“Well,” he explained, “the kind of man I'd back for a place would be a good-looking cabby or a long-haired fiddler. She'd rig him out with a soul, and so forth, to suit her fancy—and a deuce of a life they'd lead!”
No use in continuing this discussion with such an unsympathetic and unappreciative critic. He was unworthy to be her uncle, I said to myself.
When I returned to my own rooms, I opened my journal and wrote this striking passage:
“Illusion gone, clear sight returns. I have found a woman worthy of homage, of admiration, of friendship. Love (if, indeed, I ever felt that sacred emotion for any) has departed to make room for a worthier tenant. Reason rules my heart. I see dispassionately the virtues of Kate Kerry; I regard them as the mariner regards the polar star.'”'
I reproduce this extract for the benefit of the young, just as—to pursue my original and nautical metaphor—they put buoys above a dangerous wreck or mark a reef in the chart. It is on the same principle as the awful example who (I am told) accompanies the Scottish temperance lecturer.
