I. Don't you love your horse, Priscilla?
She. Yes, he's my friendly horse.
I. Well, don't bang him about like that; all the paint's coming off him.
[The carpet is in fact bestrewn with small flakes of grey paint from the unhappy creature's flanks.]
She (derisively). Ho! that isn't paint. That's snorts.
I (helplessly). Whatever do you mean?
She. That's snorts. Snorts from his mouf. White snorts.
I. But why is your horse snorting from his mouth, Priscilla?
She. He's snorting from his mouf because I'm sooing him on his back.
Well, there you are, you know; what is one going to do about it? There is a sort of specious plausibility about these replies after all; I am no farrier, but I should think it quite likely that if you shoed a cart-horse long enough on the back with a large enough hammer he would snort white snorts from his mouth; and it's no use telling the girl that she can't jump from realism to romance in that disingenuous manner. Besides she might start hammering the wheels again. Or else she would say that her horse said he was snorting, and who am I to contradict a British horse? I used to consider myself pretty good at what are called back-answers and I still believe that with a little practice I could hold my own in Whitechapel or the House of Commons, but there are subtle transitions about Priscilla's method of argument with which only a Prime Minister could cope. It carries too many guns for me. It cramps my style.