had not been of that world, might not have seen it, or, failing that,
might not see all the shards of those extinct civilizations. There was
something loving and sad in the manner in which at times, in one museum
and another, he would examine ancient art designs, those of the
Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, their public and private house plans,
their statues, book rolls, inscriptions, flambeaux, boats, swords,
chariots. Carthage, Rome, Greece, Phoenicia--their colonies, art and
trade stuffs, their foods, pleasures and worships--how he raved! A book
like Thaïs, Salammbo, Sonica, Quo Vadis, touched him to the quick.

At the same time, and odd as it may seem, he was seemingly in intimate
contact with a circle of friends that rather astonished me by its
catholicity. It included, for instance, and quite naïvely, real estate
dealers, clerks, a bank cashier or two, some man who had a leather shop
or cigar factory in the downtown section, a drummer, a printer, two or
three newspaper artists and reporters--a list too long to catalogue here
and seemingly not interesting, at least not inspiring to look at or live
in contact with. Yet his relations with all of these were of a warm,
genial, helpful, homely character, quite intimate. He used them as one
might a mulch in which to grow things, or in other words he took them on
their own ground; a thing which I could never quite understand, being
more or less aloof myself and yet wishing always to be able so to do, to
take life, as he did.

For he desired, and secured, their good will and drew them to him. He
took a simple, natural pleasure in the kinds of things they were able to
do, as well as the kinds of things he could do. With these, then, and a
type of girl who might not be classed above the clerk or manicure class,
he and they managed to eke out a social life, the outstanding phases of
which were dances, "parties," dinners at one simple home and another,