but a character; their cat is a possible reservoir of humorous
observation; they look out of window and see men as columns walking.
Even the sanctity of their own hearts, their self-respect, their most
private emotions are disregarded. The wife is infected with the taint.
Her private opinion of her husband she makes into a short story--forgets
its origin and shows it him with pride--while the husband decants his
heart-beats into occasional verse and minor poetry. It is amazing what a
lot of latter-day literature consists of such breaches of confidence.
And not simply latter-day literature.

The visitor is fortunate who leaves no marketable impression behind. The
literary entertainers eye you over, as if they were dealers in a slave
mart, and speculate on your uses. They try to think how you would do as
a scoundrel, and mark your little turns of phrase and kinks of thought
to that end. The innocent visitor bites his cake and talks about
theatres, while the meditative person in the arm-chair may be in
imagination stabbing him, or starving him on a desert island, or
even--horrible to tell!--flinging him headlong into the arms of the
young lady to the right and "covering her face with a thousand
passionate kisses." A manuscript in the rough of Euphemia's, that I
recently suppressed, was an absolutely scandalous example of this method
of utilising one's acquaintances. Mrs. Harborough, who was indeed
Euphemia's most confidential friend for six weeks and more, she had
made to elope with Scrimgeour--as steady and honourable a man as we
know, though unpleasant to Euphemia on account of his manner of holding
his teacup. I believe there really was something--quite harmless, of
course--between Mrs. Harborough and Scrimgeour, and that, imparted in
confidence, had been touched up with vivid colour here and there and
utilised freely. Scrimgeour is represented as always holding teacups in
his peculiar way, so that anyone would recognise him at once. Euphemia