Two days later we were talking of the divine afflatus, and the relation
of great work to character, when Lorraine demanded my opinion as to the
analogy between thought and conversation.
"Speech was given us to hide our thoughts," I said, quoting Tallyrand
without in the least agreeing with him.
"I fancied you would say that," he replied, and opened his note-book to
refer to some jottings which had evidently been recently made, and which
supplied, strangely enough, another impromptu and bizarre patch to the
unconventional whole so recklessly commenced by my sister Sarah.
I append the jottings shown me by their writer as a problem for
unravelment. They began:--
"Charming because she is perplexing, or perplexing because she is
charming? It is impossible to say. At anyrate, the external pencillings
are pretty. Her manner at times betrays pre-disposition to enmity, for
the flippant pose is merely a disguise. Is it enmity, or is it reserve?
One must take into account the larger reticence of larger natures in
serious matters. A woman who can be good reading to the clown must fail
to attract the scholar. Yet me she keeps on the bare threshold of
comprehension. Is it because there is a barn at the back, or a palace?
Most people open up their drawing-rooms at once, and parade their
bric-a-brac. Is she given to this want of hospitality in speech, this
loitering in the open air, or am I alone treated as a burglar--an
intruder, who longs to drag the arras from her sanctum door?"