God knows my work lacks many, many things--" "But it doesn't lack that one essential which mine lacks.

_What_ is it ?" Querida laughed: "I can't explain.

For me--your Byzantine canvas--there is in it something not intimate--" "Austere ?" "Yes--even in those divine and lovely throngs.

There is, perhaps, an aloofness--even a self-denial--" He laughed again: "I deny myself nothing--on canvas--even I have the audacity to try to draw as you do!" Neville sat thinking, watching the landscape speed away on either side in a running riot of green.
"Self-denial--too much of it--separates you from your kind," said Querida.

"The solitary fasters are never personally pleasant; hermits are the world's public admiration and private abomination.