Meanwhile the stranger had split a long roll lengthwise with dexterity and precision, and was occupied in spreading on the butter with great regard to perfect smoothness and evenness; he made a moment’s pause at the last words, casting a peculiar glance from under his bushy eye-brows over to our end of the table, and then thoughtfully continued his plastic occupation, wagging his head now and then with an expression of ironical surprise. The thought came to me that A. E. had designs upon the stranger. But I concluded that it was not the case. He had given him but a cursory glance as he entered, though it was a glance which might be supposed to grasp the personality before him, for his eye was wont to seize what it looked upon as if there were a strong hand within it; at the same time there was no sign of his paying any attention to the unknown. “Friend,” he continued, “have you noticed how a piece of falling paper will mock us? Are they not graceful, the sneering motions with which it flutters back and forth? Does not every turn tell you with elegant, voluptuous nonchalance that you are beaten? Oh, matter lies ever in waiting. I sit down cheerfully after breakfast to begin my work, never suspecting the enemy. I dip in my pen, there’s a hair in it; that is the way it begins. The fiend will not come out; I get ink on my fingers, the paper gets stained. I look for another sheet, then for a book, and so on; in short, my blessed morning is gone. From early dawn until late at night, so long as there is a human being about, matter is on the alert to play him a trick. The only way to do is to treat it as the lion-tamer does the beast whose cage he has ventured to enter--he meets its gaze and the beast meets his. To talk about the moral power of a human being is all nonsense, a mere fairy-tale; no, the steady gaze only tells the brute that the man is on his guard, and gaze against gaze the monster lurks to see if for one single moment he will forget himself. So lurks all matter, lead-pencils, pens, inkstand, paper, cigar, glass, lamp--all, all for the moment when you are not watching. But, ye saints! who can ever do it? Who has time? And like the tiger that leaps upon its unfortunate victim the moment he knows himself to be unnoticed, so does matter, drat it! sometimes clumsily, sometimes subtly, as the case may be. Diabolically subtle, for instance, was the bit of iron filing that landed in my eye the morning I was about to start out on my tour. Oh, believe me, when a respectable person is going a-travelling all the devils hold an œcumenical council to defeat him. But one of the favourite tricks dear to the heart of all objects is to creep stealthily to the edge, and drop down from a height to slip out of your hand--you forget yourself but a single moment and there goes----”