: Ike the Batt plays 5 2.7273 e has a univer university, and z Stahl or Forens Fben we Hon; he is s oble and urove r he nearly al a young wome My, light mord meets her at t por and meets is an accident, it said to be look ian, always; eithe because sociale him: and a g en up to sheer possess themselves of information. something of the hard scientific temp men. They are more apt to have humanitarianism out of a laboratory of their first sight of Piccadilly night. Mr. Wells's men, when they a at all, are likable for some intellectu in them, for their attitude to ideas. syndicate's men are likable, it is for s because they are such helpless young One expects every one in fiction, to be an egotist; but one does somet for the old days when an egotist kne to be polite. No one, I think, could affection for Jacob Stahl; but it is P feel affection for Michael Fane, the perfectly impossible to feel him i except as a householder always is i Perhaps the most charming thing on bers in any of these novels (they abound in charm) is the description undergraduate life in Sinister Str it leads to what? Michael's conscier pathetic progress among prostitutes [233] used to be. Sometimes it is curiosity that s him; but it is more apt to be a kind of anitarian sympathy. The adventure is not ⠀ one remembers, after all, Richard FevBut the temper in which it is taken is Richard was a chivalrous young fool; then Mrs. Mount was something out of ›rdinary. He did not, at first, dream what vas; and when he found out, she was able re him to think well of her. These young emen we are considering do not have to ured to think well of the young women altruistically encounter. They know bethey meet them what they are going to They cultivate them because they are that, e obviously going to be that. They prefer girl of the lower classes; prefer marriage her or free love with her, as the case be. They find her more interesting, just settlement-worker finds the slums more esting. The difference between them and ettlement-worker is that they are not out onvert her to religion or even to better ners. They are perfectly naïve in their the b for w acter oncil decen she and they again for m path Lynn cessf of mind tiona time his ter. obst But all valrous yong? as something at first. Freem nd out she vac of her. These ing do not haves f the young er. They know at they are goigt cause they are th be that. They pr es; prefer marri th her, as the ore interesting is the slums m between them at they are not or even to bett ctly naïve in the going off to a solitary cottage unblessed. (Of course, he does have the background.) He never quite for for wanting to be a legal wife. Thou acteristically enough, by the time she onciled herself to the irregularity decent woman would have somehow she were going to endure it) his v and he insists on Betty's marrying hi they can have children. Ann Veron again! But, indeed, Mr. Beresford for marriage anyhow. I know of noth pathetic in modern fiction than the Lynneker, brought up among gentle cessful in his own career, in love wi of his own class, has to cast abo mind for some way of squaring tha tional situation with his radicalism. U time, his only chance has been in app his sister's elopement with the villag ter. Now he is in love himself, and th obstacle, social or financial, to his h But he has not protested against c all his young life, only to sit down [235] he clung to him eagerly. What do you r. Beresford never tells us whether or the w of sh if an other "wed that egoti eccle that wort thou thin kind lessl beer "squ had hav vie pub too rea the rly. 'What do and then added little thing' her knees and k . 'I want our lo want it talked abo married, it must h dit must be afte mean, dear? T at all; it's only! ove hasn't anyth Ve must make or O you know what like that, too?" hrobbing violen I to each other here, in the still dhad vanished d; and yet passin ser together. you so,' she wis to his." ells us whether a ugh. Sybil was t Knows wrong place. Every lov of shrinking from a public ceremony if any two people deeply in love other would choose, for their own "wedding." Dick Lynneker need that his great idea is new. But look a egotism of it! Take it that the leg ecclesiastical ceremony is merely a he that one has to pay. Is that happ worth paying for? Generations of lo thought that it was. Suppose, even, think it not so much too heavy as t kind of payment-something unjustl lessly exacted of you, that should n been exacted at all; a sort of "squeeze." Other lovers, in other ti had a kindred sense of desecration: have realized that society, from its view, had a right to demand of public acknowledgment. They have too, that no public act of this k really touch or affect their private their private sacrament. These modern folk are neither [237] |