"That is very probable, judging from the reports that are current about you," said the doctor.
"Yes, Duncan," continued the barrister, "I don't mind confessing myself to an old friend like you. It is the women—and I seem to be becoming a greater idiot every year. My mind's always distracted by some intrigue or other, generally with some actress who chucks me up as soon as I have spent upon her all the money I can raise by every means known to the Gentiles. There's nothing that so unsettles a man's mind, so unfits him for work, and is so certain to ruin him as such a life. I know all this, but I can't pull myself together and reform. In short, I'm a confounded fool."
"Some wise man said that no man ever does any good in the world till he gets women altogether out of his mind," said the doctor.
"And how on earth does that same wise man propose to bring about that happy consummation?" asked Hudson.
"I suppose the wise man meant that as long as a man passed a large portion of his life in a sort of restless fever, worrying about one fancy after another, always full of anxiety and uncertainty over some new intrigue, he was in too unsettled a condition to concentrate himself on really good work. The remedy, I suppose, is to marry."
"Marriage is certainly often a good settler," replied Hudson; "but it's all very well to say marry—the question is how and to whom? You are clever at diagnozing, doctor. You don't tell me where to get the medicine."
"That, of course, I can't," replied his friend with a laugh. "But seriously, old man, you must take care what you are about. You are drifting. I know your temperament. You are living here alone in chambers; I know the life—too much leisure, unlimited temptations, little society. It is not to be wondered at that so many of you young barristers go to the dogs.
"I knew a man, as clever, as good a fellow as ever lived. He was a good deal my senior. He is a barrister, a briefless barrister, with a considerable private income. By the very loneliness of his life, for he too did not care about going into society, he was driven out for mere companionship's sake into vicious ways. He was of an uxorious nature, not sensual, but to be in love with some woman was a necessity of his life. His idleness, of course, intensified the necessity.
"His were not cold and heartless attachments. As long as it lasted, his was a generous fierce love enough, God knows. Women adored him; but a woman could twist him round her little finger; a bad, clever woman could ruin him. But he was not ruined, in the ordinary sense of the word, by women; but ruined morally he has been, utterly. A morbid restless craving for excitement grew on him. When not with women he was generally half-drunk. A good woman could have saved that weak generous affectionate nature, and made his a noble and useful life. But he never came across a really good woman, so what happened? As he grew older, sentiment, idealism, became dull. His intrigues were no longer poetical. His illusions vanished, but women of course became more than ever a necessity to him. He became the cold sensualist, the miserable being that has worn out all power of love, but yet is devoured by a desire which seeks all sorts of abnormal means for its gratification.
"He knew what a degraded wretch he had become, what an unhappy slave to vices that tortured without giving joy. Sometimes, for a week or so at a time, his conscience would wake up, and would present so terrible a picture to him, that to avoid madness he would drink—drink deeply, moody, sulky, and silent all the time, looking like a wild beast.