"Seems to me the limit of a man's possibility in anything is the limit of his imagination."
"And his control of it, Jack."
"Exactly."
Darwen had his chair tilted back wards, blowing clouds of smoke vertically upwards to the ceiling. He spoke slowly between the puffs. "Carstairs—Jack, has got no soul above machines, inanimate lumps of iron; the hum of a smoothly running engine is the only poetry that appeals to him, so it does to me, but I like a change; little bits of Shelley, little drops of Kipling——"
"I admit that 'M'Andrews' Hymn' is a real poem."
"Shut up! You reek of the engine room. I like a change. Variety is the soul of amusement." He dropped his chair on to its front legs again and looked at Jack's father. "Hasn't some one said that?" he asked.
"I really couldn't say, perhaps so." He smiled with amusement.
Darwen looked at him steadily, thoughtfully, for a moment. "Do you know I think there's a touch of the Dago in me—or perhaps it's Celt. Do you think I'm Irish?"
"My dear boy, you should know that best."
"That's so! English, the mater says, pure English, but I don't know. I'm a bit of a rogue, you know; the instinct of dishonesty is very strong at times."