I am obsessed by that phrase--a WOMAN AND DESIRABLE. It beats in my
brain, in my thought. I go out of my way to steal a glimpse of Miss
West through a cabin door or vista of hall when she does not know I
am looking. A woman is a wonderful thing. A woman's hair is
wonderful. A woman's softness is a magic.--Oh, I know them for what
they are, and yet this very knowledge makes them only the more
wonderful. I know--I would stake my soul--that Miss West has
considered me as a mate a thousand times to once that I have so
considered her. And yet--she is a woman and desirable.

And I find myself continually reminded of Richard Le Gallienne's
inimitable quatrain:


"Were I a woman, I would all day long
Sing my own beauty in some holy song,
Bend low before it, hushed and half afraid,
And say 'I am a woman' all day long."


Let me advise all philosophers suffering from world-sickness to take
a long sea voyage with a woman like Miss West.

In this narrative I shall call her "Miss West" no more. She has
ceased to be Miss West. She is Margaret. I do not think of her as
Miss West. I think of her as Margaret. It is a pretty word, a
woman-word. What poet must have created it! Margaret! I never tire
of it. My tongue is enamoured of it. Margaret West! What a name to
conjure with! A name provocative of dreams and mighty connotations.