'It has taken me thirty years to discover that mankind at large despises the art of its own country. Only the exotic catches the ear of fashion. But Eve has told me that you do not care for music?'
'I like your music,' he said.
'I will tell you why: because you are musically uneducated.'
He looked at her; she was smiling. He wondered whether she had overheard a whisper in the humming room.
'I speak without sarcasm,' she added; 'I envy you your early ignorance. In fact, I believe I have uttered a paradox, and that the words education and music are incompatible. Music is the emotional art, and where education steps in at the door emotion flies out at the window. We should keep education for literature, painting, architecture, and sculpture. Music is the medium to which we turn when these more intellectual mediums fail us.'
Julian listened with only half his brain. This peasant, this artist, spoke to him with the superficial ease of drawing-rooms; she employed words that matched ill with her appearance and with the accent of her speech. The native songs were right upon her lips, as the names of architecture and sculpture were wrong. He was offended in his sensitiveness. Demeter in analysis of the arts!
She was watching him.
'Ah, my young friend,' she said, 'you do not understand. I spoke to you as the cousin of Eve, who is a child, but who always understands. She is purely sentient, emotional.'
He protested,—
'I have always thought of Eve as exceptionally sophisticated.'