But I was not a negro--not even relatively a Hindoo.

I was somebody, confound it, I was somebody.
As an author, I had been so uniformly unsuccessful, so absolutely unrecognised, that I had got into the way of regarding myself as ahead of my time, as a worker for posterity.

It was a habit of mind--the only revenge that I could take upon despiteful Fate.

This girl came to confound me with the common herd--she declared herself to be that very posterity for which I worked.
She was probably a member of some clique that called themselves Fourth Dimensionists--just as there had been pre-Raphaelites.

It was a matter of cant allegory.