Praise gave him the fillip needed in order to make him surpass himself.

His talk took on a sort of autumnal richness of colour, and assumed a new width of range; he now used pathos as well as humour and generally brought in a story or apologue to lend variety to the entertainment.

His little weaknesses, too, began to show themselves and they grew rankly in the sunshine.

He always wanted to do himself well, as the phrase goes, but now he began to eat and drink more freely than before.

His vanity became defiant.
I noticed one day that he had signed himself, Oscar O'Flahertie Wilde, I think under some verses which he had contributed years before to his College magazine.