He could not help wondering whether, in the bulk, they were not just as dependent on each other as the inhabitants of Kensington; whether, like locomotives, they could run at all without these opportunities for blowing off the steam, and what would be left when the steam had all escaped.

Somebody ceased playing the violin, and close to him a group began discussing ethics.
Aspirations were in the air all round, like a lot of hungry ghosts.

He realised that, if tongue be given to them, the flavour vanishes from ideas which haunt the soul.
Again the violinist played.
"Cock gracious!" said the Prussian poet, falling into English as the fiddle ceased: "Colossal! 'Aber, wie er ist grossartig'!" "Have you read that thing of Besom's ?" asked shrill voice behind.
"Oh, my dear fellow! too horrid for words; he ought to be hanged!" "The man's dreadful," pursued the voice, shriller than ever; "nothing but a volcanic eruption would cure him." Shelton turned in alarm to look at the authors of these statements.

They were two men of letters talking of a third.
"'C'est un grand naif, vous savez,'" said the second speaker.
"These fellows don't exist," resumed the first; his small eyes gleamed with a green light, his whole face had a look as if he gnawed himself.
Though not a man of letters, Shelton could not help recognising from those eyes what joy it was to say those words: "These fellows don't exist!" "Poor Besom! You know what Moulter said.

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