She
would do so with such admirable skill and wording as to give the
impression that she was acquainted with its profoundest depths; and then
when she was safely over the chasm the first moment she was free she
would rush to Arabella for the salient points, doggedly repeat them over
and over, and on the next occasion come out with them to the same
person, convincing him more than ever of her thorough knowledge of the
subject. But her memory was her misfortune, for if Miss Clinker
instructed her, for instance, in all the different peculiarities of the
styles of Keats and Shelley, a week after she would have forgotten which
was which--because both bored her to distraction--and she would have to
be reminded again. One awful moment came when, rhapsodizing upon the
sensibility of Keats' character, she said to Sir Tedbury Delvine, the
finest litterateur of his time, that there must have come moments during
Keats' latter years when he must have felt as his own "Prometheus
Unbound"! But, seeing her mistake immediately by her listener's blank
face, she regained her ground with a skill and a flow of words which
made Sir Tedbury Delvine doubt whether his own ears had heard aright.
Pages:
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138