"He was no less a donkey that he didn't know it, and it only comes harder for him. The fool ought to have been better acquainted with his own interior condition; then he might have eased his descent to his royal thistle, secured his repast or gone without it, and got back to his stable with a whole skin. Otherwise it is just the same. The heart is an idiot baby, Robert: it feeds on pap and thinks it is guzzling nectar on Olympus."
"Exactly, James; exactly. As you say, it is our fertile fancy that does it all. You and I can conjure up women far more charming than we ever met on brick or carpet. If we only had the raw material and knew how to work it up, we could beat these flesh and blood girls off the field before breakfast. Their merits and attractions are mainly such as we generously invest them with; and often they take a mean advantage of our kindness."
I glanced at him sideways, and he flushed and winced. "I would not derogate from women, nor rate myself so high. I meant only that we imagine—well, monstrous heaps of nonsense. For instance, we often fancy that they care for us when they don't—and whose fault is that but ours? There's a deal of rot talked about lords of creation—when a man isn't able to be lord of himself. O, women are very well in their way: I've nothing against them. They are just as good as we—better, very likely; and wiser, for they don't idealize us as we do them."
"Yes, but this idealizing faculty is a very useful one to have. I see you must have found a Blowsalinda on some of these hill farms:—why, man, you're as red as her father's beets. I congratulate you, Jim: I do, heartily. As you say, the tender passion is merely a spark struck by the flint of Opportunity on the steel of Desire; and for the rest, you can enrich her practical native virtues with the golden hues of your imagination. She'll suit you just as well as any of these proud cityfied damsels—after you've sent her a term or two to boarding school; and she'll be more content to stay up here than the city girl would."
I paused to view my work, and was satisfied. The shadows of wrath and disgust were chasing each other over my friend's intelligent countenance. You see, I get so browbeaten at home that I must avenge myself on somebody now and then; and of course, it has to be a man. And then it is all for Jim's good, and he deserves all he is getting. So I went on.
"But seeing this is so, Jim, you ought to be content; and what means all your wild talk of last night and this morning, as if you had something on your conscience? You haven't—you wouldn't—No, you're not that kind of a man. Well then, what in thunder have you been making all this fuss about, and pitching into me for?"
He suppressed something with a gulp: I think it was not an expression of gratitude or affection. "Confound you, Bob; one never knows how to take you. In the name of Satan and all the devils, what are you after now?"
"I'm not after anything in the name of the gentlemen you mention; they are no friends of mine, nor objects of my regard. Put a better name on it, and I'm after getting you to say what you mean, as we agreed—though it seems to be hard work. Who's playing tricks upon travellers, and misleading a confiding friend now? I never knew such a man for beating about the bush, and talking nonsense." (I remembered this apothegm of Jane's, which sounded well, and fitted in nicely just here.)
He appeared to take himself to pieces, shake them well, and put them together carefully, before he spoke. "Perhaps my language was obscure, or even enigmatical; but I thought you might understand. Forgive me if I have been harsh, Bob, not to say uncivil: I have gone through a good deal, until I hardly know myself. It is base enough for a man to be thus at the mercy of mere externals—and I used to think I could practice the Stoic doctrine! But to be human is to be a pitiable, and, if you like, a despicable creature. I knew a case that may serve in a way to explain—not to justify—my treatment of you. Say it was years ago; the man met, in a friend's house, a lady who showed him the utmost kindness. She was used to all deference, till she and every one regarded it as her right—as it was. And he—it's not pleasant to tell—he ended by insulting her. I always understood how that fellow never could bear to mention her name, nor to hear it; how any reminder of her, or contact with the friends through whom he met her, would upset him. He would get confused, and some of his self-reproaches would fall on the wrong heads. I suppose you never knew how that could be, Bob."
"I never was in exactly such a scrape as that; but I've been near enough to imagine, and make allowances. Your friend must have thought a good deal of the lady, in spite of his insulting her. He apologized, of course?"