‘Listening first to Veronica,’ said Lamia, ‘and then to you, I am forced to the conclusion that many things are intolerable which we cannot do without. Yet I confess a Convent of Nuns seems more natural than a Confraternity of Monks.’
‘More natural, perhaps,’ said the Poet, ‘but hardly so necessary. For, even in the very heart of the world, every good woman is more or less nunlike, by virtue of her purity, her reserve——’
‘And, I suppose,’ interrupted Lamia, ‘her obedience?’
Nothing disconcerted, he re-echoed the words: ‘And her obedience.’
THROUGH THE OLIVES, FLORENCE
‘Have you not, dear,’ asked Veronica, ‘confuted yourself by anticipation? It was a man, not a woman, was it not, that took leave of the Prior, who would fain have detained him, with the words—
‘Father, farewell! Be not distressed,
And take my vow, ere I depart,