HYPATIA. Just so: how clever of you! I want to be; I want to do; and I'm game to suffer if it costs that. But stick here doing nothing but being good and nice and ladylike I simply wont. Stay down here with us for a week; and I'll shew you what it means: shew it to you going on day after day, year after year, lifetime after lifetime. LORD SUMMERHAYS. Shew me what? HYPATIA. Girls withering into ladies. Ladies withering into old maids. Nursing old women. Running errands for old men. Good for nothing else at last. Oh, you cant imagine the fiendish selfishness of the old people and the maudlin sacrifice of the young. It's more unbearable than any poverty: more horrible than any regular-right-down wickedness. Oh, home! home! parents! family! duty! how I loathe them! How I'd like to see them all blown to bits! The poor escape. The wicked escape. Well, I cant be poor: we're rolling in money: it's no use pretending we're not. But I can be wicked; and I'm quite prepared to be. LORD SUMMERHAYS. You think that easy? HYPATIA. Well, isnt it? Being a man, you ought to know. LORD SUMMERHAYS. It requires some natural talent, which can no doubt be cultivated. It's not really easy to be anything out of the common. HYPATIA. Anyhow, I mean to make a fight for living. LORD SUMMERHAYS. Living your own life, I believe the Suffragist phrase is. HYPATIA. Living any life. Living, instead of withering without even a gardener to snip you off when youre rotten. LORD SUMMERHAYS. Ive lived an active life; but Ive withered all the same. HYPATIA. No: youve worn out: thats quite different. And youve some life in you yet or you wouldnt have fallen in love with me. You can never imagine how delighted I was to find that instead of being the correct sort of big panjandrum you were supposed to be, you were really an old rip like papa. LORD SUMMERHAYS. No, no: not about your father: I really cant bear it. And if you must say these terrible things: these heart-wounding shameful things, at least find something prettier to call me than an old rip. HYPATIA. Well, what would you call a man proposing to a girl who might be-- LORD SUMMERHAYS. His daughter: yes, I know. HYPATIA. I was going to say his granddaughter. LORD SUMMERHAYS. You always have one more blow to get in. HYPATIA. Youre too sensitive. Did you ever make mud pies when you were a kid--beg pardon: a child. LORD SUMMERHAYS. I hope not. HYPATIA. It's a dirty job; but Johnny and I were vulgar enough to like it. I like young people because theyre not too afraid of dirt to live. Ive grown out of the mud pies; but I like slang; and I like bustling you up by saying things that shock you; and I'd rather put up with swearing and smoking than with dull respectability; and there are lots of things that would just shrivel you up that I think rather jolly. Now! LORD SUMMERHAYS. Ive not the slightest doubt of it. Dont insist. HYPATIA. It's not your ideal, is it?