'No, I should feel far more uncomfortable on a cushion than I do on this bit of hard oak. Our ancestors had an innate sense of form that we have not. Look at these chairs, nothing can be plainer; a cottage stool is hardly more simple, and yet they are not offensive to the eye. I had them made from a picture by Albert Durer.'
Mr. Hare smoked in silence, uncertain how far John was in earnest, how far he was assuming an attitude of mind. Presently he walked over to the book-cases. There were two: one was filled with learned-looking volumes bearing the names of Latin authors; and the parson, who prided himself on his Latinity, was surprised, and a little nettled, to find so much ignorance proved upon him. With Tertullian, St. Jerome, and St. Augustine, he was acquainted, but of Lactantius Hibernicus Exul, Angilbert, he was obliged to admit he knew nothing—even the names were unknown to him.
In the book-case on the opposite side of the room there were complete
editions of Landor and Swift, then came two large volumes on Leonardo
da Vinci. Raising his eyes, the parson read through the titles:
Browning's works; Tennyson in a cheap seven-and-six edition;
Swinburne, Pater, Rossetti, Morris, two novels by Rhoda Broughton,
Dickens, Thackeray, Fielding, and Smollett; the complete works of
Balzac, Gautier's Emaux et Camees, Salammbo, L'Assommoir; Carlyle,
Newman, Byron, Shelley, Keats, and the dramatists of the Restoration.
At the end of a long silence Mr. Hare said glancing once again at the
Latin authors, and walking towards the fire:
"Tell me, John, are those the books you are writing about? Supposing you explain to me, in a few words, the line you are taking. Your mother tells me that you intend to call your book the History of Christian Latin."
"Yes, I had thought of using that title, but I am afraid it is a little too ambitious. To write the history of a literature extending over at least eight centuries would entail an appalling amount of reading; and besides, only a few, say a couple of dozen writers out of some hundreds, are of the slightest literary interest, and very few indeed of any real aesthetic value.
"Ah!" he said, as his eye lighted on a certain name, 'here is
Marbodius, a great poet; how well he understood women! Listen to this:
'"Femina, dulce malum, pariter favus atque venenum,
Melle linens gladium cor confodit et sapientum.
Quis suasit primo vetitum gustare parenti?
Femina. Quis partem natas vitiare coegit?
Femina. Quis fortem spoliatum crine peremit?
Femina. Quis justi sacrum caput ense recidit?
Femina, quae matris cumulavit crimine crimen,
Incestum gravem graviori caede notavit….
"Chimeram
Cui non immerito fertur data forma triformis,
Nam pars prima leo, pars ultima cauda draconis,
Et mediae partes nil sunt nisi fervidus ignis."'
'Well, of course, that quite carries out your views of women. And now tell me what I am to say to your mother. Will you come home for Christmas?'