Among the visitors who frequented Lucy's home, people whom she considered
astonishingly pleasant to look at and to listen to did not abound; so
Lucy enjoyed the change all the more.

The first time Peter took Urquhart down to Chelsea to call on his Hope
uncle and cousins, one Sunday afternoon, he gave him a succinct account
of the sort of people they would probably meet there.

"They have oddities in, you know--and particularly on Sunday afternoons.
They usually have one or two staying in the house, too. They keep open
house for wastrels. A lot of them are aliens--Polish refugees, Russian
anarchists, oppressed Finns, massacred Armenians who do embroidery;
violinists who can't earn a living, decayed chimney-sweeps and so forth.
'Disillusioned (or still illusioned) geniuses, would-bes, theorists,
artistic natures, failed reformers, knaves and fools incompetent or
over-old, broken evangelists and debauchees, inebriates, criminals,
cowards, virtual slaves' ... Anyhow it's a home for Lost Hopes. (Do you
see that?) My uncle is keen on anyone who tries to revolt against
anything--governments, Russians, proprieties, or anything else--and
Felicity is keen on anyone who fails."

"And your other cousin--what is she keen on?"

"Oh, Lucy's too young for the Oddities, like me. She and I sit in a
corner and look on. It's my uncle and Felicity they like to talk to. They
talk about Liberty to them, you know. My uncle is great on Liberty. And
they give them lemon in their tea, and say how wicked Russians are, and
how stupid Royal Academicians are, and buy the Armenians' embroidery,
and so forth. Lucy and I don't do that well. I disapprove of liberty for
most people, I think, and certainly for them; and I don't like lemon in