restfulness was conveyed partly by the fat green sofa and the almost
superfluous number of extremely comfortable arm-chairs, and Peter's
attitude in one of them. On a frame in a corner a large piece of
embroidery was stretched--a cherry tree in blossom coming to slow birth
on a green serge background. Peter was quite good at embroidery. He
carried pieces of it (mostly elaborately designed book-covers) about in
his pockets, and took them out at tea-parties and (surreptitiously) at
lectures. He said it was soothing, like smoking; only smoking didn't
soothe him, it made him feel ill. On days when he had been doing tiresome
or boring or jarring things, or been associating with a certain type of
person, he did a great deal of embroidery in the evenings, because, as he
said, it was such a change. The embroidery stood for a symbol, a type of
the pleasures of the senses, and when he fell to it with fervour beyond
the ordinary, one understood that he had been having a surfeit of the
displeasures of the senses, and felt need to restore the balance.

Hilary stopped before a piece of extremely shabby, frayed and dingy
tapestry, that had the appearance of having once been even dingier and
shabbier. It looked as if it had lain for years in a dusty corner of
a dusty old shop, till someone had found it and been pleased by it and
taken possession, loving it through its squalor.

"Rather nice," said Hilary. "Really good, isn't it?"

Peter nodded. "Gobelin, of the best time. Someone told me that
afterwards. When I bought it, I only knew it was nice. A man wanted to
buy it from me for quite a lot."

Hilary looked about him. "You've got some good things. How do you pick
them up?"