, here in
Italy, there is far less of such feeling.«
    »Far less; but why must there be any at all? And Puritanism isn't a
sufficient explanation. The English Puritans of the really Puritan time had
freedom of conversation which would horrify us of to-day. We become more and
more prudish as what we call civilization advances. It is a hateful fact that,
from the domestic point of view, there exists no difference between some of the
noblest things in art and poetry, and the obscenities which are prosecuted; the
one is as impossible of frank discussion as the other.«
    »The domestic point of view is contemptible. It means the bourgeois point of
view, the Philistine point of view.«
    »Then I myself, if I had children, should be both bourgeois and Philistine.
And so, I have a strong suspicion, would you too.«
    »Very well,« replied Mallard, with some annoyance, »then it is one more
reason why an artist should have nothing to do with domesticities. But look
here, you are wrong as regards me. If ever I marry, amico mio, my wife shall
learn to make more than a theoretical distinction between what is art and what
is grossness. If ever I have children, they shall from the first be taught a
natural morality, and not the conventional. If I can afford good casts of noble
statues, they shall stand freely about my house. When I read aloud, by the fire
side, there shall be no skipping or muttering or frank omissions; no, by Apollo!
If a daughter of mine cannot describe to me the points of difference between the
Venus of the Capitol and that of the Medici, she shall be bidden to use her eyes
and her brains better. I'll have no contemptible prudery in my house!«
    »Bravissimo!« cried Spence, laughing. »I see that my cousin Miriam is not
the only person who has progressed during these years. Do you remember a certain
conversation of ours at Posillipo about the education of a certain young lady?«
    »Yes, I do. But that was a different matter. The question was not of Greek
statues and classical books, but of modern pruriencies and shallowness and
irresponsibility.«
    »You exaggerated then, and you do so now,« said Spence; »at present with
less excuse.«
    Mallard kept silence for a space; then said:
    »Let us speak of what we have been avoiding. How has that marriage turned
out?«
    »I have told you all I