FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45  
46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   >>   >|  
arts; and specialists also taught them hygiene: how to walk, sit, breathe; how to masticate; how to relax after the manner of the domestic cat. They had memory lessons; lessons in personal physiology, and in first aid to themselves. Specialists cared for their teeth, their eyes, their hair, their skin, their hands and feet. Everything that was taught them, done for them, indirectly educated them in the science of self-consideration and deepened an unavoidably natural belief in their own overwhelming importance. They had not been born so. But in the house of Seagrave everything revolved around and centred in them; everything began for them and ended for them alone. They had no chance. True, they were also instructed in theology and religion; they became well grounded in the elements of both,--laws, by-laws, theory, legends, proverbs, truisms, and even a few abstract truths. But there was no meaning in either to these little prisoners of self. Seclusion is an enemy to youth; solitude its destruction. When the twins were fifteen they went to their first party. A week of superficial self-restraint and inward delirium was their preparation, a brief hour of passive bewilderment the realisation. Dazed by the sight and touch and clamor of the throng, they moved and spoke as in a vision. The presence of their own kind in such numbers confused them; overwhelmed, they found no voices to answer the call of happiness. Their capacity to respond was too limited. As in a dream they were removed earlier than anybody else--taken away by a footman and a maid with decorous pomp and circumstance, carefully muffled in motor robes, and embedded in a limousine. The daily papers, with that lofty purpose which always characterises them, recorded next morning the important fact that the famous Seagrave twins had appeared at their first party. * * * * * Between the ages of fifteen and sixteen the twins might have entered Harvard, for the entrance examinations were tried on both children, and both passed brilliantly. For a year or two they found a substitute for happiness in pretending that they were really at college; they simulated, day by day, the life that they supposed was led there; they became devoted to their new game. Excited through tales told by tutor and friend, they developed a passionate loyalty for their college and class; they were solemnly elected to coveted societies, they wi
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45  
46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

college

 

Seagrave

 
fifteen
 

taught

 

happiness

 
lessons
 

overwhelmed

 

embedded

 

answer

 

limousine


voices
 

papers

 
presence
 

purpose

 

numbers

 

confused

 

carefully

 
respond
 

limited

 

earlier


decorous

 
circumstance
 

removed

 

capacity

 

footman

 
muffled
 

sixteen

 
devoted
 
Excited
 

supposed


pretending
 

simulated

 

elected

 

solemnly

 

coveted

 

societies

 
loyalty
 

friend

 

developed

 

passionate


substitute

 

Between

 

appeared

 
vision
 
famous
 

recorded

 

morning

 

important

 

entered

 

brilliantly