he boy.

She held up her large, fat hand, and marked the points off on her
fingers.

"Three things," she said. "Firstly, get away from people who don't
understand you, and whom, incidentally, you don't understand. Secondly,
try to see how ridiculous you and everybody else always are; and,
thirdly, which is much the most important, don't think about yourself.
If I thought about myself I should consider how old and fat and ugly
I am. I'm not ugly, really; you needn't be foolish and tell me so. I
should spoil my life by trying to be young, and only eating devilled
codfish and drinking hot plum-juice, or whatever is the accepted remedy
for what we call obesity. We're all odd old things, as you say. We can
only get away from that depressing fact by doing something, and not
thinking about ourselves. We can all try not to be egoists. Egoism is
the really heavy quality in the world."

She paused a moment in this inspired discourse and whistled to Og,
who had stretched his weary limbs across a bed of particularly fine
geraniums.

"There!" she said, pointing, "if your dog had done that, you would be
submerged in depression at the thought of how vexed your father would
be. That would be because you are thinking of the effect on yourself. As
it's my dog that has done it--dear me, they do look squashed now he has
got up--you don't really mind about your father's vexation, because you
won't have to think about yourself. That is wise of you; if you were a
little wiser still, you would picture to yourself how ridiculous I shall
look apologising for Og. Kindly kick him, Michael; he will understand.
Naughty! And as for your not having any friends, that would be
exceedingly sad, if you had gone the right way to get them and failed.
But you haven't. You haven't even gone among the people who could be
your friends. Your friends, broadly speaking, must like the same sort of
things as you. There must be a common basis. You can't even argue with
somebody, or disagree with somebody unless you have a common ground to
start from. If I say that black is white, and you think it is blue, we
can't get on. It leads nowhere. And, finally--"

She turned round and faced him directly.

"Finally, don't be so cross, my dear," she said.

"But am I?" asked he.

"Yes. You don't know it, or else probably, since you are a very decent
fellow, you wouldn't be. You expect not to be liked, and that is cross
of you. A good-humoured person expects to be like