e of those dear Barons of the Cinque Ports--a decent
plumber-body from Rye or Winchelsea--one of the six--or eight--who
claimed the privilege of carrying the canopy over the King"--she is
speaking of King Edward's coronation of course--"how that he was
discovered suddenly to be speaking quite audibly to the sacred presence
so near to him: 'It is very remarkable--we should be here, your
majesty--very remarkable.' And then he subsided--happily unheard--into
hopeless embarrassment. That is exactly how I feel, Stephen. I feel I
can't stand it much longer, that presently I shall splutter and spoil
the procession....

"Perhaps I don't properly estimate our position in the fabric, but I
can't get away from the feeling that everything in social life leads up
to this--to us,--the ridiculous canopy. If so, then the universe
means--_nothing_; it's blowing great forms and shapes as a swamp blows
bubbles; a little while ago it was megatheriums and plesiosauriums--if
that's the name for them--and now it is country-houses and motor-cars
and coronation festivals. And in the end--it is all nonsense, Stephen.
It is utter nonsense.

"If it isn't nonsense, tell me what it is. For me at any rate it's
nonsense, and for every intelligent woman about me--for I talk to some
of them, we indulge in seditious whisperings and wit--and there isn't
one who seems to have been able to get to anything solider than I have
done. Each of us has had her little fling at maternity--about as much as
a washerwoman does in her odd time every two or three years--and that is
our uttermost reality. All the rest,--trimmings! We go about the world,
Stephen, dressing and meeting each other with immense ceremony, we have
our seasonal movements in relation to the ritual of politics and sport,
we travel south for the Budget and north for the grouse, we play games
to amuse the men who keep us--not a woman would play a game for its own
sake--we dabble with social reform and politics, for which few of us
care a rap except as an occupation, we 'discover' artists or musicians
or lecturers (as though we cared), we try to believe in lovers or, still
harder, try to believe in old or new religions, and most of us--I
don't--do our best to give the gratifications and exercise the
fascinations that are expected of us....

"Something has to be done for women, Stephen. We are the heart of life,
birth and begetting, the home where the future grows, and your schemes
ignore us and sli