A graduate of a German university, a man who has written three books and has a reputation for always winning his lawsuits, sought me out after a dinner, with the fatal accuracy of a man who has dined to repletion and wishes to be amused.
Possibly because I also had dined and was therefore affable, I endeavored to see if there was any forgotten corner of his mind, any blind alley I hitherto had left unexplored, where I might find mine own and feel at home.
His face was dull, heavy, unemotional, but I said in sprightly tones to coax his lethargy:
"I have made such a delicious discovery to-day. I have found that
Carlyle has given the most acute definition of humor I ever read.
Isn't that rather surprising, when Carlyle's humor is rather
lumbering?"
He thought a moment.
"It is," he said, carefully, with that want of recklessness which should endear him to a stone image.
"Do you know it, or shall I tell you?" I said, with fatal geniality.
Another pause.
"Tell me," he said, heavily, wadding his mind with cotton, for fear some lightness should percolate through it.
"Why, he said that humor was an appreciation of the under side of things. Isn't that delicious?"