s speech, and felt a revival of doubt as to her interest in Tasso's
madness.)
    »I think there should be more croquet, for one thing,« said young Clintock;
»I am usually away, but if I were more here I should go in for a croquet club.
You are one of the archers, I think. But depend upon it croquet is the game of
the future. It wants writing up, though. One of our best men has written a poem
on it, in four cantos; - as good as Pope. I want him to publish it. You never
read anything better.«
    »I shall study croquet to-morrow. I shall take to it instead of singing.«
    »No, no, not that; but do take to croquet. I will send you Jenning's poem,
if you like. I have a manuscript copy.«
    »Is he a great friend of yours?«
    »Well, rather.«
    »Oh, if he is only rather, I think I will decline. Or, if you send it me,
will you promise not to catechise me upon it and ask me which part I like best?
Because it is not so easy to know a poem without reading it as to know a sermon
without listening.«
    »Decidedly,« Mrs. Arrowpoint thought, »this girl is double and satirical. I
shall be on my guard against her.«
    But Gwendolen, nevertheless, continued to receive polite attentions from the
family at Quetcham, not merely because invitations have larger grounds than
those of personal liking, but because the trying little scene at the piano had
awakened a kindly solicitude towards her in the gentle mind of Miss Arrowpoint,
who managed all the invitations and visits, her mother being otherwise occupied.
 

                                   Chapter VI

            »Croyez vous m'avoir humiliée pour m'avoir appris que la terre
            tourne autour du soleil? Je vous jure que je ne m'en estime pas
            moins.«
                                               Fontenelle: Pluralité des Mondes.
 
That lofty criticism had caused Gwendolen a new sort of pain. She would not have
chosen to confess how unfortunate she thought herself in not having had Miss
Arrowpoint's musical advantages, so as to be able to question Herr Klesmer's
taste with the confidence of thorough knowledge; still less, to admit even to
herself that Miss Arrowpoint each time they met raised an unwonted feeling of
jealousy in her: not in the least because she was an heiress, but because it was
really provoking that a girl whose appearance you could not characterise except
by saying that her
