The Descent of Man and Other Stories

e plebeian aroma of heated tram-cars and muddy street-crossings

into the corner of a silk-cushioned bergere, "I'v

e with her head propped on a langui

said her visit

head. "I was never bette

elp myself to

d glove before taking a buttered tea-ca

I said just now

st

Loose'? I came

"I never," she cried dramatically,

d Mrs. Clinch, se

e incommunicable; then, dropping into her seat again, she

ateness of the impulse in an atmosphere so charged with the portentous. "Do you mean that

urst out, with an ineffectual clutch at her h

riety of taking no more tea, crossed over to her cousin an

eded; "but you'll be surprised to

ed to it-" Mrs. Fethe

n so very nast

them!" the n

oes hurt, I know-but hadn

cried Mrs. Feth

at I fancied from what you said before the book came ou

to everybody as a per

! Is that what

el speechle

one o

ry o

Clinch, with an

t yourself!" her cousin

d wh

ren't so awf

me up to such a pitch that it wa

he worst. "Why not say at once," she sugge

ven't sa

e all s

oor P

the Bi

called it a

he wanted me to change it; but when he'd read the book he wrote that

rs. Clinch. "That was nothin

?" cried her cou

d he knew the quickest way to kill yours was to di

really think it'

Not nearly a

d, Bella-but t

cold remains of her tea-cake. "Let me see," she said, suddenly; "do you

e 'Radi

hey often do if a big paper sets the pace. Saves a lot of trouble

Bishop said!" cri

di

rough a Glass Brightly' was to have it

wo." She turned an illuminated eye on her cousin. "You o

suppose every book must stand or fall on its

' extracts from them. Even these are rapidly being replaced by paragraphs borrowed from the vocabulary of commerce. I often have to look twice before I am sure if I am reading a department-store advertisement or the announcement of a new batch of literature. The publishers will soon be having their 'fa

-?" Mrs. Fe

hose two novels in

sly. "There is so much more interest

the demand. The Bishop could run your novel

an't make hi

very well preach aga

se and picked

thankful that there's no demand for pessimism in the field of natural history.