Fräulein Schmidt and Mr. Anstruther

by Elizabeth Von Arnim

'You were quite convinced.'

'I was not hungry.'

'You know he is all for pure water.'

'He is all for many things that seem admirable to those who have lately dined.'

'You know he says that if the populace of Paris at the time of the Revolution had drunk at the pure source of the Seine—'

'There is no pure source of the Seine within reach of the populace of Paris. There would only be cats. Dead cats. And cats interspersed, no doubt, with a variety of objects of the nature of portions of crockery and empty tins.'

'But he says pure source.'

'Then he says pure nonsense.'

'He says if they had done that and satisfied their hunger at the ever-furnished table of vegetable nature—'

'Ever-furnished table? Holy Heaven—the good, the excellent young man.'