THE ART OF CONVERSATION.
I had a terrible experience yesterday, one of life's inky black hours which will bring a shudder whenever in future days memory seizes an idle moment to refresh herself. I had been dining with Scarfield and his mother at Hampstead, and with the entry of the coffee he had pleaded a sudden dyspepsia and withdrawn. So his mother, a dear colourless old lady, undertook to entertain me. By her desire I lighted a cigar.
She mentioned that she had just returned from a visit to Glasgow, and I remarked intelligently that Glasgow was a fine place. Considering for a moment, she observed that she thought the weather in Glasgow was colder than that of the South of England; and I said, Yes, very likely, I had heard so. In about two minutes she qualified her statement by informing me that the South of England was as a rule milder than Glasgow. I replied that it appeared to me very possible, adding recklessly that they had peculiarly mixed weather in Glasgow, which she seemed to think rather a questionable presentment of the case for the North, for she kept silent and ruminated for seven or eight minutes. My mind took a little excursion to Putney, where I have friends. But, before I had really settled at Putney, the lady's voice intimated that perhaps they had more rain in Glasgow than in the South of England.
I came back from Putney with a slight mental wrench, yet sufficiently clear-headed to say decidedly that Glasgow, on the whole, had a much better climate than the South, because I had once spent a day there, and the sun shone the whole time, so I ought to know. Then I started off again, and had just reached Walham Green (one does not speak of these places, but I may tell you that it is a station on the way to Putney, where I have a friend), when she responded with lightning-like swiftness that it couldn't be healthy to live in Glasgow. This bordered on repartee, so I countered rapidly with the brilliant suggestion that a good many people managed to live there, hoping she would not score by the obvious rejoinder that a good many people died there. If she had, I can't imagine how I should have extricated myself. Luckily she merely murmured, "Ah, yes," and reflected. I was just stepping off the train at a station (Putney—to be explicit, it is a lady friend) when there seemed to be a collision, and I caught myself saying, "Indeed!" though I don't know why. She nodded approval, however, and I ventured on a meditative "Ye-es."
"But they don't seem to mind," she said, glancing at me blandly through her spectacles. "Do they?"
"You see," I answered, chancing it, "they are so used to it." She smiled and agreed.
"That must be the reason," she said. For what, I hadn't the remotest idea; but this just shows what presence of mind will do for one in an emergency.
"What a difference they must find," I went on boldly, and lapsed into a muse. She sighted it, however, and replied in less than five minutes—
"You mean now that the old-fashioned ones are coming in again?"