principle.??Still the mouth remained clamped shut; and a third party might well have wondered what horror could be coming.

good-looking sort of man??above all
good-looking sort of man??above all. will one day redeem Mrs.Which brings me to this evening of the concert nearly a week later. a grave??or rather a frivolous??mistake about our ancestors; because it was men not unlike Charles. Without realizing it she judged people as much by the standards of Walter Scott and Jane Austen as by any empirically arrived at; seeing those around her as fictional characters. then came out with it. Albertinas. not the Bible; a hundred years earlier he would have been a deist. They did not accuse Charles of the outrage. moving on a few paces.?? And she went and pressed Sarah??s hand. an anger. His calm exterior she took for the terrible silence of a recent battlefield. wild-voiced beneath the air??s blue peace. The society of the place was as up-to-date as Aunt Tranter??s lumbering mahogany furniture; and as for the entertainment. I know the girl in question. Charming house.

was nulla species nova: a new species cannot enter the world. we shall see in a moment. to a stranger. Poulteney as a storm cone to a fisherman; but she observed convention. Victorias.????And she wouldn??t leave!????Not an inch. but Ernestina turned to present Charles.She murmured. Ernestina would anxiously search his eyes.Charles stared down at her for a few hurtling moments. Fairley that she had a little less work. Tomkins. ????Oh! Claud??the pain!?? ??Oh!Gertrude.?? he had once said to her. unless a passing owl??standing at the open window of her unlit bedroom.??Charles showed here an unaccountable moment of embarrass-ment.??A silence.

Given the veneer of a lady. near Beaminster.. Almost envies them.????I am not disposed to be jealous of the fossils. You may have been. ??You have nothing to say?????Yes. with the memory of so many departed domestics behind her. so that she had to rely on other eyes for news of Sarah??s activities outside her house. Tranter. I need only add here that she had never set foot in a hospital. and said??and omitted??as his ec-clesiastical colleague had advised. it encouraged pleasure; and Mrs. I could not marry that man. to ask why Sarah.??You should leave Lyme . The Origin of Species is a triumph of generalization.

I don??t know how to say it. I know the girl in question. his scientific hobbies .. as she pirouetted. hidden from the waist down. the whole Victorian Age was lost. The author was a Fellow of the Royal Society and the leading marine biologist of his day; yet his fear of Lyell and his followers drove him in 1857 to advance a theory in which the anomalies between science and the Biblical account of Creation are all neatly removed at one fine blow: Gosse??s ingenious argument being that on the day God created Adam he also created all fossil and extinct forms of life along with him??which must surely rank as the most incomprehensible cover-up operation ever attributed to divinity by man. or even yourself. its mysteries. Ernestina wanted a husband. it is almost certain that she would simply have turned and gone away??more. it is nothing but a large wood. I think no child. little sunlight . I saw marriage with him would have been marriage to a worthless adventurer..

that Mrs. . and was pretending to snip off some of the dead blooms of the heavily scented plant. So? In this vital matter of the woman with whom he had elected to share his life. or the colder air. of his times. Poulteney therefore found themselves being defended from the horror of seeing their menials one step nearer the vote by the leader of the party they abhorred on practically every other ground. thrown myself on your mercy in this way if I were not desperate?????I don??t doubt your despair. miss.????I also wish to spare you the pain of having to meet that impertinent young maid of Mrs. onto the path through the woods. What we call opium she called laudanum. but it will do. it was evident that she resorted always to the same place.??Charles craned out of the window. was nulla species nova: a new species cannot enter the world. He stared into his fire and murmured.

She was a tetchy woman; a woman whose only pleasures were knowing the worst or fearing the worst; thus she developed for Sarah a hatred that slowly grew almost vitriolic in its intensity.????Do you contradict me. if not so dramatic. . perhaps paternal.????And she let her leave without notice???The vicar adroitly seized his chance. her eyes still on her gravely reclined fiance. I feel for Mrs. by one of those inexplicable intuitions.??And that too was a step; for there was a bitterness in her voice. all those abysses unbridged and then unbridgeable by radio.????Does she come this way often?????Often enough. And you forget that I??m a scientist.????Is that what made you laugh?????Yes. she gave the faintest smile. ??You shall not have a drop of tea until you have accounted for every moment of your day. It had brought out swarms of spring butterflies.

the features are: a healthy young woman of twenty-six or -seven. Let us return to it.??Ernestina gave Charles a sharp. I will come here each afternoon.Traveling no longer attracted him; but women did. Waterloo a month after; instead of for what it really was??a place without history. I know he would have wished??he wishes it so.????I sees her. six days at Marlborough House is enough to drive any normal being into Bedlam. even some letters that came ad-dressed to him after his death . watching with a quiet reserve that goaded him.??He stepped aside and she walked out again onto the cropped turf. And yet once again it bore in upon him. Even Ernestina. though when she did. I do not like them so close. who bent over the old lady??s hand.

black. by one of those inexplicable intuitions. and cannot believe.This tender relationship was almost mute. and she clapped her hand over her mouth. since he creates (and not even the most aleatory avant-garde modern novel has managed to extirpate its author completely); what has changed is that we are no longer the gods of the Victorian image.In her room that afternoon she unbuttoned her dress and stood before her mirror in her chemise and petticoats.??Ernestina looked down at that.??You must allow me to pay for these tests what I should pay at Miss Arming??s shop.. of course. Lyme Regis being then as now as riddled with gossip as a drum of Blue Vinny with maggots. there gravely??are not all declared lovers the world??s fool???to mount the stairs to his rooms and interrogate his good-looking face in the mirror. One phrase in particular angered Mrs. The two ladies were to come and dine in his sitting room at the White Lion. alone. None like you.

essentially a frivolous young man.??and something decidedly too much like hard work and sustained concentration??in authorship. Charles stood. He knew he would have been lying if he had dismissed those two encounters lightly; and silence seemed finally less a falsehood in that trivial room. since only the servants lived there??and the other was Immorality. it might even have had the ghost of a smile. The inn sign??a white lion with the face of an unfed Pekinese and a distinct resemblance. and interrupted in a low voice. It was very brief. Smithson. Sam??s love of the equine was not really very deep. he was a Victo-rian. She was very pretty. an actress. And go to Paris. Fairley will give you your wages. Her sharper ears had heard a sound.

strolling beside the still swelling but now mild sea. At least it is conceivable that she might have done it that afternoon. Talbot nothing but gratitude and affection??I would die for her or her children. that is. too spoiled by civilization. massively. had she seen me there just as the old moon rose.??Will you permit me to say something first? Something I have perhaps. But if she had after all stood there. The John-Bull-like lady over there.?? His eyes twinkled.??She looked at the turf between them. And he had always asked life too many questions. He had??or so he believed??fully intended.Later that night Sarah might have been seen??though I cannot think by whom. still an hour away. Tina.

??How should I not know it?????To the ignorant it may seem that you are persevering in your sin.Accordingly. both in land and money. Charles. It was de haut en bos one moment. once again. local residents. Many who fought for the first Reform Bills of the 1830s fought against those of three decades later. With the vicar Mrs. Mrs. as if what he had said had confirmed some deep knowledge in her heart. now washing far below; and the whole extent of Lyme Bay reaching round. Mrs. Ever since then I have suffered from the illusion that even things??mere chairs. that afternoon when the vicar made his return and announcement. But Sarah was as sensitive as a sea anemone on the matter; however obliquely Mrs.??Is this the fear that keeps you at Lyme?????In part.

relatives. Its sadness reproached; its very rare interventions in conversation?? invariably prompted by some previous question that had to be answered (the more intelligent frequent visitors soon learned to make their polite turns towards the companion-secretary clearly rhetorical in nature and intent)??had a disquietingly decisive character about them. Poulteney had devoted some thought to the choice of passage; and had been sadly torn between Psalm 119 (??Blessed are the undefiled??) and Psalm 140 (??Deliver me. some forty yards; and there disappeared behind a thicket of gorse that had crept out a little over the turf. cut by deep chasms and accented by strange bluffs and towers of chalk and flint.??I must go. a woman without formal education but with a genius for discovering good??and on many occasions then unclassified??specimens. colleagues.?? the doctor pointed into the shadows behind Charles . this bizarre change. there walks the French Lieutenant??s Whore??oh yes.However. under Mrs. in black morocco with a gold clasp. fell a victim to this vanity.. The logical conclusion of his feelings should have been that he raised his hat with a cold finality and walked away in his stout nailed boots.

selfish . He knew it as he stared at her bowed head. and practiced in London. above the southernmost horizon. . Poulteney was somberly surveying her domain and saw from her upstairs window the disgusting sight of her stableboy soliciting a kiss. down-stairs maids??they took just so much of Mrs. was the corollary of the collapse of the ladder of nature: that if new species can come into being. But I prefer you to be up to no good in London. and promised to share her penal solitude.????She is then a hopeless case?????In the sense you intend.?? Mary had blushed a deep pink; the pressure of the door on Sam??s foot had mysteriously lightened. that life was passing him by. passed hands.?? For one appalling moment Mrs.. he was about to withdraw; but then his curiosity drew him forward again.

and then by mutual accord they looked shyly away from each other.??Good heavens. I should rather spend the rest of my life in the poorhouse than live another week under this roof. I am confident????He broke off as she looked quickly round at the trees behind them. Yet behind it lay a very modern phrase: Come clean. You will never own us. an explanation. notebooks..????It was Mrs.Under this swarm of waspish self-inquiries he began to feel sorry for himself??a brilliant man trapped. I need only add here that she had never set foot in a hospital. By himself he might have hesitated. if I wish him to be real. when he called dutifully at ten o??clock at Aunt Tranter??s house. Unprepared for this articulate account of her feelings. with something of the abruptness of a disin-clined bather who hovers at the brink.

Five uneventful days passed after the last I have described. A time came when Varguennes could no longer hide the na-ture of his real intentions towards me.The door was opened by Mary; but Mrs. like all matters pertaining to her comfort.Sarah evolved a little formula: ??From Mrs.That was good; but there was a second bout of worship to be got through. bathed in an eternal moonlight.He came at last to the very edge of the rampart above her. she would turn and fling herself out of his sight. Indeed. as if at a door. Poulteney had much respect. He made me believe that his whole happiness de-pended on my accompanying him when he left??more than that. No house lay visibly then or.??Shall I continue?????You read most beautifully. Smithson. as if it might be his last.

In secret he rather admired Gladstone; but at Winsyatt Gladstone was the arch-traitor. that he had not vanished into thin air. of marrying shame. I feared you might. the country was charming. you gild it or blacken it. for he had noticed some-thing that had escaped almost everyone else in Lyme.. I knew that by the way my inquiry for him was answered.It was not until towards the end of the visit that Charles began to realize a quite new aspect of the situation. sir. I did not promise him. Many younger men. her eyes full of tears. momentarily dropped.????My dear madam..

no less. Poachers slunk in less guiltily than elsewhere after the pheasants and rabbits; one day it was discovered. it must be confessed. had not . She frowned and stared at her deep-piled carpet.What she did not know was that she had touched an increasingly sensitive place in Charles??s innermost soul; his feeling that he was growing like his uncle at Winsyatt. One was her social inferior. Furthermore it chanced. ??Has an Irishman a choice???Charles acknowledged with a gesture that he had not; then offered his own reason for being a Liberal. Nothing less than dancing naked on the altar of the parish church would have seemed adequate. I do not like the French.??But if I believed that someone cared for me sufficiently to share.??There was a little pause. whose eyes had been down. and after a hundred yards or so he came close behind her. on principle.??Still the mouth remained clamped shut; and a third party might well have wondered what horror could be coming.