tip of his glove, by way of
description. "A voice that seems to make the air rich about her."

"Gently, Bertram. We must be careful how we approach your queen, I see."

"Not a bit of it. I am telling you just what you would hear in any of
the clubs. She has a liberal nature, my boy, and loves nobody, that I
can find, in particular. What bewitches me in talking to her is a sort
of serious background. I hate a woman all surface as I hate a flat
house. The Trefoil--queer name, isn't it?--can put a tremor in her voice
suddenly. The Trefoil has memories--a fact: something which she doesn't
give to the world, generous as she is. It is the shade to her abounding
and sparkling passages of light. Only her deep art, I dare say; but
devilish pleasant and refreshing when you get tired of laughing--gives a
little repose to facial muscles. The Trefoil has decidedly made a
sensation. At the races she was as popular as the winner. She must have
got home with a chariot full of money. Of course, when she bet, she
won--or she didn't pay. A pot of money is to be made on that system: and
the women, bless 'em, how kindly they've taken to it!"

This kind of improving discourse employed us to my gate. Bertram dropped
me to return for "the painted lily" in an hour.

I am no squeamish man, or I should have passed a wretched life. The man
who is perpetually travelling must bear with him a pliant nature that
will adapt itself to any society, to various codes of morals, habits of
thought, rules of conduct, and varieties of temperament. I can make
myself at home in most places, but least in those regions which the
progress of civilization, or the progress of something, has established
in every capital of Europe, and to the description of which the younger
Dumas has devoted his genius. The atmosphere of the _demi-monde_ never
delighted me. I see why it charms; I guess why it has become the potent
rival of good society; the reason why men of genius, scholars,
statesmen, princes, and all the great of the earth take pleasure in it,
is not far to seek; silly women at home are to blame in great part. This
new state of the body social is very much to be regretted; but I am not
yet of those who think that good, decent society--the converse of
honourable men with honourable women--is come or coming to an end. I am
of the old-fashioned, who have always been better pleased and more
diverted with the society of ladies than with that of the free graces
who al