‘But why should he repeat it three times?’
‘For emphasis!’
‘Perhaps,’ said Mrs. Beecher, ‘it was Mr. Setebos, and Mrs. Setebos, and a little Setebos.’
‘Now, if you are going to make fun, I won’t read. But I think we were wrong to say that we would take it line by line. It would be easier sentence by sentence.’
‘Quite so.’
‘Then we will include the next line, which finishes the sentence. It is, “thinketh he dwelleth in the cold of the moon.”’
‘Then it was only one Setebos!’ cried Maude.
‘So it appears. It is easy to understand if one will only put it into ordinary language. This person Setebos was under the impression that his life was spent in the moonlight.’
‘But what nonsense it is!’ cried Mrs. Beecher. Mrs. Hunt Mortimer looked at her reproachfully. ‘It is very easy to call everything which we do not understand “nonsense,”’ said she. ‘I have no doubt that Browning had a profound meaning in this.’
‘What was it, then?’