neral principles of literature and painting;
of people, of sunsets, of Italy, of the high seas, of the Paris
streets--of what, in fine, you pleased. Or he would spin you yarns,
sober, farcical, veridical, or invented. And, with transitions
infinitely rapid, he would be serious, jocose--solemn, ribald--earnest,
flippant--logical, whimsical, turn and turn about. And in every
sentence, in its form or in its substance, he would wrap a surprise
for you--it was the unexpected word, the unexpected assertion,
sentiment, conclusion, that constantly arrived. Meanwhile it would
enhance your enjoyment mightily to watch his physiognomy, the
movements of his great, grey, shaggy head, the lightening and
darkening of his eyes, his smile, his frown, his occasional slight
shrug or gesture. But the oddest thing was this, that he could take as
well as give; he could listen--surely a rare talent in a monologist.
Indeed, I have never known a man who could make _you_ feel so
interesting.

After dinner he would light an immense brown meerschaum pipe, and
smoke for a quarter-hour or so in silence; then he would play a game
or two of chess with some one; and by and by he would open his piano,
and sing to us till midnight.

IV.

I speak of him as old, and indeed we always called him Old Childe
among ourselves; yet he was barely fifty. Nina, when I first made her
acquaintance, must have been a girl of sixteen or seventeen;
though--tall, with an amply-rounded, mature-seeming figure--if one
had judged from her appearance, one would have fancied her three or
four years older. For that matter, she looked then very much as she
looks now; I can perceive scarcely any alteration. She had the same
dark hair, gathered up in a big smooth knot behind, and breaking into
a tumult of little ringlets over her forehead; the same clear,
sensitive complexion; the same rather large, full-lipped mouth,
tip-tilted nose, soft chin, and merry mischievous eyes. She moved in
the same way, with the same leisurely, almost lazy grace, that could,
however, on occasions, quicken to an alert, elastic vivacity; she had
the same voice, a trifle deeper than most women's, and of a quality
never so delicately nasal, which made it racy and characteristic; the
same fresh ready laughter. There was something arch, something a
little sceptical, a little quizzical in her expression, as if,
perhaps, she were disposed to take the world, more or less, with a
grain of salt; at the same