"Possibly you will"--he said, looking at me through half-closed eyes and a cloud of smoke,--"London easily talks. Particularly on unsavoury and questionable subjects. Therefore,--as I have already hinted,--if your book were a judicious mixture of Zola, Huysmans and Baudelaire, or had for its heroine a 'modest' maid who considered honourable marriage a 'degradation,' it would be quite sure of success in these days of new Sodom and Gomorrah." Here he suddenly sprang up, and flinging away his cigar, confronted me. "Why do not the heavens rain fire on this accursed city! It is ripe for punishment,--full of abhorrent creatures not worth the torturing in hell to which it is said liars and hypocrites are condemned! Tempest, if there is one human being more than another that I utterly abhor, it is the type of man so common to the present time, the man who huddles his own loathly vices under a cloak of assumed broad-mindedness and virtue. Such an one will even deify the loss of chastity in woman by the name of 'purity,'--because he knows that it is by her moral and physical ruin alone that he can gratify his brutal lusts. Rather than be such a sanctimonious coward I would openly proclaim myself vile!" "That is because yours is a noble nature"--I said--"You are an exception to the rule." "An exception? I?"--and he laughed bitterly--"Yes, you are right; I am an exception among men perhaps,--but I am one with the beasts in honesty! The lion does not assume the manners of the dove,--he loudly announces his own ferocity. The very cobra, stealthy though its movements be, evinces its meaning by a warning hiss or rattle. The hungry wolf's bay is heard far down the wind, intimidating the hurrying traveller among the wastes of snow. But man gives no clue to his intent--more malignant than the lion, more treacherous than the snake, more greedy than the wolf, he takes his fellow-man's hand in pretended friendship, and an hour later defames his character behind his back,--with a smiling face he hides a false and selfish heart,--flinging his pigmy mockery at the riddle of the Universe, he stands gibing at God, feebly a-straddle on his own earth-grave--Heavens!"--here he stopped short with a passionate gesture--"What should the Eternities do with such a thankless, blind worm as he!" His voice rang out with singular emphasis,--his eyes glowed with a fiery ardour; startled by his impressive manner I let my cigar die out and stared at him in mute amazement. What an inspired countenance!--what an imposing figure!--how sovereignly supreme and almost god-like in his looks he seemed at the moment;--and yet there was something terrifying in his attitude of protest and defiance. He caught my wondering glance,--the glow of passion faded from his face,--he laughed and shrugged his shoulders.