“I’m very sorry,” I said; “but really it was impossible to bring them with me.” Here I most certainlymeantto conclude the sentence: and it was with a feeling of utter amazement, which I cannot adequately describe, that I heard myselfgoing on speaking. “—but they are to join me here in the course of the evening” were the words, uttered inmyvoice, and seeming to come frommylips.
“I’msoglad!” Lady Muriel joyfully replied. “Ishallenjoy introducing them to some of my friends here! When do you expect them?”
I took refuge in silence. The onlyhonestreply would have been “That was notmyremark.Ididn’t say it, andit isn’t true!” But I had not the moral courage to make such a confession. The character of a ‘lunatic’ is not, I believe, very difficult toacquire: but it is amazingly difficult toget rid of: and it seemed quite certain that any such speech asthatwouldquitejustify the issue of a writ ‘de lunatico inquirendo.’
Lady Muriel evidently thought I had failed to hear her question, and turned to Arthur with a remark on some other subject; and Ihad time to recover from my shock of surprise—or to awake out of my momentary ‘eerie’ condition, whichever it was.
When things around me seemed once more to be real, Arthur was saying “I’m afraid there’s no help for it: theymustbe finite in number.”
“I should be sorry to have to believe it,” said Lady Muriel. “Yet, when one comes to think of it, thereareno new melodies, now-a-days. What people talk of as ‘the last new song’ always recalls tomesome tune I’ve known as a child!”
“The day must come—if the world lasts long enough——” said Arthur, “when every possible tune will have been composed—every possible pun perpetrated——” (Lady Muriel wrung her hands, like a tragedy-queen) “and, worse than that, every possiblebookwritten! For the number ofwordsis finite.”
“It’ll make very little difference to theauthors,” I suggested. “Instead of saying ‘whatbook shall I write?’ an author will ask himself ‘whichbook shall I write?’ A mere verbal distinction!”
Lady Muriel gave me an approving smile. “Butlunaticswould always write new books, surely?” she went on. “Theycouldn’twrite the sane books over again!”
“True,” said Arthur. “Buttheirbooks would come to an end, also. The number of lunaticbooksis as finite as the number of lunatics.”
“Andthatnumber is becoming greater every year,” said a pompous man, whom I recognised as the self-appointed showman on the day of the picnic.
“So they say,” replied Arthur. “And, when ninety per cent. of us are lunatics,” (he seemed to be in a wildly nonsensical mood) “the asylums will be put to their proper use.”
“And that is——?” the pompous man gravely enquired.
“To shelter the sane!” said Arthur. “Weshall bar ourselves in. The lunatics will have it all their own way,outside. They’ll do it a little queerly, no doubt. Railway-collisions will be always happening: steamers always blowing up: most of the towns will be burnt down: most of the ships sunk——”
“And most of the menkilled!” murmured the pompous man, who was evidently hopelessly bewildered.
“Certainly,” Arthur assented. “Till at last there will befewerlunatics than sane men. Thenwecome out:theygo in: and things return to their normal condition!”
The pompous man frowned darkly, and bit his lip, and folded his arms, vainly trying to think it out. “He isjesting!” he muttered to himself at last, in a tone of withering contempt, as he stalked away.
By this time the other guests had arrived; and dinner was announced. Arthur of course took down Lady Muriel: andIwas pleased to find myself seated at her other side, with a severe-looking old lady (whom I had not met before, and whose name I had, as is usual in introductions, entirely failed to catch, merely gathering that it sounded like a compound-name) as my partner for the banquet.
She appeared, however, to be acquainted with Arthur, and confided to me in a low voice her opinion that he was “a very argumentative young man.” Arthur, for his part, seemed wellinclined to show himself worthy of the character she had given him, and, hearing her say “I never take wine with my soup!” (this wasnota confidence to me, but was launched upon Society, as a matter of general interest), he at once challenged a combat by asking her “whenwould you say that propertycommencein a plate of soup?”
“This ismysoup,” she sternly replied: “and what is before you isyours.”
“No doubt,” said Arthur: “butwhendid I begin to own it? Up to the moment of its being put into the plate, it was the property of our host: while being offered round the table, it was, let us say, held in trust by the waiter: did it become mine when I accepted it? Or when it was placed before me? Or when I took the first spoonful?”
“He is averyargumentative young man!” was all the old lady would say: but she said it audibly, this time, feeling that Society had a right to know it.
Arthur smiled mischievously. “I shouldn’t mind betting you a shilling,” he said, “that the Eminent Barrister next you” (It certainlyispossible to say words so as to make them begin with capitals!) “ca’n’t answer me!”
“Ineverbet,” she sternly replied.
“Not even sixpenny points atwhist?”
“Never!” she repeated. “Whistis innocent enough: but whist played formoney!” She shuddered.
Arthur became serious again. “I’m afraid I ca’n’t take that view,” he said. “I consider that the introduction of small stakes for card-playing was one of the mostmoralacts Society ever did,asSociety.”
“How was it so?” said Lady Muriel.
“Because it took Cards, once for all, out of the category of games at whichcheatingis possible. Look at the way Croquet is demoralising Society. Ladies are beginning to cheat at it, terribly: and, if they’re found out, they only laugh, and call it fun. But when there’smoneyat stake, that is out of the question. The swindler isnotaccepted as a wit. When a man sits down to cards, and cheats his friends out of their money, he doesn’t get muchfunout of it—unless he thinks it fun to be kicked down stairs!”
“If all gentlemen thought as badly of ladies asyoudo,” my neighbour remarked with some bitterness, “there would be very few—very few——.” She seemed doubtful how to end her sentence, but at last took “honeymoons” as a safe word.
“On the contrary,” said Arthur, the mischievous smile returning to his face, “if only people would adoptmytheory, the number of honeymoons—quite of a new kind—would be greatly increased!”
“May we hear about this new kind of honeymoon?” said Lady Muriel.
“LetXbe the gentleman,” Arthur began, in a slightly raised voice, as he now found himself with an audience ofsix, including ‘Mein Herr,’ who was seated at the other side of my polynomial partner. “LetXbe the gentleman, andYthe lady to whom he thinks of proposing. He applies for an Experimental Honeymoon. It is granted. Forthwith the young couple—accompanied by the great-aunt ofY, to act as chaperone—start for a month’s tour, during which they have many a moonlight-walk, and many atête-à-têteconversation, and each canform a more correct estimate of the other’s character, in fourweeks, than would have been possible in as manyyears, when meeting under the ordinary restrictions of Society. And it is only after theirreturnthatXfinally decides whether he will, or will not, put the momentous question toY!”
“In nine cases out of ten,” the pompous man proclaimed, “he would decide to break it off!”
“Then, in nine cases out of ten,” Arthur rejoined, “an unsuitable match would be prevented, andbothparties saved from misery!”
“The only reallyunsuitablematches,” the old lady remarked, “are those made without sufficientMoney. Love may comeafterwards. Money is neededto begin with!”
This remark was cast loose upon Society, as a sort of general challenge; and, as such, it was at once accepted by several of those within hearing:Moneybecame the key-note of the conversation for some time; and a fitful echo of it was again heard, when the dessert had been placed upon the table, the servants had left the room, and the Earl had started the wine in its welcome progress round the table.
“I’m very glad to see you keep up the old customs,” I said to Lady Muriel as I filled her glass. “It’s really delightful to experience, once more, the peaceful feeling that comes over one when the waiters have left the room—when one can converse without the feeling of being overheard, and without having dishes constantly thrust over one’s shoulder. How much more sociable it is to be able to pour out the wine for the ladies, and to hand the dishes to those who wish for them!”
“In that case, kindly send those peaches down here,” said a fat red-faced man, who was seated beyond our pompous friend. “I’ve been wishing for them—diagonally—for some time!”
“Yes, itisa ghastly innovation,” Lady Muriel replied, “letting the waiters carry round the wine at dessert. For one thing, theyalwaystake it the wrong way round—which of course brings bad luck toeverybodypresent!”
“Better go thewrongway than not goat all!” said our host. “Would you kindly help yourself?” (This was to the fat red-faced man.) “You are not a teetotaler, I think?”
“Indeed but Iam!” he replied, as he pushed on the bottles. “Nearly twice as much money is spent in England onDrink, as on any other article of food. Read this card.” (What faddist ever goes about without a pocketful of the appropriate literature?) “The stripes of different colours represent the amounts spent on various articles of food. Look at the highest three. Money spent on butter and on cheese, thirty-five millions: on bread, seventy millions: onintoxicating liquors, one hundred and thirty-six millions! If I had my way, I would close every public-house in the land! Look at that card, and read the motto.That’s where all the money goes to!”
“Have you seen theAnti-Teetotal Card?” Arthur innocently enquired.
“No, Sir, I have not!” the orator savagely replied. “What is it like?”
“Almost exactly like this one. The coloured stripes are the same. Only, instead of the words ‘Money spent on,’ it has ‘Incomes derived from sale of’; and, instead of ‘That’s where all the money goes to,’ its motto is ‘That’s where all the money comes from!’”
The red-faced man scowled, but evidently considered Arthur beneath his notice. So Lady Muriel took up the cudgels. “Do you hold the theory,” she enquired, “that people can preach teetotalism more effectually by being teetotalers themselves?”
“Certainly I do!” replied the red-faced man. “Now, here is a case in point,” unfolding a newspaper-cutting: “let me read you this letter from a teetotaler.To the Editor. Sir, I was once a moderate drinker, and knew a man who drank to excess. I went to him. ‘Give up this drink,’ I said. ‘It will ruin your health!’ ‘You drink,’ he said: ‘why shouldn’t I?’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but I know when to leave off.’ He turned away from me. ‘You drink in your way,’ he said: ‘let me drink in mine. Be off!’ Then I saw that, to do any good with him, I must forswear drink. From that hour I haven’t touched a drop!”
“There! What do you say tothat?” He looked round triumphantly, while the cutting was handed round for inspection.
“How very curious!” exclaimed Arthur, when it had reached him. “Did you happento see a letter, last week, about early rising? It was strangely like this one.”
The red-faced man’s curiosity was roused. “Where did it appear?” he asked.
“Let me read it to you,” said Arthur. He took some papers from his pocket, opened one of them, and read as follows. “To the Editor. Sir, I was once a moderate sleeper, and knew a man who slept to excess. I pleaded with him. ‘Give up this lying in bed,’ I said, ‘It will ruin your health!’ ‘You go to bed,’ he said: ‘why shouldn’t I?’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but I know when to get up in the morning.’ He turned away from me. ‘You sleep in your way,’ he said: ‘let me sleep in mine. Be off!’ Then I saw that to do any good with him, I must forswear sleep. From that hour I haven’t been to bed!”
Arthur folded and pocketed his paper, and passed on the newspaper-cutting. None of us dared to laugh, the red-faced man was evidently so angry. “Your parallel doesn’t run on all fours!” he snarled.
“Moderatedrinkers never do so!” Arthur quietly replied. Even the stern old lady laughed at this.
“But it needs many other things to make aperfectdinner!” said Lady Muriel, evidently anxious to change the subject. “Mein Herr! What isyouridea of a perfect dinner-party?”
The old man looked round smilingly, and his gigantic spectacles seemed more gigantic than ever. “Aperfectdinner-party?” he repeated. “First, it must be presided over by our present hostess!”
“That, ofcourse!” she gaily interposed. “But whatelse, Mein Herr?”
“I can but tell you what I have seen,” said Mein Herr, “in mine own—in the country I have traveled in.”
He paused for a full minute, and gazed steadily at the ceiling—with so dreamy an expression on his face, that I feared he was going off into a reverie, which seemed to be his normal state. However, after a minute, he suddenly began again.
“That which chiefly causes the failure of a dinner-party, is the running-short—not of meat, nor yet of drink, but ofconversation.”
“In anEnglishdinner-party,” I remarked, “I have never knownsmall-talkrun short!”
“Pardon me,” Mein Herr respectfully replied, “I did not say ‘small-talk.’ I said ‘conversation.’ All such topics as the weather, or politics, or local gossip, are unknown among us. They are either vapid or controversial. What we need forconversationis a topic ofinterestand ofnovelty. To secure these things we have tried various plans—Moving-Pictures, Wild-Creatures, Moving-Guests, and a Revolving-Humorist. But this last is only adapted tosmallparties.”
“Let us have it in four separate Chapters, please!” said Lady Muriel, who was evidently deeply interested—as, indeed, most of the party were, by this time: and, all down the table, talk had ceased, and heads were leaning forwards, eager to catch fragments of Mein Herr’s oration.
“Chapter One! Moving-Pictures!” was proclaimed in the silvery voice of our hostess.
“The dining-table is shaped like a circular ring,” Mein Herr began, in low dreamy tones, which, however, were perfectly audible in the silence. “The guests are seated at the inner side as well as the outer, having ascended totheir places by a winding-staircase, from the room below. Along the middle of the table runs a little railway; and there is an endless train of trucks, worked round by machinery; and on each truck there are two pictures, leaning back to back. The train makes two circuits during dinner; and, when it has beenonceround, the waiters turn the pictures round in each truck, making them face the other way. Thuseveryguest seeseverypicture!”
He paused, and the silence seemed deader than ever. Lady Muriel looked aghast. “Really, if this goes on,” she exclaimed, “I shall have to drop a pin! Oh, it’smyfault, is it?” (In answer to an appealing look from Mein Herr.) “I was forgetting my duty. Chapter Two! Wild-Creatures!”
“We found the Moving-Pictures alittlemonotonous,” said Mein Herr. “People didn’t care to talk Art through a whole dinner; so we tried Wild-Creatures. Among the flowers, which we laid (just asyoudo) about the table, were to be seen, here a mouse, there a beetle; here a spider,” (Lady Muriel shuddered) “there a wasp; here a toad, there a snake;” (“Father!”said Lady Muriel, plaintively. “Did you hearthat?”) “so we had plenty to talk about!”
“And when you got stung——” the old lady began.
“They were all chained-up, dear Madam!”
And the old lady gave a satisfied nod.
There was no silence to follow,thistime. “Third Chapter!” Lady Muriel proclaimed at once, “Moving-Guests!”
“Even the Wild-Creatures proved monotonous,” the orator proceeded. “So we left the guests to choose their own subjects; and, to avoid monotony, we changedthem. We made the table oftworings; and the inner ring moved slowly round, all the time, along with the floor in the middle and the inner row of guests. Thuseveryinner guest was brought face-to-face witheveryouter guest. It was a little confusing, sometimes, to have tobegina story to one friend andfinishit to another; buteveryplan has its faults, you know.”
“Fourth Chapter!” Lady Muriel hastened to announce. “The Revolving-Humorist!”
“For asmallparty we found it an excellent plan to have a round table, with a hole cut inthe middle large enough to holdoneguest. Here we placed ourbesttalker. He revolved slowly, facing every other guest in turn: and he told lively anecdotes the whole time!”
“I shouldn’t like it!” murmured the pompous man. “It would make me giddy, revolving like that! I should decline to——” here it appeared to dawn upon him that perhaps the assumption he was making was not warranted by the circumstances: he took a hasty gulp of wine, and choked himself.
But Mein Herr had relapsed into reverie, and made no further remark. Lady Muriel gave the signal, and the ladies left the room.
When the last lady had disappeared, and the Earl, taking his place at the head of the table, had issued the military order “Gentlemen! Close up the ranks, if you please!”, and when, in obedience to his command, we had gathered ourselves compactly round him, the pompous man gave a deep sigh of relief, filled his glass to the brim, pushed on the wine, and began one of his favorite orations. “They are charming, no doubt! Charming, but very frivolous. They drag us down, so to speak, to a lower level. They——”
“Do not all pronouns require antecedentnouns?” the Earl gently enquired.
“Pardon me,” said the pompous man, with lofty condescension. “I had overlooked the noun. The ladies. We regret their absence. Yet we console ourselves.Thought is free.With them, we are limited totrivialtopics—Art, Literature, Politics, and so forth. One can bear to discusssuchpaltry matters with a lady. But no man, in his senses—” (he looked sternly round the table, as if defying contradiction) “—ever yet discussedWINEwith a lady!” He sipped his glass of port, leaned back in his chair, and slowly raised it up to his eye, so as to look through it at the lamp. “The vintage, my Lord?” he enquired, glancing at his host.
The Earl named the date.
“So I had supposed. But one likes to be certain. Thetintis, perhaps, slightly pale. But thebodyis unquestionable. And as for thebouquet——”
Ah, that magic Bouquet! How vividly that single word recalled the scene! The little beggar-boy turning his somersault inthe road—the sweet little crippled maiden in my arms—the mysterious evanescent nurse-maid—all rushed tumultuously into my mind, like the creatures of a dream: and through this mental haze there still boomed on, like the tolling of a bell, the solemn voice of the great connoisseur ofWINE!
Evenhisutterances had taken on themselves a strange and dream-like form. “No,” he resumed—andwhyis it, I pause to ask, that, in taking up the broken thread of a dialogue, onealwaysbegins with this cheerless monosyllable? After much anxious thought, I have come to the conclusion that the object in view is the same as that of the schoolboy, when the sum he is working has got into a hopeless muddle, and when in despair he takes the sponge, washes it all out, and begins again. Just in the same way the bewildered orator, by the simple process of denyingeverythingthat has been hitherto asserted, makes a clean sweep of the whole discussion, and can ‘start fair’ with a fresh theory. “No,” he resumed: “there’s nothing like cherry-jam, after all. That’s whatIsay!”
“Not forallqualities!” an eager little man shrilly interposed. “Forrichnessof general tone I don’t say that ithasa rival. But fordelicacyof modulation—for what one may call the ‘harmonics’ of flavour—givemegood oldraspberry-jam!”
“Allow me one word!” The fat red-faced man, quite hoarse with excitement, broke into the dialogue. “It’s too important a question to be settled by Amateurs! I can give you the views of aProfessional—perhaps the most experienced jam-taster now living. Why, I’ve known him fix the age of strawberry-jam, to aday—and we all know what a difficult jam it is to give a date to—on a single tasting! Well, I put to him theveryquestion you are discussing. His words were ‘cherry-jam is best, for merechiaroscuroof flavour:raspberry-jam lends itself best to those resolved discords that linger so lovingly on the tongue: but, for rapturousutternessof saccharine perfection, it’sapricot-jam first and the rest nowhere!’ That was well put,wasn’tit?”
“Consummately put!” shrieked the eager little man.
“I know your friend well,” said the pompous man. “As a jam-taster, he has no rival! Yet I scarcely think——”
But here the discussion became general: and his words were lost in a confused medley of names, every guest sounding the praises of his own favorite jam. At length, through the din, our host’s voice made itself heard. “Let us join the ladies!” These words seemed to recall me to waking life; and I felt sure that, for the last few minutes, I had relapsed into the ‘eerie’ state.
“A strange dream!” I said to myself as we trooped upstairs. “Grown men discussing, as seriously as if they were matters of life and death, the hopelessly trivial details of meredelicacies, that appeal to no higher human function than the nerves of the tongue and palate! What a humiliating spectacle such a discussion would be in waking life!”
When, on our way to the drawing-room, I received from the housekeeper my little friends, clad in the daintiest of evening costumes, and looking, in the flush of expectant delight, more radiantly beautiful than I had ever seen thembefore, I felt no shock of surprise, but accepted the fact with the same unreasoning apathy with which one meets the events of a dream, and was merely conscious of a vague anxiety as to how they would acquit themselves in so novel a scene—forgetting that Court-life in Outland was as good training as they could need for Society in the more substantial world.
It would be best, I thought, to introduce them as soon as possible to some good-natured lady-guest, and I selected the young lady whose piano-forte-playing had been so much talked of. “I am sure you like children,” I said. “May I introduce two little friends of mine? This is Sylvie—and this is Bruno.”
The young lady kissed Sylvie very graciously. She would have done the same forBruno, but he hastily drew back out of reach. “Their faces are new to me,” she said. “Where do you come from, my dear?”
I had not anticipated so inconvenient a question; and, fearing that it might embarrass Sylvie, I answered for her. “They come from some distance. They are only here just for this one evening.”
“How far have you come, dear?” the young lady persisted.
Sylvie looked puzzled. “A mile or two, Ithink,” she said doubtfully.
“A mile orthree,” said Bruno.
“You shouldn’t say ‘a mile orthree,’” Sylvie corrected him.
The young lady nodded approval. “Sylvie’s quite right. It isn’t usual to say ‘a mile orthree.’”
“It would be usual—if we said it often enough,” said Bruno.
It was the young lady’s turn to look puzzled now. “He’s very quick, for his age!” she murmured. “You’re not more than seven, are you, dear?” she added aloud.
“I’m not so many asthat,” said Bruno. “I’mone. Sylvie’sone. Sylvie and me istwo.Sylvietaught me to count.”
“Oh, I wasn’tcountingyou, you know!” the young lady laughingly replied.
“Hasn’t oolearntto count?” said Bruno.
The young lady bit her lip. “Dear! What embarrassing questions hedoesask!” she said in a half-audible ‘aside.’
“Bruno, you shouldn’t!” Sylvie said reprovingly.
“Shouldn’twhat?” said Bruno.
“You shouldn’t ask—that sort of questions.”
“Whatsort of questions?” Bruno mischievously persisted.
“Whatshetold you not,” Sylvie replied, with a shy glance at the young lady, and losing all sense of grammar in her confusion.
“Oo ca’n’t pronounce it!” Bruno triumphantly cried. And he turned to the young lady, for sympathy in his victory. “Iknewedshe couldn’t pronounce ‘umbrella-sting’!”
The young lady thought it best to return to the arithmetical problem. “When I asked if you wereseven, you know, I didn’t mean ‘how manychildren?’ I meant ‘how manyyears——’”
“Only gottwoears,” said Bruno. “Nobody’s gotsevenears.”
“And you belong to this little girl?” the young lady continued, skilfully evading the anatomical problem.
“No, I doosn’t belong toher!” said Bruno. “Sylvie belongs tome!” And he claspedhis arms round her as he added “She are my very mine!”
“And, do you know,” said the young lady, “I’ve a little sister at home, exactly likeyoursister? I’m sure they’d love each other.”
“They’d be very extremely useful to each other,” Bruno said, thoughtfully. “And they wouldn’t want no looking-glasses to brush their hair wiz.”
“Why not, my child?”
“Why, each one would do for the other one’s looking-glass, a-course!” cried Bruno.
But here Lady Muriel, who had been standing by, listening to this bewildering dialogue, interrupted it to ask if the young lady would favour us with some music; and the children followed their new friend to the piano.
Arthur came and sat down by me. “If rumour speaks truly,” he whispered, “we are to have a real treat!” And then, amid a breathless silence, the performance began.
She was one of those players whom Society talks of as ‘brilliant,’ and she dashed into the loveliest of Haydn’s Symphonies in a style that was clearly the outcome of years of patientstudy under the best masters. At first it seemed to be the perfection of piano-forte-playing; but in a few minutes I began to ask myself, wearily, “Whatis it that is wanting?Whydoes one get no pleasure from it?”
Then I set myself to listen intently to every note; and the mystery explained itself. Therewasan almost-perfect mechanicalcorrectness—and there was nothing else! False notes, of course, did not occur: she knew the piece too well forthat; but there was just enough irregularity oftimeto betray that the player had no real ‘ear’ for music—just enough inarticulateness in the more elaborate passages to show that she did not think her audience worth taking real pains for—just enough mechanical monotony of accent to take allsoulout of the heavenly modulations she was profaning—in short, it was simply irritating; and, when she had rattled off the finale and had struck the final chord as if, the instrument being now done with, it didn’t matter how many wires she broke, I could not evenaffectto join in the stereotyped “Oh,thankyou!” which was chorused around me.
Lady Muriel joined us for a moment. “Isn’t itbeautiful?” she whispered, to Arthur, with a mischievous smile.
“No, it isn’t!” said Arthur. But the gentle sweetness of his face quite neutralised the apparent rudeness of the reply.
“Such execution, you know!” she persisted.
“That’s what shedeserves,” Arthur doggedly replied: “but people are so prejudiced against capital——”
“Now you’re beginning to talk nonsense!” Lady Muriel cried. “But youdolike Music, don’t you? You said so just now.”
“Do I likeMusic?” the Doctor repeated softly to himself. “My dear Lady Muriel, there is Music and Music. Your question is painfully vague. You might as well ask ‘Do you likePeople?’”
Lady Muriel bit her lip, frowned, and stamped with one tiny foot. As a dramatic representation of ill-temper, it was distinctlynota success. However, it took inoneof her audience, and Bruno hastened to interpose, as peacemaker in a rising quarrel, with the remark “Ilikes Peoples!”
Arthur laid a loving hand on the little curly head. “What?AllPeoples?” he enquired.
“NotallPeoples,” Bruno explained. “Only but Sylvie—and Lady Muriel—and him—” (pointing to the Earl) “and oo—and oo!”
“You shouldn’t point at people,” said Sylvie. “It’s very rude.”
“In Bruno’s World,” I said, “there are onlyfourPeople—worth mentioning!”
“In Bruno’s World!” Lady Muriel repeated thoughtfully. “A bright and flowery world. Where the grass is always green, where the breezes always blow softly, and the rain-clouds never gather; where there are no wild beasts, and no deserts——”
“Theremustbe deserts,” Arthur decisively remarked. “At least if it wasmyideal world.”
“But what possible use is there in adesert?” said Lady Muriel. “Surelyyou would have no wilderness in your ideal world?”
Arthur smiled. “But indeed Iwould!” he said. “A wilderness would be more necessary than a railway; andfarmore conducive to general happiness than church-bells!”
“But what would you use it for?”
“To practise music in,” he replied. “All the young ladies, that have no ear for music, but insist on learning it, should be conveyed, every morning, two or three miles into the wilderness. There each would find a comfortable room provided for her, and also a cheap second-hand piano-forte, on which she might play for hours, without adding one needless pang to the sum of human misery!”
Lady Muriel glanced round in alarm, lest these barbarous sentiments should be overheard. But the fair musician was at a safe distance. “At any rate you must allow that she’s a sweet girl?” she resumed.
“Oh, certainly. As sweet aseau sucrée, if you choose—and nearly as interesting!”
“You are incorrigible!” said Lady Muriel, and turned to me. “I hope you found Mrs. Mills an interesting companion?”
“Oh,that’sher name, is it?” I said. “I fancied there wasmoreof it.”
“So there is: and it will be ‘at your proper peril’ (whatever that may mean) if you ever presume to address her as ‘Mrs. Mills.’ She is ‘Mrs. Ernest—Atkinson—Mills’!”
“She is one of those would-be grandees,” said Arthur, “who think that, by tacking on to their surname all their spare Christian-names, with hyphens between, they can give it an aristocratic flavour. As if it wasn’t trouble enough to rememberonesurname!”
By this time the room was getting crowded, as the guests, invited for the evening-party, were beginning to arrive, and Lady Muriel had to devote herself to the task of welcoming them, which she did with the sweetest grace imaginable. Sylvie and Bruno stood by her, deeply interested in the process.
“I hope you like my friends?” she said to them. “Specially my dear old friend, Mein Herr (What’s become of him, I wonder? Oh, there he is!), that old gentleman in spectacles, with a long beard?”
“He’s a grand old gentleman!” Sylvie said, gazing admiringly at ‘Mein Herr,’ who had settled down in a corner, from which his mild eyes beamed on us through a gigantic pair of spectacles. “And what a lovely beard!”
“What does he call his-self?” Bruno whispered.
“He calls himself ‘Mein Herr,’” Sylvie whispered in reply.
Bruno shook his head impatiently. “That’s what he calls hishair, not hisself, oo silly!” He appealed to me. “What doos he call hisself, Mister Sir?”
“That’s the only nameIknow of,” I said. “But he looks very lonely. Don’t you pity his grey hairs?”
“I pities hisself,” said Bruno, still harping on the misnomer; “but I doosn’t pity hishair, one bit. Hishairca’n’t feel!”
“We met him this afternoon,” said Sylvie. “We’d been to see Nero, and we’d hadsuchfun with him, making him invisible again! And we saw that nice old gentleman as we came back.”
“Well, let’s go and talk to him, and cheer him up a little,” I said: “and perhaps we shall find out what he calls himself.”
The children came willingly. With one of them on each side of me, I approached the corner occupied by ‘Mein Herr.’ “You don’t object tochildren, I hope?” I began.
“Crabbed age and youth cannot live together!” the old man cheerfully replied, with a most genial smile. “Now take a good look at me, my children! You would guess me to be anoldman, wouldn’t you?”
At first sight, though his face had reminded me so mysteriously of “the Professor,” he had seemed to be decidedly ayoungerman:but, when I came to look into the wonderful depth of those large dreamy eyes, I felt, with a strange sense of awe, that he was incalculablyolder: he seemed to gaze at us out of some by-gone age, centuries away.
MEIN HERR’S FAIRY-FRIENDSMEIN HERR’S FAIRY-FRIENDS
MEIN HERR’S FAIRY-FRIENDS
“I don’t know if oo’re anoldman,” Bruno answered, as the children, won over by the gentle voice, crept a little closer to him. “I thinks oo’reeighty-three.”
“He is very exact!” said Mein Herr.
“Is he anything like right?” I said.
“There are reasons,” Mein Herr gently replied, “reasons which I am not at liberty to explain, for not mentioningdefinitelyany Persons, Places, or Dates. One remark only I will permit myself to make—that the period of life, between the ages of a hundred-and-sixty-five and a hundred-and-seventy-five, is a speciallysafeone.”
“How do you make that out?” I said.
“Thus. You would consider swimming to be a very safe amusement, if you scarcely ever heard of any one dying of it. Am I not right in thinking that you never heard of any one dying between those two ages?”
“I see what you mean,” I said: “but I’m afraid you ca’n’t proveswimmingto be safe, on the same principle. It is no uncommon thing to hear of some one beingdrowned.”
“Inmycountry,” said Mein Herr, “no one iseverdrowned.”
“Is there no water deep enough?”
“Plenty! But we ca’n’tsink. We are alllighter than water. Let me explain,” he added,seeing my look of surprise. “Suppose you desire a race ofpigeonsof a particular shape or colour, do you not select, from year to year, those that are nearest to the shape or colour you want, and keep those, and part with the others?”
“We do,” I replied. “We call it ‘Artificial Selection.’”
“Exactly so,” said Mein Herr. “Well,wehave practised that for some centuries—constantly selecting thelightestpeople: so that, now,everybodyis lighter than water.”
“Then you never can be drowned atsea?”
“Never! It is only on theland—for instance, when attending a play in a theatre—that we are in such a danger.”
“How can that happen at atheatre?”
“Our theatres are allunderground. Large tanks of water are placed above. If a fire breaks out, the taps are turned, and in one minute the theatre is flooded, up to the very roof! Thus the fire is extinguished.”
“Andthe audience, I presume?”
“That is a minor matter,” Mein Herr carelessly replied. “But they have the comfort ofknowing that, whether drowned or not, they are alllighter than water. We have not yet reached the standard of making people lighter thanair: but we areaimingat it; and, in another thousand years or so——”
“What doos oo do wiz the peoples that’s too heavy?” Bruno solemnly enquired.
“We have applied the same process,” Mein Herr continued, not noticing Bruno’s question, “to many other purposes. We have gone on selectingwalking-sticks—always keeping those that walkedbest—till we have obtained some, that can walk by themselves! We have gone on selectingcotton-wool, till we have got some lighter than air! You’ve no idea what a useful material it is! We call it ‘Imponderal.’”
“What do you use it for?”
“Well, chiefly forpackingarticles, to go by Parcel-Post. It makes them weighless than nothing, you know.”
“And how do the Post-Office people know what you have to pay?”
“That’s the beauty of the new system!” Mein Herr cried exultingly. “They payus:we don’t paythem! I’ve often got as much as five shillings for sending a parcel.”
“But doesn’t your Government object?”
“Well, theydoobject, a little. They say it comes so expensive, in the long run. But the thing’s as clear as daylight, by their own rules. If I send a parcel, that weighs a poundmorethan nothing, Ipaythree-pence: so, of course, if it weighs a poundlessthan nothing, I ought toreceivethree-pence.”
“It isindeeda useful article!” I said.
“Yet even ‘Imponderal’ has its disadvantages,” he resumed. “I bought some, a few days ago, and put it into myhat, to carry it home, and the hat simply floated away!”
“Had oo some of that funny stuff in oor hattoday?” Bruno enquired. “Sylvie and me saw oo in the road, and oor hat were ever so high up! Weren’t it, Sylvie?”
“No, that was quite another thing.” said Mein Herr. “There was a drop or two of rain falling: so I put my hat on the top of my stick—as an umbrella, you know. As I came along the road,” he continued, turning to me, “I was overtaken by——”