eneral and
Man in particular. (Though the words were but spoken, I could clearly
discern the capital M in their acid utterance.)

Of course I was not present officially, so to speak. Down below, in my
sub-world of chair-legs and hearthrugs and the undersides of sofas, I
was working out my own floor-problems, while they babbled on far above
my head, considering me as but a chair-leg, or even something lower in
the scale. Yet I was listening hard all the time, with that respectful
consideration one gives to all grown-up people's remarks, so long as one
knows no better.

It seemed a serious indictment enough, as they rolled it out. In
tact, considerateness, and right appreciation, as well as in taste
and aesthetic sensibilities--we failed at every point, we breeched and
bearded prentice-jobs of Nature; and I began to feel like collapsing on
the carpet from sheer spiritual anaemia. But when one of them, with
a swing of her skirt, prostrated a whole regiment of my brave tin
soldiers, and never apologized nor even offered her aid toward
revivifying the battle-line, I could not help feeling that in
tactfulness and consideration for others she was still a little to seek.
And I said as much, with some directness of language.

That was the end of me, from a society point of view. Rudeness to
visitors was the unpardonable sin, and in two seconds I had my marching
orders, and was sullenly wending my way to the St. Helena of the
nursery. As I climbed the stair, my thoughts reverted somehow to a
game we had been playing that very morning. It was the good old game of
Rafts,--a game that will be played till all the oceans are dry and all
the trees in the world are felled--and after. And we were all crowded
together on the precarious little platform, and Selina occupied every
bit as much room as I did, and Charlotte's legs didn't dangle over any
more than Harold's. The pitiless sun overhead beat on us all with tropic
impartiality, and the hungry sharks, whose fins scored the limitless
Pacific stretching out on every side, were impelled by an appetite that
made no exceptions as to sex. When we shared the ultimate biscuit and
circulated the last water-keg, the girls got an absolute fourth apiece,
and neither more nor less; and the only partiality shown was entirely
in favour of Charlotte, who was allowed to perceive and to hail the
saviour-sail on the horizon. And this was only because it was her turn
to do so, not because she happened