the Dean's hand, the words: "Only a woman's hair." An instance, says Scott, of the Dean's desire to veil his feelings under the mask of cynical indifference.
See the various notions of critics! Do those words indicate indifference or an attempt to hide feeling? Did you ever hear or read four words more pathetic? Only a woman's hair, only love, only fidelity, only purity, innocence, beauty; only the tenderest heart in the world stricken and wounded, and passed away now out of reach of pangs of hope deferred, love insulted, and pitiless desertion;—only that lock of hair left: and memory and remorse, for the guilty, lonely wretch, shuddering over the grave of his victim.
And yet to have had so much love, he must have given some. Treasures of wit and wisdom and tenderness, too, must that man have had locked up in the caverns of his gloomy heart, and shown fitfully to one or two whom he took in there. But it was not good to visit that place. People did not remain there long, and suffered for having been there.[1] He shrank away from all affections sooner or later. Stella and Vanessa both died near him, and away from him. He had not heart
- ↑ "M. Swift est Rabelais dans son bon sens, et vivant en bonne compagnie. Il n'a pas, á la verite, la gaité du premier, mais il a toute la finesse, la raison, le choix, le bon goût qui manquent à notre curé de Meudon. Ses vers sont d'un goût singulier, et presque inimitable; la bonne plaisanterie est son partage en vers et en prose; mais pour le bien en tendre il faut faire un petit voyage dans son pays."—Voltaire, Lettres sur les Anglais, Let. 22.
