Part 45 (1/2)
”The present age is truly a strange one,” she exclaimed.
”Do you think so? It always seems to me that the present age is finding out for the first time how very strange all the _other_ ages have been.”
”However that may be, it seems to me, that a sort of s.h.i.+ver is going through all Society, as if it had suddenly become very much aware of things and couldn't make them out--nor itself.”
”Like a creature beginning to struggle through a bad illness. I do think it is all extremely remarkable, especially the bad illness.”
”You are as strange as your epoch,” cried Lady Engleton.
”It is a sorry sign when one remarks health instead of disease.”
”Upon my word, you have a wholesome confidence in yourself!”
”I do not, in that respect, differ from my kind,” Hadria returned calmly.
”It is that which _was_ that seems to you astonis.h.i.+ng, not that which is to be,” Lady Engleton commented, pensively. ”For my part I confess I am frightened, almost terrified at times, at that which is to be.”
”I am frightened, terrified, so that the thought becomes unbearable, at that which _is_,” said Hadria.
There was a long silence. Lady Engleton appeared to be again plunged in thought.
”The maternal instinct--yes; it seems to be round that unacknowledged centre that the whole storm is raging.”
”A desperate question that Society shrinks from in terror: whether women shall be expected to conduct themselves as if the instinct had been weighed out accurately, like weekly stores, and given to all alike, or whether choice and individual feeling is to be held lawful in this matter--_there_ is the red-hot heart of the battle.”
”Remember men of science are against freedom in this respect. (I do wish _our_ man of science would make haste.)”
”They rush to the rescue when they see the sentimental defences giving way,” said Hadria. ”If the 'sacred privilege' and 'n.o.blest vocation'
safeguards won't hold, science must throw up entrenchments.”
”I prefer the more romantic and sentimental presentment of the matter,”
said Lady Engleton.
”Naturally. Ah! it is pathetic, the way we have tried to make things decorative; but it won't hold out much longer. Women are driving their masters to plain speaking--the ornaments are being dragged down. And what do we find? Bare and very ugly fact. And if we venture to hint that this unsatisfactory skeleton may be modified in form, science becomes stern. She wishes things, in this department, left as they are. Women are made for purposes of reproduction; let them clearly understand that.
No picking and choosing.”
”Men pick and choose, it is true,” observed Lady Engleton in a musing tone, as if thinking aloud.
”Ah, but that's different--a real scientific argument, though a superficial observer might not credit it. At any rate, it is quite sufficiently scientific for this particular subject. Our leaders of thought don't bring out their Sunday-best logic on this question. They lounge in dressing-gown and slippers. One gets to know the oriental pattern of that dressing-gown and the worn-down heels of those old slippers.”
”They may be right though, notwithstanding their logic,” said Lady Engleton.
”By good luck, not good guidance. I wonder what her Serene Highness Science would say if she heard us?”
”That we two ignorant creatures are very presumptuous.”
”Yes, people always fall back on that, when they can't refute you.”