--by God and my Soul-and-bones! it would be honester, finer,
sweeter--more _comfortable_ to be the dirty beggar-woman in the wet
slippery streets--
But it’s facilely fancied because I am of Right Dimensions to be some
Good Scout’s wife.
A curious subtly pitfalled world: in it my Shape and Size, and my
Weight which is also Right, could betray me into being an excellent
wife: and by that a lying chattel, an inexpressibly damaged woman.
_Ice-water, corrosive acid and human breath_