“I bury my face in it!”—(He buried his face in it!!)—“I laugh hoarsely through its thickness, choking and spitting; coughing, sneezing, blowing.—People will begin to think I am an alligator if they see me always swimming in their daily ooze. As far as sex is concerned, I am that. Sex, Hobson, is a German study. A German study.” He shook his head in a dejected, drunken way, protruding his lips. He seemed to find analogies for his _repeating_ habits, with the digestion.—“All the same, you must take my word for much in that connexion.—The choice of a wife is not practical in the way that the securing of a good bicycle, hygiene, or advertisement is. You must think more of the dishes of the table. Rembrandt paints decrepit old Jews, the most decayed specimens of the lowest race on earth, that is. Shakespeare deals in human tubs of grease—Falstaff; Christ in sinners. Now as to sex; Socrates married a shrew; most of the wisest men marry fools, picture post cards, cows, or strumpets.” “I don’t think that is quite true.” Hobson resurrected himself dutifully. “The more sensible people I can think of off-hand have more sensible, and on the whole prettier, wives than other people.” “Prettier wives?—You are describing a meaningless average.—The most suspicious fact about a distinguished man is the possession of a distinguished wife. But you might just as well say in answer to my Art statement that Sir Edward Leighton did not paint the decayed meat of humanity.” Hobson surged up a little in his chair and collapsed.—He had to appeal to his body to sustain the argument. “Neither did Raphael—I don’t see why you should drag Rembrandt in—Rembrandt⸺” “You’re going to sniff at Rembrandt!—You accuse me of following the fashions in my liking for Cubism. You are much more fashionable yourself. Would you mind my ‘dragging in’ cheese, high game⸺?” Hobson allowed cheeses with a rather drawn expression. But he did not see what that had to do with it, either. “It is not _purely_ a question of appetite,” he said. “Sex, sir, is _purely_ a question of appetite!” Tarr replied. Hobson inclined himself mincingly, with a sweet chuckle. “If it is _pure_ sex, that is,” Tarr added. “Oh, if it is _pure_ sex—that, naturally⸺” Hobson convulsed himself and crowed thrice. “Listen, Hobson!—You mustn’t make that noise. It’s very clever of you to be able to. But you will not succeed in rattling me by making me feel I am addressing a rooster⸺” Hobson let himself go in whoops and caws, as though Tarr had been pressing him to perform. When he had finished, Tarr said: “Are you willing to _consider sex seriously, or not_?” “Yes, I don’t mind.”—Hobson settled down, his face flushed from his late display.—“But I shall begin to believe before very long that your intentions are honourable as regards the fair Fräulein.—What exactly is your discourse intended to prove?”