but one of the many items which went to the making up of you. You have
traveled everywhere, no? Was it like living over again the books of
travel?"

"Not in the least. Each man travels for himself."

"Madame de Staël said that traveling was sad. Is it so?"

"To the lover of history it is like food without salt: imagination has
painted an historical city with the panorama of a great time; it has
been to us a stage for great events. We find it a stage with familiar
paraphernalia, and actors as commonplace as ourselves."

"It is more satisfactory to stay at home and read about it?"

"Infinitely, though less expanding."

"Then is anything worth while except reading?

"Several things; the pursuit of glory, for one thing, and the active
occupied life necessary for its achievement."

She leaned forward a little; she felt that she had stumbled nearer to
him. "Are you ambitious?" she asked.

"For what it compels life to yield; abstractly, not. Ambition is the
looting of hell in chase of biting flames swirling above a desert of
ashes. As for posthumous fame, it must be about as satisfactory as a
draught of ice-water poured down the throat of a man who has died on
Sahara. And yet, even if in the end it all means nothing, if 'from