"That's a superficial view, Marian. Neither poetic or outlandish
costume, nor the impossible language put into the mouths of their
creations by the old bards, makes the unconventional woman. There
is, in truth, a conventionality about these very things, only it
is antiquated. It is not a woman's dress or phraseology that makes
her an ideal or an inspiration, but what she is herself. No two
leaves are alike on the same tree, but they are all enough alike
to make but one impression. Some are more shapely than others,
and flutter from their support with a fairer and more conspicuous
grace to the closely observant; but there is nothing independent
about them, nothing to distinguish them especially from their
companions. They fulfil their general purpose, and fall away. This
simile applies to the majority of people. Not only poetry and romance,
but history also, gives us instances wherein men and women differ
and break away from accepted types, some in absurd or grotesque
ways, others through the sheer force of gifted selfishness, and
others still in natural, noble development of graces of heart and
mind."

"Stop generalizing, and tell me, your silly, vain, flirtatious
daughter, how I can be unconventional in this prosaic midday of
civilization."

"Prosaic day? You are mistaken, Marian. There never was a period
like it Barbaric principles, older than Abraham, are now to triumph,
or give place to a better and more enlightened human nature. We
almost at this moment hear the echoes of a strife in which specimens
of the best manhood of the age are arrayed against one another in
a struggle such as the world has never witnessed. I have my part
in the conflict, and it brings to me great responsibilities and