"
BOWEN: "Would the absence of brains have been of any help to him?"
After this, our mutual good humour was restored and I only had
time for a word with Mrs. Green before the evening was ruined by
Jowett taking us across the quad to hear moderate music in the
hideous Balliol hall. Of all the Master's women friends, I
infinitely preferred Mrs. T. H. Green, John Addington Symonds'
sister. She is among the rare women who have all the qualities
which in moments of disillusion I deny to them.
I spent my last week-end at Balliol when Jowett's health appeared
to have completely recovered. On the Monday morning, after his
guests had gone, I went as usual into his study to talk to him. My
wire on receiving his death-bed letter had amused but distressed
him; and on my arrival he pressed me to tell him what it was he
had written that had offended me. I told him I was not offended,
only hurt. He asked me what the difference was. I wish I could
have given him the answer that my daughter Elizabeth gave Lord
Grey [Footnote: Viscount Grey of Fallodon.] when he asked her the
same question, walking in the garden at Fallodon on the occasion
of her first countryhouse visit:
"The one touches your vanity and the other your heart."
I do not know what I said, but I told him I was quite unoffended
and without touchiness, but that his letter had all the faults of
a schoolmaster and a cleric in it and not the love of a friend. He
listened to me with his usual patience and sweetness and expressed
his regret.
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