granted, worshiping frankly, sweetly, with the candid, innocent
informality of barbarians to whom the conventional was the unknown.
After all, why not? Isn't word of eye as sacred as word of mouth?

Bess returned to them from the hall.

"I say, Bess!" bleated Mr. Fopling anxiously.

"In a moment, child!" returned Bess, in maternal tones.

Mr. Fopling relapsed, while Richard was amused. Some corner of Richard's
amusement must have stuck out to attract the notice of Bess. She met it
finely, undisturbed.

"Some day, Mr. Storms," beamed Bess, as though replying to a question,
"I shall talk to you on marriage and husbands."

"Why not on marriage and wives?"

"Because I would not speak of the philosopher and the experiment, but of
the experiment and the result. Marriage is a cause; the husband an
effect. Husbands are artificial and made by marriage. Wives, like poets,
are born, not made. I shall talk to you on marriage and husbands; I have
some original ideas, I assure you."

"Now I can well believe that!" declared Richard, much tumbled about in
his mind. Bess's harangue left him wondering whether she might not be
possessed of a mild mania on wedlock and husbands.

"You need have no misgivings," returned Bess, as though reading his