he would also, if he could,
make friends with English Grammar. But how can I hope for his success
in the latter struggle when the books he borrows from my little store
are returned uncut. Possibly the colourless eyes, which survey me over
the _retrousse_ nose and deceptive moustache, are capable of gathering
wisdom from the uncut fields of learning. And yet, and yet, have I not
unintentionally surprised him in his cabin devouring "The Unwritten
Commandment" or "The Lady's Realm," while my Aristophanes is on
the settee? I do not blame a sea-going engineer for disliking
Aristophanes. Many agricultural labourers would find him uninforming.
But why borrow him and simulate a cultured interest in his plays?

My friend, I think, abhors blatant uxoriousness. So do I. And I fear
the Most Wonderful Man on Earth is blatantly uxorious. I honour him
for a certain sadness in his voice when he speaks of unrequited love.
But his constant reference to Ibsen's _motif_ in the "Wild Duck,"
though it fails in its primary object of convincing me that he is
familiar with Ibsen's plays, does in truth tell me that some fair one
gave him sleepless nights.

Of course, this amusing assumption would not stand a single hour in a
cultured circle. Some periodicals of the day foster the fallacy in
many an unfortunate mind that to read about a book is really quite
as good as actually to read it. Their readers are led to infer that
learning is quite a spare-time affair. I once assured a victim of this
delusion that in true culture there was no threepence-in-the-shilling
discount; and he wrinkles his brows yet, I believe, wondering what I
meant. How many years of close study, my friend, are required to
enable one to stroll through a second-hand book-shop, pick up the
_one_ treasure from the shelves, and walk out again?

It may be, perchance, that I labour this trait in the character of one
who would be great but for his disabilities. Which thought recalls to
my mind a suspicion that intermittently haunts me--that, living as we
do here on this ocean tramp, "thrown together," as the phrase goes,
so constantly, faults in another man grow more and more apparent;
social abrasions which would be smoothed down and forgotten ashore are
roughened at each fresh encounter, until the man is hidden behind one
flaming sin. Especially is this to be expected when mind and body are
worn, the one with responsibility, the other with rough toil. Who am I
that I should cl