“What is it about?” said Knight, taking up the paper and reading.
“There: don’t get red about it. Own that experience has taught you to be more charitable. I have never read such unchivalrous sentiments in my life—from a man, I mean. There, I forgive you; it was before you knew Elfride.”
“Oh yes,” said Knight, looking up. “I remember now. The text of that sermon was not my own at all, but was suggested to me by a young man named Smith—the same whom I have mentioned to you as coming from this parish. I thought the idea rather ingenious at the time, and enlarged it to the weight of a few guineas, because I had nothing else in my head.”
“Which idea do you call the text? I am curious to know that.”
“Well, this,” said Knight, somewhat unwillingly. “That experience teaches, and your sweetheart, no less than your tailor, is necessarily very imperfect in her duties, if you are her first patron: and conversely, the sweetheart who is graceful under the initial kiss must be supposed to have had some practice in the trade.”
“And do you mean to say that you wrote that upon the strength of another man’s remark, without having tested it by practice?”
“Yes—indeed I do.”
“Then I think it was uncalled for and unfair. And how do you know it is true? I expect you regret it now.”
“Since you bring me into a serious mood, I will speak candidly. I do believe that remark to be perfectly true, and, having written it, I would defend it anywhere. But I do often regret having ever written it, as well as others of the sort. I have grown older since, and I find such a tone of writing is calculated to do harm in the world. Every literary Jack becomes a gentleman if he can only pen a few indifferent satires upon womankind: women themselves, too, have taken to the trick; and so, upon the whole, I begin to be rather ashamed of my companions.”
“Ah, Henry, you have fallen in love since and it makes a difference,” said Mrs. Swancourt with a faint tone of banter.