Belvoir had caught sight of my grinning face over Ludlow’s shoulder, and for my benefit, I believe, he carried on a spirited rejoinder. “My books, upon which you have delivered so restrained a stricture, are little more than depositories of facts, my good sir. When I assert that modesty is a purely conventional matter, I am not spinning a yarn from an arm-chair. When I remark that modern marriage—all marriage—is the outcome of hardened tribal customs, I am not foining in intellectual darkness. When I comment on the different conceptions of chastity, instancing the preparation for marriage of Babylonian girls in the temples of the priests—”
Ludlow had been standing still as death during these words, but I could see that his cleaver-like brownish cheek had been taking on a very amiable purple hue. The mention of Babylon fired him.
“Babylon! Filth! Pah!”
“Quite so, if you are viciously entangled in the nets of your own particular hidebound, Tory—”
“You’re a fool, sir, and the sooner you—”
“But how beautiful to the Babylonian woman—”
“Rubbish! In the first place, you haven’t any—”
“Even you, Ludlow, if you had happened to be a priest in Baby—”
“Outrageous, sir! What right—”
“Why will a Brahmin wash—”