We all drank; and then there was a great silence.
“Well,” said the poet, deliberately, looking around from his seat on the curb, “take it altogether, that shanty, those bushes, the pig-sty, the hopeless sandy field, the oozing pool, and this horrible tepid water, drawn from, to say the least, a dubious source—a very dubious source—it is, all in all, about the ugliest place I ever saw!”
There was a general shout.
“We have suspected it in our hearts all winter,” said the “other young lady;” “but not one of us dared put the thought into words, as it was our only walk.”
The poet staid with us a day or two longer, and charmed us all with his delightful, winsome humor.
“Do you know, I really love that man,” I announced.
“So do I,” said Iris.
“That is nothing,” said John; “he is ‘the poet whom poets love,’ you know.”
“But we are not poets, Mr. Hoffman.”
“We are only plebes, and plebes may very well love what poets love, I think.”