"What could I do? Tears were coming into her eyes. Not a mile away, waiting in her path, stood one I hated. Could I let her go on distrusting my love, to meet possible treachery?
"I gave up the contest without a struggle.
"We turned from the footpath, and crossing a strip of heather, descended into a woody glen. Through this glen ran a merry bubbling stream, and the soft moisture which it left along its edges had encouraged the growth of deep soft moss to cover the otherwise barren stones. Choosing a pleasant nook thus carpeted on which the sun shone brightly, we sat and rested.
"A few birds were singing their farewell songs to Scotland before retreating to a warmer country. My companion's face was slightly flushed by the wind, and the colour seemed to give an additional depth to the blue eyes which looked shyly forth from between her dark lashes. Her fair hair, which was unusually soft and fine, had been blown by the wind into a waving network of shining confusion round her ears, and over her forehead. As she sat just above me, and I looked into her face, it seemed impossible for God to make, or man to picture, aught more fair or pure in earthly texture. Yet, so does my nature act and react, ever tumbling from the sublime to the ridiculous, that I had hardly realized the perfect human beauty before me when my mind began to drop down into one of its most annoying analytical moods, tearing, as it were, all soft and delicate covering from the face, and pointing mockingly to the hollow skull beneath, the framework alike of beauty and ugliness. Not that there is really anything ridiculous, or for the matter of that, frightful about a skull; the comic part of the situation lay in the fact that it was impossible for me vividly to realize this framework of the beauty I had a moment before worshipped, without a shudder. I refer to it now, because such sensations throw a valuable sidelight on love itself.
"It is to be presumed that when we love a person, we fancy that we love, not the body, not in fact the clothing of the individual, but the personality; that there is something therein which attracts and draws forth these sensations wholly apart from anything to do with simply animal passion. There are, of course, some who deny this, but to reason with such is, as said before, absolutely useless: to the purely animal nature all must necessarily appear animal. Such men and women are exceptions, yet though many are conscious of the strength of higher love, how few seem to try to solve the mystery surrounding it, or to draw a line between true and false sensations.
"For instance, here was I sitting at the feet of one who, as far as it was possible to judge, possessed nothing really attractive except most unusual physical beauty; one I judged to be lacking in will-power, to be untruthful and vain, to be possessed of little information and still less discernment. Yet, knowing all this, I loved her. You may think that I deceived myself, and that what I really experienced was simply animal fascination; but before my story is finished you will see that you have judged wrongly. The truth of the matter is this; pure love is no more drawn out by nobleness of character than it is by beauty of form, but by a far more subtle attraction for which as yet we have no name, and which reaches us through the medium of our imperfectly developed sixth sense. Whatever comes to us through the ordinary channels is merely passion or comradeship, though owing to our complex nature, the former usually accompanies true spiritual love and is hopelessly confused with it. This confusion has led to much misery and to many senseless social and so-called moral laws which are quite unsuited to the present condition of man's development, as they are nearly all founded on the theory of animal instincts alone.
"I am sorry to be obliged so frequently to break the thread of my narrative, but as I am about to deal with subjects which are outside the range of ordinary experience, it is absolutely necessary that from the commencement you should follow not only the course of events, but also the working of my mind. If I simply confine myself to the story, it might possibly interest you as the wild imagination of either a liar or a madman; on the other hand, should you have patience to hear me to the end, I hope to convince you that many things which seem incredible are only so as long as we stand outside the door of discovery. There is nothing more remarkable than the ease with which the public will swallow yesterday's miracle, if only scientists will give it a name.
"For instance, look at a recent case--the Telephone. What do the public understand about it? The electricians themselves have only discovered a method by which they can produce certain effects, and know nearly as little as the public of the servants they employ. Yet this miraculous transmission of sound, once baptized, is admitted forthwith without further questioning, into the circle of commonplace.
"You must not suppose that, though I have thus wandered from my subject, any of these ideas occurred to me after my encounter with the imaginary skull, for at that moment one of my companion's thoughts fortunately deranged my own, and gave me fresh subject for reflection.
"'I like him in some ways better, but he is certainly not nearly so amusing.'