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1"All right, Uncle George, I'll tell her, but it won't have any effect. Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity.
2It is their distinguishing characteristic." The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his servant.
3Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street and turned his steps in the direction of Berkeley Square. So
4that was the story of Dorian Gray's parentage. Crudely as it had been told to him, it had yet stirred him by its
5suggestion of a strange, almost modern romance. A beautiful woman risking everything for a mad passion. A few wild weeks
6of happiness cut short by a hideous, treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then a child born in pain. The
7mother snatched away by death, the boy left to solitude and the tyranny of an old and loveless man. Yes; it was an
8interesting background. It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it were. Behind every exquisite thing that existed,
9there was something tragic. Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might blow.... And how charming he had
10been at dinner the night before, as with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure he had sat opposite to him
11at the club, the red candleshades staining to a richer rose the wakening wonder of his face. Talking to him was like
12playing upon an exquisite violin. He answered to every touch and thrill of the bow.... There was something terribly
13enthralling in the exercise of influence. No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into some gracious form,
14and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music of
15passion and youth; to convey one's temperament into another as though it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: there
16was a real joy in that--perhaps the most satisfying joy left to us in an age so limited and vulgar as our own, an age
17grossly carnal in its pleasures, and grossly common in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, whom by so
18curious a chance he had met in Basil's studio, or could be fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. Grace was his,
19and the white purity of boyhood, and beauty such as old Greek marbles kept for us. There was nothing that one could not
20do with him. He could be made a Titan or a toy. What a pity it was that such beauty was destined to fade! ... And Basil?
21From a psychological point of view, how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh mode of looking at life,
22suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence of one who was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt
23in dim woodland, and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing herself, Dryadlike and not afraid, because in his
24soul who sought for her there had been wakened that wonderful vision to which alone are wonderful things revealed; the
25mere shapes and patterns of things becoming, as it were, refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, as though they
26were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! He
27remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, that artist in thought, who had first analyzed it? Was it not
28Buonarotti who had carved it in the coloured marbles of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own century it was strange....
29Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray what, without knowing it, the lad was to the painter who had fashioned the
30wonderful portrait. He would seek to dominate him--had already, indeed, half done so. He would make that wonderful
31spirit his own. There was something fascinating in this son of love and death. Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the
32houses. He found that he had passed his aunt's some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. When he entered the
33somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick
34and passed into the dining-room. "Late as usual, Harry," cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. He invented a facile
35excuse, and having taken the vacant seat next to her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed to him shyly from
36the end of the table, a flush of pleasure stealing into his cheek. Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, a lady of
37admirable good-nature and good temper, much liked by every one who knew her, and of those ample architectural
38proportions that in women who are not duchesses are described by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat,
39on her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, who followed his leader in public life and in private
40life followed the best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking with the Liberals, in accordance with a wise and
41well-known rule. The post on her left was occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, an old gentleman of considerable charm
42and culture, who had fallen, however, into bad habits of silence, having, as he explained once to Lady Agatha, said
43everything that he had to say before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, one of his aunt's oldest
44friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book.
45Fortunately for him she had on the other side Lord Faudel, a most intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, as bald as a
46ministerial statement in the House of Commons, with whom she was conversing in that intensely earnest manner which is
47the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once himself, that all really good people fall into, and from which none of
48them ever quite escape. "We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry," cried the duchess, nodding pleasantly to him
49across the table. "Do you think he will really marry this fascinating young person?" "I believe she has made up her mind
50to propose to him, Duchess." "How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Agatha. "Really, some one should interfere." "I am told, on
51excellent authority, that her father keeps an American dry-goods store," said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious.
52"My uncle has already suggested pork-packing, Sir Thomas." "Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the duchess,
53raising her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. "American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to
54some quail. The duchess looked puzzled. "Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never means anything that
55he says." "When America was discovered," said the Radical member--and he began to give some wearisome facts. Like all
56people who try to exhaust a subject, he exhausted his listeners. The duchess sighed and exercised her privilege of
57interruption. "I wish to goodness it never had been discovered at all!" she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance
58nowadays. It is most unfair." "Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," said Mr. Erskine; "I myself would
59say that it had merely been detected." "Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the duchess vaguely.
60"I must confess that most of them are extremely pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. I
61wish I could afford to do the same." "They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," chuckled Sir Thomas, who
62had a large wardrobe of Humour's cast-off clothes. "Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" inquired
63the duchess. "They go to America," murmured Lord Henry. Sir Thomas frowned. "I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced
64against that great country," he said to Lady Agatha. "I have travelled all over it in cars provided by the directors,
65who, in such matters, are extremely civil. I assure you that it is an education to visit it." "But must we really see
66Chicago in order to be educated?" asked Mr. Erskine plaintively. "I don't feel up to the journey." Sir Thomas waved his
67hand. "Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on his shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about
68them. The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are absolutely reasonable. I think that is their
69distinguishing characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely reasonable people. I assure you there is no nonsense
70about the Americans." "How dreadful!" cried Lord Henry. "I can stand brute force, but brute reason is quite unbearable.
71There is something unfair about its use. It is hitting below the intellect." "I do not understand you," said Sir Thomas,
72growing rather red. "I do, Lord Henry," murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. "Paradoxes are all very well in their
73way...." rejoined the baronet.
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