"You mean these _are_ the great men? Well, I'm not a great man myself, so what does it matter to me? And what does it matter to those infants? Oh, it's all in the old Greek tag: 'A great book is a great evil.'... You're laughing; look here: I'll tell you the kind of thing that used to happen half a dozen times a day. I used to set these boys and girls to draw a simple object--simple, but more than they could do, for all that, or ever would be able to do; it all depends on how much you see in a simple object. And I'd even show 'em how to do it--for there are one or two simple things I really know and can do myself. Well, presently I'd look up, and there would be sweet seventeen, giving me a pitying sort of smile. I'd ask her what she was smiling at, and then she'd coo, 'Oh, but Degas didn't draw like that!'--or Beardsley, or the newest man from Montmartre (but the chances were it was somebody rather corrupt). 'But you don't happen to be his pupil just at this moment,' I'd say.... Anyhow, the point is, that an adorable young female person, or a decent young fellow for that matter, with no more use for an idea than I have for Moses' Rod, would throw one of these names at my head as soon as look at me. And the bigger the duffer the bigger the name: get that well into your head: that was unvarying. They used to think it was a joke when I asked them, whether they could make an omelette--of course, I really meant make a baby's shirt and contrive to get a baby inside it, but I couldn't exactly say that, so I used to say 'omelette' very slowly and distinctly, and look hard at 'em.... A baby? If I had said it, another piece of paper would have come in. They wouldn't have been able to get a baby until they'd seen what Strindberg or Nietzsche or somebody had to say about it first! And even if they did manage it, then there'd be more paper--systematics--newest methods of this and that and the other--lectures on proteids before they dared to feed it--paper, paper, paper--I know--I've had twenty-three years of it----" His friend twinkled. "Has the little red-haired girl any family yet?" he asked. "I don't know; but"--something like a twinkle flickered for a moment under Jowett's shaggy brows also--"perhaps I'm wrong. Perhaps Pratt knows at least one little bit about Life by this time. One of the girls there used to sing some song or other, I remember--something about-- "'Tying a piece of ribbon round his bonnie, bonnie waist, To let the ladies know he was married.' and I shouldn't be surprised--I don't know, of course, but at a guess----" "Oh?... You mean she'll be likely to be jealous?" "Well, I fancy she'll have him safe under her pretty little thumb. I suppose there's nothing new about the whole thing really--same old twig, same old lime, same old bird. But a vast deal more paper--I still stick to that."