"Purity and endurance! And snakes in her hair! Aphrodite must have been far more pleasant, especially if she was like me. She was the patroness of our city, the Father said; and Dr Sforelli wrote to the papers once to say that the image of the Virgin in the Cathedral Church was a heathen statue that some King put up there and that clothes had been made for it later. I know that because Father Algio was so furious at the time that he preached three sermons against the Jews. But why do you read such rubbish?"
Norman was irritated by the naïveness of the remark, and still more irritated with himself for being irritated.
"What an ass I am," he said to himself, "to talk to a pretty girl about the Classics, and what a much larger ass to trouble what she thinks!"
Norman had to learn that education makes prigs of all of us, whether we will or no. Of wise and learned men only the truly great can keep their characters free of priggishness, and even then, what of Marcus Aurelius and William Wordsworth and John Ruskin? What even of Olympian Goethe?
And there she was, shining, shining.
"You mean," said Norman, "why do I read such rubbish when I have you to look at?"
And still Peronella shone.
"The book of your eyes is the best book," said Norman.
Romance even in her moment could not so fool him that he did not wish he could have said "the book of your soul."
Peronella shone, and, by an instinct, shone in silence.