TARLETON. _[manipulating the syphon]_ Whats the use of telling children to read the Bible when you know they wont. I was kept away from the Bible for forty years by being told to read it when I was young. Then I picked it up one evening in a hotel in Sunderland when I had left all my papers in the train; and I found it wasnt half bad. _[He drinks, and puts down the glass with a smack of enjoyment]._ Better than most halfpenny papers, anyhow, if only you could make people believe it. _[He sits down by the writing-table, near his wife]._ But if you want to understand old age scientifically, read Darwin and Weismann. Of course if you want to understand it romantically, read about Solomon. MRS TARLETON. Have you had tea, John? TARLETON. Yes. Dont interrupt me when I'm improving the boy's mind. Where was I? This repulsive mask--Yes. _[Explosively]_ What is death? MRS TARLETON. John! HYPATIA. Death is a rather unpleasant subject, papa. TARLETON. Not a bit. Not scientifically. Scientifically it's a delightful subject. You think death's natural. Well, it isnt. You read Weismann. There wasnt any death to start with. You go look in any ditch outside and youll find swimming about there as fresh as paint some of the identical little live cells that Adam christened in the Garden of Eden. But if big things like us didnt die, we'd crowd one another off the face of the globe. Nothing survived, sir, except the sort of people that had the sense and good manners to die and make room for the fresh supplies. And so death was introduced by Natural Selection. You get it out of your head, my lad, that I'm going to die because I'm wearing out or decaying. Theres no such thing as decay to a vital man. I shall clear out; but I shant decay. BENTLEY. And what about the wrinkles and the almond tree and the grasshopper that becomes a burden and the desire that fails? TARLETON. Does it? by George! No, sir: it spiritualizes. As to your grasshopper, I can carry an elephant. MRS TARLETON. You do say such things, Bunny! What does he mean by the almond tree? TARLETON. He means my white hairs: the repulsive mask. That, my boy, is another invention of Natural Selection to disgust young women with me, and give the lads a turn. MRS TARLETON. John: I wont have it. Thats a forbidden subject. TARLETON. They talk of the wickedness and vanity of women painting their faces and wearing auburn wigs at fifty. But why shouldnt they? Why should a woman allow Nature to put a false mask of age on her when she knows that shes as young as ever? Why should she look in the glass and see a wrinkled lie when a touch of fine art will shew her a glorious truth? The wrinkles are a dodge to repel young men. Suppose she doesnt want to repel young men! Suppose she likes them! MRS TARLETON. Bunny: take Hypatia out into the grounds for a walk: theres a good boy. John has got one of his naughty fits this evening.