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The History of Pendennis by William Makepeace Thackeray
page 45 of 1146 (03%)
floating fancies under which he sweetly suffered--of a young lady to whom
he could really make verses, and whom he could set up and adore, in place
of those unsubstantial Ianthes and Zuleikas to whom he addressed the
outpourings of his gushing muse. He read his favourite poems over and
over again, he called upon Alma Venus the delight of gods and men, he
translated Anacreon's odes, and picked out passages suitable to his
complaint from Waller, Dryden, Prior, and the like. Smirke and he were
never weary, in their interviews, of discoursing about love. The
faithless tutor entertained him with sentimental conversations in place
of lectures on algebra and Greek; for Smirke was in love too. Who could
help it, being in daily intercourse with such a woman? Smirke was madly
in love (as far as such a mild flame as Mr. Smirke's may be called
madness) with Mrs. Pendennis. That honest lady, sitting down below stairs
teaching little Laura to play the piano, or devising flannel petticoats
for the poor round about her, or otherwise busied with the calm routine
of her modest and spotless Christian life, was little aware what storms
were brewing in two bosoms upstairs in the study--in Pen's, as he sate in
his shooting jacket, with his elbows on the green study-table, and his
hands clutching his curly brown hair, Homer under his nose,--and in
worthy Mr. Smirke's, with whom he was reading. Here they would talk about
Helen and Andromache. "Andromache's like my mother," Pen used to avouch;
"but I say, Smirke, by Jove I'd cut off my nose to see Helen;" and he
would spout certain favourite lines which the reader will find in their
proper place in the third book. He drew portraits of her--they are extant
still--with straight noses and enormous eyes, and 'Arthur Pendennis
delineavit et pinxit' gallantly written underneath.

As for Mr. Smirke he naturally preferred Andromache. And in consequence
he was uncommonly kind to Pen. He gave him his Elzevir Horace, of which
the boy was fond, and his little Greek Testament which his own mamma at
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