THE SHE-ANCIENT. The penalty of attending to children. Farewell.
The two Ancients go away severally, she into the grove, he up to the hills behind the temple.
ALL. Ouf! [A great sigh of relief].
ECRASIA. Dreadful people!
STREPHON. Bores!
MARTELLUS. Yet one would like to follow them; to enter into their life; to grasp their thought; to comprehend the universe as they must.
ARJILLAX. Getting old, Martellus?
MARTELLUS. Well, I have finished with the dolls; and I am no longer jealous of you. That looks like the end. Two hours sleep is enough for me. I am afraid I am beginning to find you all rather silly.
STREPHON. I know. My girl went off this morning. She hadnt slept for weeks. And she found mathematics more interesting than me.
MARTELLUS. There is a prehistoric saying that has come down to us from a famous woman teacher. She said: 'Leave women; and study mathematics.' It is the only remaining fragment of a lost scripture called The Confessions of St Augustin, the English Opium Eater. That primitive savage must have been a great woman, to say a thing that still lives after three hundred centuries. I too will leave women and study mathematics, which I have neglected too long. Farewell, children, my old playmates. I almost wish I could feel sentimental about parting from you; but the cold truth is that you bore me. Do not be angry with me: your turn will come. [He passes away gravely into the grove].