"That is the disadvantage of a portrait; as a rule, one's bitterest friends can find nothing more to ask than the faithful unlikeness that goes down to posterity as oneself. I hate posterity--it's so fond of having the last word. Of course, as regards portraits, there are exceptions." "For instance?" "To die before being painted by Sargent is to go to heaven prematurely." "With the necessary care and impatience, you may avoid that catastrophe." "If you're going to be rude," said Reginald, "I shall dine with you to- morrow night as well. The chief vice of the Academy," he continued, "is its nomenclature. Why, for instance, should an obvious trout-stream with a palpable rabbit sitting in the foreground be called 'an evening dream of unbeclouded peace,' or something of that sort?" "You think," said the Other, "that a name should economise description rather than stimulate imagination?" "Properly chosen, it should do both. There is my lady kitten at home, for instance; I've called it Derry." "Suggests nothing to my imagination but protracted sieges and religious animosities. Of course, I don't know your kitten"-- "Oh, you're silly. It's a sweet name, and it answers to it--when it wants to. Then, if there are any unseemly noises in the night, they can be explained succinctly: Derry and Toms." "You might almost charge for the advertisement. But as applied to pictures, don't you think your system would be too subtle, say, for the Country Cousins?" "Every reformation must have its victims. You can't expect the fatted calf to share the enthusiasm of the angels over the prodigal's return. Another darling weakness of the Academy is that none of its luminaries must 'arrive' in a hurry. You can see them coming for years, like a Balkan trouble or a street improvement, and by the time they have painted a thousand or so square yards of canvas, their work begins to be recognised." "Someone who Must Not be Contradicted said that a man must be a success by the time he's thirty, or never." "To have reached thirty," said Reginald, "is to have failed in life." REGINALD AT THE THEATRE "After all," said the Duchess vaguely, "there are certain things you can't get away from. Right and wrong, good conduct and moral rectitude, have certain well-defined limits." "So, for the matter of that," replied Reginald, "has the Russian Empire. The trouble is that the limits are not always in the same place." Reginald and the Duchess regarded each other with mutual distrust, tempered by a scientific interest. Reginald considered that the Duchess had much to learn; in particular, not to hurry out of the Carlton as though afraid of losing one's last 'bus. A woman, he said, who is careless of disappearances is capable of leaving town before Goodwood, and dying at the wrong moment of an unfashionable disease. The Duchess thought that Reginald did not exceed the ethical standard which circumstances demanded.