'The other day in Paris I heard an American woman whistling. "Have you lost your dog?" I asked. "No," she says; "my husband."'
A chorus of approval greeted this malicious sally, followed by the retailing of various anti-American anecdotes that made up in sting what they lacked in delicacy. These showed no signs of abatement until, slightly nettled, Selwyn put in an oar.
'I had hoped,' he said, 'to find some illuminating points in the conversation to-night. But it seems as if you treat not only your own country in a spirit of caricature, but mine as well. We are a very young race, and we have the faults of youth; but, then, youth always has a future. It was a sort of post-graduate course to come to England and Europe to absorb some of the lore—or isn't it one of your poets who speaks of "The Spoils of Time"? Your past is so rich that naturally we look to you and Europe for the fundamental things of civilisation.'
'And what have you found?' asked Elise Durwent.
'Well,' said the American, 'much to admire—and much to deplore.'
'In other words,' said Johnston Smyth, 'he has been to Edinburgh and to
London.'
'That is so,' smiled Selwyn; 'but I don't'——
'All people,' said Smyth serenely, 'admire Edinburgh, but abuse London. Over here a man will jest about his religion or even his grandfather, but never about Edinburgh. On the other hand, as every one damns London, and as an Englishman is never so happy as when he has something on hand to grouse about, London's population has grown to some eight millions.'
'I think, Mr. Smyth,' said Lady Durwent, 'that you are as much a philosopher as a painter.'
'Lady Durwent,' said the futurist, 'all art is philosophy—even old
Pyford's here, though his amounts almost to theology.'