one from
another of the several occasions on which I heard him talk is difficult
because the procedure was so invariable: Watts-Dunton always dictating
when I arrived, Swinburne always appearing at the moment of the meal,
always the same simple and substantial fare, Swinburne never allowed
to talk before the meal was half over. As to this last point, I soon
realised that I had been quite unjust in suspecting Watts-Dunton of
selfishness. It was simply a sign of the care with which he watched over
his friend's welfare. Had Swinburne been admitted earlier to the talk,
he would not have taken his proper quantity of roast mutton. So soon,
always, as he had taken that, the embargo was removed, the chance was
given him. And, swiftly though he embraced the chance, and much though
he made of it in the courses of apple-pie and of cheese, he seemed
touchingly ashamed of 'holding forth.' Often, before he had said
his really full say on the theme suggested by Watts-Dunton's loud
interrogation, he would curb his speech and try to eliminate himself,
bowing his head over his plate; and then, when he had promptly been
brought in again, he would always try to atone for his inhibiting
deafness by much reference and deference to all that we might otherwise
have to say. 'I hope,' he would coo to me, 'my friend Watts-Dunton,
who'--and here he would turn and make a little bow to Watts-Dunton--'is
himself a scholar, will bear me out when I say'--or 'I hardly know,'
he would flute to his old friend, 'whether Mr. Beerbohm'--here a bow to
me--'will agree with me in my opinion of' some delicate point in Greek
prosody or some incident in an old French romance I had never heard of.

On one occasion, just before the removal of the mutton, Watts-Dunton
had been asking me about an English translation that had been made of M.
Rostand's 'Cyrano de Bergerac.' He then took my information as the match
to ignite the Swinburnian tinder. 'Well, Algernon, it seems that "Cyrano
de Bergerac"'--but this first spark was enough: instantly Swinburne
was praising the works of Cyrano de Bergerac. Of M. Rostand he may
have heard, but him he forgot. Indeed I never heard Swinburne mention a
single contemporary writer. His mind ranged and revelled always in the
illustrious or obscure past. To him the writings of Cyrano de Bergerac
were as fresh as paint--as fresh as to me, alas, was the news of their
survival. Of course, of course, you have read "L'Histoire Comique des
eta