And he was taken in, and used to discourse on them by the hour.
On fine days he was driven to the green-houses in his pony-chair,
and waddled through them, prodding and leering at the fruit, like
a fat Turk in his seraglio. When he bragged to me of the expense
of growing them I was reminded of a hideous old Lothario bragging
of what his pleasures cost. And the resemblance was completed by
the fact that he couldn't eat as much as a mouthful of his
melons--had lived for years on buttermilk and toast. 'But, after
all, it's my only hobby--why shouldn't I indulge it?' he said
sentimentally. As if I'd ever been able to indulge any of mine!
On the keep of those melons Kate and I could have lived like
gods. . .

"One day toward the end of the summer, when Kate was too unwell
to drag herself up to the big house, she asked me to go and spend
the afternoon with cousin Joseph. It was a lovely soft September
afternoon--a day to lie under a Roman stone-pine, with one's eyes
on the sky, and let the cosmic harmonies rush through one.
Perhaps the vision was suggested by the fact that, as I entered
cousin Joseph's hideous black walnut library, I passed one of the
under-gardeners, a handsome full-throated Italian, who dashed out
in such a hurry that he nearly knocked me down. I remember
thinking it queer that the fellow, whom I had often seen about
the melon-houses, did not bow to me, or even seem to see me.

"Cousin Joseph sat in his usual seat, behind the darkened
windows, his fat hands folded on his protuberant waistcoat, the
last number of the Churchman at his elbow, and near it, on a huge
dish, a fat melon--the fattest melon I'd ever seen. As I looked
at it I pictured the ecstasy of contemplation from which I must