Edward thought, “I certainly have no delusions about her. I can see that she monopolises talk too much. And she talks entirely about herself. Having no delusions about her I can see the more clearly how adorable she is.” “When I read my notebook now it is like a fog translated into words. Yet I swear this is all I thought about George Moore, and I am not abnormally stupid.” “No indeed,” said Banner Hope helpfully. “This is what I find in my notebook: ‘Why not die if you are Victorian? _Terrible is the day when each sees his own soul naked._ But his soul is all dressed up in tight trousers and what not. And side-whiskers. I wonder if my navy shirt is too tight? My mind is wandering. I must read this book acutely. _I fain would show my soul._ Mrs. Felicia Hemans toying with adultery. My first schoolroom had a green wallpaper. What’s this about Scott. _Too impersonal._ Who cares for the effect of Scott now? Might as well care for the effect of Little Arthur’s History. Oh, what roguey rogue he is trying to be. _Of course I liked the fashionable sunlight in the Park, and to shock my friends ... I boasted of my dissipations._ Now he boasts of his boasting and that is just as bad. _A satyr carrying a woman._ How laboriously luscious. But why not laboriously luscious? He’s got to give his Young Man something to Confess. But in these days we would laugh at his Young Man. Because he isn’t young. He’s only pretending to be traditionally young. _I cannot recall a case of man or woman who ever occupied any considerable part of my thoughts that did not contribute to my moral or physical welfare._ He is very proud of that. He thinks that using people makes him great. Men are vainer than women. Or naïver. Talking of vanity, I’d like leather buttons on my coat like a man’s. They would look sort of tawny. _Beginning to regard the delineation of a nymph or youth bathing as a very narrow channel to carry off the tide of a man’s thought._ How very good all this is. How honest of him to admit his impression of Impressionists. The shocker shocked. Hurray. He is not a spirit shocker but a flesh shocker. It is certainly fair of him to admit his vulgarity—if only he knew how vulgar it was. I don’t know about all this. I don’t know Théophile Gautier. I am a fool. I am a woman. Why do they let women be like me, skipping the strange parts of books? I think the needles on the pine trees are woven like Japanese matting against the sky. I am bored. I am bored. Now I am not bored. I am proud of being not bored; I am proud because the quotations from Gautier please me so. I am applying it all to myself. Oh, he is laughing at me. Being a woman, that’s the trouble. _Pity, that most vile of vile virtues, has never been known to me._ Is it being a woman that prevents me from understanding how pity can be vile? Women are paid to pretend to understand men’s epigrams. Epigrams about virtues are easy. Pity isn’t really vile, only there are