d dinner, forced, even then, to
reckon every penny, and to make their children laugh with halfpence.
Either he would be ashamed before so much content, or else he would be
again touched by the sense of his inhumanity which could take no interest
in the common things of life. But still he went to be at least taken out
of himself, to be forced to look at another side of the world, so that he
might perhaps forget a little while his own sorrows.

He was fascinated by what he saw and heard. He wondered whether De
Quincey also had seen the same spectacle, and had concealed his
impressions out of reverence for the average reader. Here there were no
simple joys of honest toilers, but wonderful orgies, that drew out his
heart to horrible music. At first the violence of sound and sight had
overwhelmed him; the lights flaring in the night wind, the array of
naphtha lamps, the black shadows, the roar of voices. The dance about the
piano-organ had been the first sign of an inner meaning, and the face of
the dark girl as she came round and round to the flame had been amazing
in its utter furious abandon. And what songs they were singing all around
him, and what terrible words rang out, only to excite peals of laughter.
In the public-houses the workmen's wives, the wives of small tradesmen,
decently dressed in black, were drinking their faces to a flaming red,
and urging their husbands to drink more. Beautiful young women, flushed
and laughing, put their arms round the men's necks and kissed them,
and then held up the glass to their lips. In the dark corners, at the
openings of side streets, the children were talking together, instructing
each other, whispering what they had seen; a boy of fifteen was plying a
girl of twelve with whisky, and presently they crept away. Lucian passed
them as they turned to go, and both looked at him. The boy laughed, and
the girl smiled quietly. It was above all in the faces around him that he
saw the most astounding things, the Bacchic fury unveiled and unashamed.
To his eyes it seemed as if these revelers recognized him as a fellow,
and smiled up in his face, aware that he was in the secret. Every
instinct of religion, of civilization even, was swept away; they gazed at
one another and at him, absolved of all scruples, children of the earth
and nothing more. Now and then a couple detached themselves from the
swarm, and went away into the darkness, answering the jeers and laughter
of their friends as th