While I stood talking to Watts-Dunton--talking as loudly as he, for he was very deaf--I enjoyed the thrill of suspense in watching the door through which would appear--Swinburne. I asked after Mr. Swinburne’s health. Watts-Dunton said it was very good: ‘He always goes out for his long walk in the morning--wonderfully active. Active in mind, too. But I’m afraid you won’t be able to get into touch with him. He’s almost stone-deaf, poor fellow--almost stone-deaf now.’ He changed the subject, and I felt I must be careful not to seem interested in Swinburne exclusively. I spoke of ‘Aylwin.’ The parlourmaid brought in the hot dishes. The great moment was at hand. Nor was I disappointed. Swinburne’s entry was for me a great moment. Here, suddenly visible in the flesh, was the legendary being and divine singer. Here he was, shutting the door behind him as might anybody else, and advancing--a strange small figure in grey, having an air at once noble and roguish, proud and skittish. My name was roared to him. In shaking his hand, I bowed low, of course--a bow de coeur; and he, in the old aristocratic manner, bowed equally low, but with such swiftness that we narrowly escaped concussion. You do not usually associate a man of genius, when you see one, with any social class; and, Swinburne being of an aspect so unrelated as it was to any species of human kind, I wondered the more that almost the first impression he made on me, or would make on any one, was that of a very great gentleman indeed. Not of an old gentleman, either. Sparse and straggling though the grey hair was that fringed the immense pale dome of his head, and venerably haloed though he was for me by his greatness, there was yet about him something--boyish? girlish? childish, rather; something of a beautifully well-bred child. But he had the eyes of a god, and the smile of an elf. In figure, at first glance, he seemed almost fat; but this was merely because of the way he carried himself, with his long neck strained so tightly back that he all receded from the waist upwards. I noticed afterwards that this deportment made the back of his jacket hang quite far away from his legs; and so small and sloping were his shoulders that the jacket seemed ever so likely to slip right off. I became aware, too, that when he bowed he did not unbend his back, but only his neck--the length of the neck accounting for the depth of the bow. His hands were tiny, even for his size, and they fluttered helplessly, touchingly, unceasingly.