Marten was silent. "I did not ask you to stop," said Denis. "You've got it very pat!" "Plain sailing, my boy. It's the social reformers and novelists who create these artificial conundrums; they want to sell their rotten literature; they want to make us forget that the only interesting and important part of the business is what nobody talks or writes about. What does it all amount to? Man creates intellectually and physically. He classifies minerals or blasts out a tunnel. Woman creates physiologically; she supplies the essential, the raw material; her noblest product is a child. I get on splendidly with women, because we both realize the stupidity of the average sex-twaddle. We have no illusions about each other. We know exactly what we are after. We know exactly how to attain it. I tell you what, Phipps, Female Emancipation is going to do away with a lot of cant and idealism. Knock the silly male on the head. There'll be an end of your chastity-worship, once women are fairly started on the game. They won't put up with it." "Disgusting," said Denis. "Go on." "I'm done. What, sanidin again?" Denis still held the stone in his hand. He was thinking, however, of other things. He liked to collect fresh ideas, to be impregnated with the mentality of other people--he knew how much he had to learn. But he would have preferred his mind to be moulded gently, in artistic fashion. Marten's style was more like random blows from a sledge-hammer, half of them wide of the mark. It was not very edifying, or even instructive. Keith was the same. Why was everybody so violent, so extreme in their views? Marten repeated: "Sanidin?" "It might be sanidin in places," replied Denis. "I do know a little something about crystals, Marten. I have read Ruskin's ETHICS OF THE DUST." "Ruskin. Good god! He's not a man; he's an emetic. But you never answered my first question. You always hit upon sanidin. Why?" "Oh, I don't know. It's rather a pretty word, don't you think? It would do for a Christian name. Girls' names are so terribly commonplace. They are always Marjorie, or something. If I had a daughter, I should call her Sanidin." "You're not likely to find yourself in that position at this rate. If I had a daughter, I know perfectly well what I should call her." "What?" "Angelina." "You would?" asked Denis slowly. "And why?" "Oh, it's rather a pretty name, don't you think?" "Not a bad name at all, now I come to think of it. But it sounds foreign. I thought you did not care about foreigners." "I don't. But there's one--" "Go on," said Denis. Mr. Marten winked. The mists had fled from the hilltops; rocks and vineyards, and the sea at their foot, lay flooded in sunshine. With one accord, the two young men rose from the ground and turned their steps homewards. The mineralogical lesson was over. "Coming to Keith's to-night?" enquired Marten with a fine show of nonchalance. "I don't know."