"Then talk when you have. I say it's ruining the country and pampering the public. Who wants to know about the countries and customs of the world? What men and women want to know is the workings of the human heart." Unexpectedly Mr. Mole found himself reduced to triteness. The only comment that presented itself to his mind was that the human heart was a mystery beyond knowing, but that did not allow him to controvert the actor's dictum that no one wanted to know about the countries and customs of the world, and he wondered whether the kinematograph did, in fact, convey a more accurate impression of the wonders of the world than Hakluyt or Sir John Mandeville, who did, at any rate, present the results of their travels and inventions with that pride in both truth and lying which begets style. He determined to visit the kinematograph, and after he and Mr. Copas had completed their round and made it possible for a large number of the inhabitants of the Potteries to become aware of their existence, he returned to the Theater Royal and fetched Matilda. They paid threepence each and sat in the best seats in the middle of the hall, where they were regaled with a Wild West melodrama, an adventure of Max Linder, a Shakespearean production by a famous London actor, a French drama of love and money, and a picture of bees making honey in their hive. Matilda liked the bees and the horses in the Wild West melodrama. When Max Linder climbed into a piano and the hammers hit him on the nose and eyes she laughed; but she said the French drama was silly, and as for the Shakespearean production she said: "You can't follow the play, but I suppose it's good for you." "How do you mean--good for you?" "I mean you don't really like it, but there's a lot of it, and a lot of people, and the dresses are lovely. It doesn't get hold of you like uncle does sometimes." "Your uncle says the kinemas are ruining the country." "Oh! He only means they're making business bad for him." "Your uncle says you'll never make an actress, Matilda." "Does he?" (Some one behind them said "Ssh!" "Ssh yourself," retorted Matilda. "There ain't nothing to hear.") "Does he?" she said. "What do _you_ think?" "I'm afraid I don't know much about it."