th

called him a representative Englishman and regretted

and silver plate and monthly gloatings over his gains. I wonder you can re

entleman, except on a t

ve discussed it before, haven't we? Your money would sweeten nothing for me. It

ral tenacity, was not easily

he says? 'Put money in thy purse, for to lack the current coin of the realm is to

urprised. I have sometimes noticed

denying yourself the common emoluments of life. It's a form of self-indulgence. I wish you would op

a mistake. I try to see soberly. I try to

d reply, with a horrible accent on the word "alw

ery variety of manner and rendered above all things as sensitive as possible to pleasurable impressions. In fact, you want to be a kind of Aeolian harp. I admit that this is more than a string of sophisms; you may call it a philosophy of life. But it is not my philosophy. It does not appeal to me in the least. You will get no satisfaction out of me, Keith, with your hedonism. You are up against a brick wall. You speak of my deliberately closing up avenues of pleasure. They ought to be closed up,

ted to think you are not really clean-minded, in spite of

rity. Then, via Alexander of Macedon, "one of the greatest sons of earth," as Bishop Thirlwall had called him-Alexander, with whose deplorable capacity for "unbending" a scholar like Eames was perfectly familiar-he would switch the conversation into realms of military science, and begin to expatiate upon the wonderf

ir of strained but polite attention, and he generally broke off the conversation and took his departure at the earliest moment consistent wit

TETIGIT NON