I was conversing with Mr. Carlton the Librarian, and he quoted from
memory a line from Catulle Mendes that seemed to me uncommonly
felicitous: "La vie est un jour de Mi-Careme. Quelques-uns se masquent;
moi, je ris."
* * *
In his declining years M. France has associated himself with the bunch
called "Clarte," a conscious group organized by Barbusse, the object of
which is the "union of all partisans of the true right and the true
liberty." How wittily the Abbe Coignard would have discussed "Clarte,"
and how wisely M. Bergeret would have considered it! Alas! it is sad to
lose one's hair, but it is a tragedy to lose one's unbeliefs.
* * *
Chicago, as has been intimated, rather broadly, is a jay town; but it is
coming on. A department store advertises "cigarette cases and holders
for the gay sub-deb and her great-grandmother," also "a diary for 'her'
if she leads an exciting life."
* * *
We infer from the reviews of John Burroughs' "Accepting the Universe"
that John has decided to accept it. One might as well. With the
reservation that acceptance does not imply approval.
* * *
It is possible that Schopenhauer wrote his w. k. essay on woman after a
visit to a bathing beach.
* * *
We heard a good definition of a bore. A bore is a man who, when you ask
him how he is, tells you.
* * *
The sleeping sickness (not the African variety) is more mysterious than
the flu. It will be remembered that two things were discovered about the
flu: first, that it was caused by a certain bacillus, and, second, that
it was not caused by that bacillus. But all that is known about the
sleeping sickness is that it attacks, by preference, carpenters and
plumbers.
* * *
Slangy and prophetic Merimee, who wrote, in "Love Letters of a Genius":
"You may take it from me that ... short dresses will be the order of the
day, and those who are blessed with natural advantages will be at last
distinguished from those whose advantages are artificial only."
* * *
Happy above all other writing mortals we esteem him who, like Barrie,
treads with sure feet the borderland 'twixt fact and faery, stepping now
on this side, now on that. One must write with moist eyes many pages of
such a fantasy as "A Kiss for Cinderella." There are tears that are not
laughter's, nor grief's, but beauty's own. A lovely landscape may bring
them, or a strain of music, or a written or a spoken line.
* * *
All we can get out of a Shaw play is two hours and a half of mental
exhilaration. We are, inscrutably, denied the pleasure of wondering what
Shaw means, or whether he is sincere.
* * *