"I?"
It is impossible to portray the majesty of Mr. Prawle's monosyllabic pronoun. "If I am not great," he enunciated slowly, "then no one has been or ever will be great. I have a divine mission. A truly and positively divine mission."
Pauline gave a little inscrutable nod. "A divine mission is a very nice thing to have. I hope you will execute it."
"I shall execute it!" cried Mr. Prawle. "All the poets, on every side of me, are singing about The Past. I, and I alone, sing of The Future. I set evolution to music ... what other poet has done that? I wrest from Buckle, Spencer, Tyndall, Huxley—from all the grand modern thinkers, in fact—their poetic and yet rationalistic elements! If you had heard my poem to yourself through—if you had had the patience, I—I may add, the kindliness, to hear it through, you would have seen that my terminus was in accord with the prevailing theories of Herbert Spencer's noble philosophy...."
"Shall I ever cling to or love Herbert Spencer again?" thought Pauline, "when I see him made the shibboleth of such intellectual charlatans as this?"
"In accord," continued Mr. Prawle, "with everything that is progressive and unbigoted. I finished with an allusion to the Religion of Humanity. I usually do, in all my poems. That is what makes them so unique, so incomparable!"
Pauline held out her hand in distinct token of farewell.
"Belief in one's self is a very saving quality," she said. "I congratulate you upon it."
Mr. Prawle shrank offendedly toward the door. "You dismiss me!" he burst forth. "After I have bared my inmost soul to you, you dismiss me!"
Pauline tossed her head, either from irritation or semi-diversion. "Ah, you take too much for granted!" she said, withdrawing her hand.