One lady, who knew him well, said that, though he only met you in a crowd and made some commonplace remark, you went for the rest of the day with your head up.

Another lady who did not know him, and therefore disliked him, asked after a dinner party, "Who was that too-exuberant financier ?" These are the diversities of feeling about him.

But they all agree in one point--that he did not talk cleverly, or try to talk cleverly, as that proceeding is understood in literary circles.

He talked positively, he talked a great deal, but he never attempted to give that neat and aesthetic character to his speech which is almost invariable in the case of the man who is vain of his mental superiority.

When he did impress people with mental gymnastics, it was mostly in the form of pouring out, with passionate enthusiasm, whole epics written by other people, which is the last thing that the literary egotist would be likely to waste his time over.