It was impossible she found to recall how the talk had developed, but now that hardly mattered. The real value of a talk is not how it goes but what it leaves in your memory, which is one reason perhaps why dialogues in books are always so boring to read. Even Plato was boring. Jowett’s Plato had been one of the acutest disappointments in her life. She remembered how she had got the “Symposium” volume out of her father’s library and struggled with it in the apple tree. She had expected something like a bag of unimagined jewels. In any talk much of what was said was like the wire stage of a clay model and better forgotten as soon as it was covered over. But what was left from last night was a fabric8 plain and large in its incompleted outline, in which she felt her mind could wander about very agreeably and very profitably whenever she was so disposed. And in which Philip’s mind might be wandering even now.
This morning however she had little energy for such exploration. She approved of the great talk and blessed it and felt that it had added very much to her life. But she surveyed it only from the outside. The chief thing in her consciousness was that she was very comfortable and that she did not intend to get up. She would lie and think. But so far it seemed likely to be pure thought she would produce, without any contamination with particular things. She was very comfortable, propped9 up by pillows in her extensive bed.
She was, also, had she been able to see herself, very pretty. She was wearing a silk bed-jacket that just repeated a little more intensely the sapphire10 colour beneath her lace bedspread. It was trimmed with white fur. Her ruffled11 hair made her look like a very jolly but rather fragile boy. A great canopy12 supported by bed-posts of carved wood did its utmost to enhance the importance of the mistress of Casa Terragena. The dressing13 table with its furnishings of silver and shining enamel14 and cut and coloured glass, enforced the idea that whatever size the lady chose to be, it was the duty of her bedroom to treat her as an outsize in gracious ladies. The curtains of the window to the south-east still shut out the sunlight, but the western window was wide open and showed a stone-pine in the nearer distance, a rocky promontory15, and then far away the sunlit French coast and Mentone and Cap Martin.
The day was fine but not convincingly fine. Over the sea was a long line of woolly yet possibly wicked little clouds putting their heads together. But so often in this easy climate such conspiracies16 came to nothing.
She wasn’t going down to breakfast; she did not intend indeed to go down until lunch. She was taking the fullest advantage of her state to be thoroughly17 lazy and self-indulgent and lie and play with her mind. Or doze18 as the mood might take her. Philip and Catherine and Geoffry and dear Miss Fenimore and everybody, let alone Bombaccio the major-domo and his morning minion19, would see that everybody was given coffee and tea and hot rolls and eggs and bacon and fruit and Dundee marmalade, according to their needs. They would all see to each other and Bombaccio would see to all of them. Just think. She would not force her thinking or think anything out, but she would let her thoughts run.
This onset20 of maternity21 about which feminists22 and serious spinsters made such a fuss, was proving to be not at all the dreadful experience she had prepared herself to face. Soft folds of indolent well-being23 seemed to be wrapping about her, fold upon fold.
After all, bearing heirs to the Rylands’ millions was a very easy and pleasant sort of work to do in the world. Almost too easy and pleasant when one considered the pay. Smooth. Gentle. Living to the tune24 of a quiet murmur25. She remembered something her Sussex aunt, Aunt Janet Nicholas, Aunt Janet the prolific26, had once said. “It makes you feel less and less like being Brighton and more and more like being the Downs.” The Downs, the drowsy27 old Downs in summer sunshine. The tiny harebells in the turf. The velvet28 sound of bees. A peacefulness of body and soul. And yet one could think as clearly and pleasantly as ever. Or at least one seemed to think.
She had an idea, a by no means imperative29 idea, that presently when she had done with realising how comfortable she was, her thoughts might after all take a stroll about the aisles30 and cloisters31 of the overnight discussion, but instead she found herself thinking alternatively of two more established prepossessions. One was Philip and his interest in the talk and the other, which somehow ought to be quite detached from him and yet which seemed this morning to be following the thought of him like a shadow, was —Stupids.
Philip’s interest in this discussion had surprised her, and yet it was only the culminating fact to something that had been very present to her mind for some little time. She was convinced — and she had always been convinced — that Philip’s mind was a very vigorous and able one, a mind of essential nobility and limitless possibilities, but so soon as she had got over the emotion and amazement32 of the wonderful marriage that had lifted her out of the parental33 Hampshire rectory to be the mistress of three lovely homes, and begun really to look at Philip and consider him not as a love god but as a human being, she had perceived a certain restrictedness in his intellectual equipment. Apparently34 he had read scarcely anything of the slightest importance in the world; he had gone through the educational furnaces of Eton and had a year at Oxford35 before the war, unscathed by sound learning of any sort. The smell of intellectual fire had not passed upon him. Not a hair of his head had been singed36 by it. He was amazingly inexpressive and inarticulate. If he knew the English language, for some reason he cut most of it dead. And he opened a book about as often as he took medicine, which was never.
Yet he seemed to know a lot of things and every now and then she found she had to admit him not only cleverer but more knowledgeable37 than she was. If he had read little, he had picked up a lot. He had been a good soldier under Allenby, they said, especially in the East. In spite of his youth men had been glad to follow him. And in spite of his silences all sorts of intelligent people respected him. Mr. Plantagenet-Buchan and Mr. Sempack betrayed no contempt nor pity for such rare remarks as he made. They were infrequent but sound. He conducted, or at any rate helped to conduct, business operations that were still extremely vague to her, operations that she had gathered had to do mainly with steel. When he went into Parliament, and he was nursing Sealholme to that end, he would, she was sure, be quite a good member of Parliament. And yet — she knew it and still her mind struggled against the admission — there was something that was lacking. A vigour38, an expansion. His mind refused to be militant39, was at best reserved and a commentary. Dear and adorable Philip! Was it treason to think as much? Was it treason to want him perfect?
Her own family was an old Whig family with traditions of intellectual aggressiveness. She had cousins who were university professors, and her home, so close and convenient for Oxford, had been actively40 bookish and alive to poetry and painting. She had listened to good talk before she was fifteen. She had not always understood, but she had listened soundly. She had grown up into the idea that there was this something eminently41 desirable that you got from the literature of the world, that was conveyed insidiously43 by great music, and by all sorts of cared-for and venerated44 lovely things. It went with a frequent fine use of the mind, a conscious use, and it took all science by the way. It was an inward and spiritual grace, this something, that was needed to make the large, handsome and magnificently prosperous things of life worth while. She had not so much thought out these ideas to their definiteness, as apprehended45 their existence established in her mind. And when all the storm of meeting this glorious happy Philip and attracting him and being loved by him and marrying him and becoming the most fortunate of young women subsided46, there were these values, still entrenched47, reflecting upon all that she had achieved.
There in the middle of her world ruled this sun-god, this dear friend and lover, active, quietly amused, bringing her with such an adorable pride and such adorable humility48 to the homes of his fathers, giving, exhibiting; and yet as one settled into this life, as day followed day, and one began to realise what the routines and usages, the interests and entertainments amounted to, there arose this whisper of discontent, this rebellious49 idea that still something was lacking.
The life was so large and free and splendid in comparison with anything that she might reasonably have hoped for, that there seemed a whiff of ingratitude50 even in thinking that it was also rather superficial.
It wasn’t, she told herself, that this new life that made her a great lady wasn’t good enough for her. She was a lucky woman. Her estimate of herself was balanced and unexacting. She had never been able to make up her mind whether she was rather more than usually clever or rather more than usually stupid; she was inclined to think both. It wasn’t a question of how this new life became her, but how it became Philip. The point was that it was somehow not good enough for Philip. And, if this wasn’t a paradox51, as if Philip wasn’t as yet quite good enough for himself.
And still more evasive and subtle was her recent apprehension52 of the fact that Philip himself knew that somehow he wasn’t quite good enough for himself. This new perception had reached back, as it were, and supplied an explanation of why Philip had come out of a world of alert and brilliant women, to her of all people. Because about her that had been a sort of schoolgirl prestige of knowledge and cleverness, and perhaps for him that had seemed to promise just whatever it was that would supply that haunting yet impalpable insufficiency. Instead of which, she reflected, here in this almost regal apartment, she had given him a dewy passion of love, worship, physical, but physical as tears and moonlight, and now this promise of a child.
Had he forgotten, in his new phase of grateful protectiveness, what need it was had first brought them together?
Quite recently, and after being altogether blind to it, she had discovered these gropings out towards something more than the current interests of his happy and healthy days. He was questioning things. But he was questioning them as though he had forgotten she existed. He was, for example, quite markedly exercised by this question of a possible coal strike in England. With amazement she had become aware how keenly he was interested. For all she knew the Rylands’ millions were deeply involved in coal, but it wasn’t, she was assured, on any personal account that he was interested.
Beyond the question of the miners, there was something more. He was concerned about England. She had thought at first that, like nearly all his class, he took the Empire and the social system, and so forth53, for granted, and the secret undertow of her mind, her memories of talk at the parental table, had made it seem a little wanting in him to treat such questionable54 things as though they were fundamental and inalterable. But now she realised he was beginning to penetrate55 these assumptions. There had been an illuminating56 little encounter, about a week ago, with Colonel Bullace — on the night of Colonel Bullace’s arrival.
Philip never discussed; he was too untrained to discuss. But he would suddenly ask quite far-reaching questions and then take your answer off to gnaw57 it over at leisure. Or he would drop remarks, like ultimatums58, days or weeks after you had answered his questions. And a couple of these rare questions of his were fired that night at Colonel Bullace.
“What’s all this about British Fascists59?” asked Philip, out of the void.
“Eh!” said Colonel Bullace, and accumulated force. “Very necessary organisation61.”
Philip had remained patiently interrogative.
“Pat’s pretty deep in it,” dear Mrs. Bullace had explained in her simple disarming62 way.
The picture of the scene came back to Mrs. Rylands. It was a foursome that evening; the Bullaces had been the first of this present party to arrive. She recalled Colonel Bullace’s face. He was like a wiry-haired terrier. No, he was more like a Belgian griffon — with that big eyeglass, he was more like a one-eyed Belgian griffon. What a queer thing it must be to be a nice little, rather silly little woman like Mrs. Bullace and be married to a man like that, a sort of canine63 man. She supposed — for example — one would have to kiss that muzzle64. Embrace the man! Mrs. Rylands stirred uneasily under her lace bedspread at the thought. He had talked about the dangers of Communism in England, of the increasing insubordination of labour, of the gold of Moscow, and the need there was to “check these Bolsheviks.” All in sentences that were like barks. She did not remember very clearly what he said; it sounded like nonsense out of the Daily Mail. It probably was. What she remembered was Philip’s grave face and how, abruptly65, it came to her again as though she had never seen or felt it before, how handsome he was, how fine he was and how almost intolerably she loved him.
“You mean to say, you would like to provoke a general strike now? And smash the Trade unions?”
“Put ’em in their place.”
“But if you resort to ‘firmness’ now — if Joynson-Hicks and his fellow Fascists in the Cabinet, and your Daily Mail and Morning Post party, do succeed in bringing off a fight and humiliating and beating the workers and splitting England into two camps ——”
Philip found his sentence too involved and dropped it. “How many men will you leave beaten?” he asked. “How many Trade unionists are there?”
Colonel Bullace didn’t seem to know.
“Some millions of them? Englishmen?”
“Dupes of Moscow!” said Colonel Bullace. “Dupes of Moscow.”
“A day will come,” added Colonel Bullace defiantly67, “when they will be grateful to us for the lesson — grateful.”
Philip had considered that for a moment and then he had sighed deeply and said, “Oh! Let’s go to bed,” and it seemed to her that never before had she heard those four words used so definitely for calling a man a fool.
And afterwards he had come into her room, still darkly thoughtful. He had kissed her good-night almost absent-mindedly and then stood quite still for a minute perhaps at the open window looking out at the starlight. “I don’t understand all this stuff,” he said at last, to himself almost as much as to her. “I don’t understand what is going on and has been going on for some time. This British Fascist60 stuff and so on. . . . I wonder if anyone does? These work-people — and their hours and lives, and what they will stand and what they won’t. It’s all — beyond anything I know about.”
He stood silent for a time.
“Wages went down. Now — unemployment is growing and growing.
“Nobody seems to know.” It was like a sigh.
“Suppose they smash things up.”
Then in his catlike way he was gone, without a sound except the soft click of the door.
Perplexed68 Philip!
Perplexing Philip!
She looked now at the window against which he had stood and wondered how she might help him. He was the most difficult and comprehensive problem she had ever faced. This social struggle that it seemed hung over England had risen disregarded while she had been giving herself wholly to love. She did not know any of the details of the coal subsidies69 and coal compromises, that had produced this present situation about which everybody was growing anxious. It had all come on suddenly, so far as her knowledge went, in a year or so. And now here she was, useless to her man. It was no good pestering70 him with ill-informed questions. She would have to read, she would have to find out before she approached him.
It was queerly characteristic of Philip that he had pounced71 upon Mr. Sempack at the Fortescues’ at Roquebrune and brought him over, without a word of explanation. She guessed Mr. Sempack had talked about coal and labour at Roquebrune. Philip had something instinctive72 and inexplicable73 in his actions; he seemed to do things without any formulated74 reason; he had felt the need of talk as a dog will sometimes feel the need of grass and fall upon it and devour75 it. But she reproached herself that he should have had to discover this need for himself.
Talk. That she reflected had been one of the great things that had been missing in the opening months of married life. This morning it was clearly apparent to her that so spacious76 and free a life as hers and Philip’s here in Casa Terragena had no right to exist without a steady flow of lucid77 and thorough talking.
That was a final precision of something that had been evolving itself in her mind since first she had been taken up into the beauty and comfort of this Italian palace. From the outset there had been a faint murmuring in her conscience, a murmuring she spoke78 of at times as her “Socialism.” She squared this murmuring with her continued intense enjoyment79 of her new life by explaining to herself that people were given these magnificent homes and famous and entrancing gardens and scores of servants and gardeners and airy lovely rooms with luminous80 views of delicately sunlit coastlines, so that they might lead beautiful exemplary lives that would enrich the whole world. For the dresses and furnishings, the graces and harmonies of life at Casa Terragena were finally reflected in beauty and better living all down the social scale. No Socialist81 State, she was sure, with everything equal and “divided up” could create and maintain such a garden as hers, such a tradition of gardening. That was why she was not a political socialist. Because she had to be a custodian82 of beauty and the finer life. That had been her apology for her happiness, and it was the underlying83 motive84 in her discontent and in her sense of something wanting, that their life was not sustaining her apology. They had been given the best of everything and they were not even producing the best of themselves. They were living without quality.
That was it, they had been living without quality.
Tennis, she reflected, by day and bridge by night.
He was not living like an aristocrat85, he was living like a suburban86 clerk in the seventh heaven of suburbanism.
He was doing so and yet he didn’t want to do so. He was in some way hypnotised against his secret craving87 to do the finest and best with himself. And he was trying to find a way of release to be the man, the leader, the masterful figure in human affairs she surely believed he might be.
How to help him as he deserved to be helped, when one was clever and understanding perhaps but not very capable, not very brilliant, and when one was so easily fatigued88. How to help him now particularly when one was invaded and half submerged by the needs of another life?
That was a strand89 of thought familiar now to Mrs. Rylands and it twisted its way slowly through her clear unhurrying mind for the tenth time perhaps or the twentieth time, with little variations due to the overnight talk and with an extension now from Philip to a score of great houses she had visited in England and wonderful dances and assemblies where she had seen so many other men and women after his type, so expensive, so free and so materially happy. With something inexpressive and futile90 shadowing their large magnificence. And interweaving with this and embracing it now with a suggestion almost of explanation, was a still more intimate strand in her philosophy, her long established conviction that there was a great excess of Stupids in the world.
Stupids were the enemy. This grey film that rested upon things, this formalism, this shallowness, this refusal to take life in a grand and adventurous91 way, were all the work of Stupids. Stupids were her enemies as dogs are the enemies of cats.
Her conception of life as a war for self-preservation against Stupids dated from the days when she had been a small, fragile, but intractable child, much afflicted92 by governesses in her father’s rambling93 Warwickshire rectory. Stupids were lumps. Stupids were obstacles. Stupids were flatteners and diluters and spoilers of exciting and delightful94 things. They told you not to and said it was dinner time. They wanted you to put on galoshes. They said you mustn’t be too eager to excel and that everyone would laugh at you. “Don’t over-do it,” they said. In the place of your lovely things which they marred95, they had disgusting gustoes of their own. They made ineffable96 Channel-crossing faces when one said sensible things about religion and they abased97 themselves in an inelegant collapse98 of loyalty99 before quite obviously commonplace people, and quite obviously absurd institutions. And they wanted you to! And made fusses and scenes when you didn’t! Oh! Stupids! She met them in the country-side, she met them again at Somerville College where she had imagined she would be released into a company of free and vigorous virgins100.
And now in this new life of great wealth and distinction, in which it ought to be so easy for men and women to become at least as noble as their furniture and at least as glorious as their gardens, there were moments when it seemed to her that Stupid was King.
She came back to her idea of Philip as awakening101, as endeavouring to awake, from something that hypnotised him, that had caught him and hypnotised him quite early in life. He had been caught by Stupids and made to respect their opinions and their standards; he had been trained to a great and biased102 toleration of Stupids, so that they pervaded103 his life and wasted his time and interrupted his development. The Stupids at school had persuaded him that work was nothing and games were everything. The Stupids of his set had insisted that most of the English language was a mistake. The Stupids of this world set their heavy faces against all thought. She saw Philip as struggling in a sort of Stupid quicksand, needing help and not knowing where to find it, and she herself by no means secure, frantic104 to help and unable.
What if she were to try to do more than she did in making an atmosphere for Philip? The irruption and effect of Mr. Sempack had set her enquiring105 whether there were not perhaps quite a lot of other stimulating106 people to be found, and whether perhaps it wasn’t a wife’s place to collect them. Mr. Plantagenet-Buchan of course was clever, clever and dexterous107, but he did not stimulate108, and there were moments when Philip stared at some of Mr. Plantagenet-Buchan’s good things as though he couldn’t imagine why on earth they had been said. Tamars were intelligent but self-contained, they liked to wander off about the garden, just the two of them, she evidently listening to an otherwise rather silent young man, and Lady Catherine again was intelligent but quite uncultivated, a mental wild rose, a rambler, a sprawling109 sweet-briar. Philip seemed to avoid Tamar, which was natural perhaps since Tamar showed an equal shyness of Philip, but also he and Lady Catherine avoided each other, which was odd seeing how charming they both were. But all the others of the party ——?
The little face on the pillow meditated110 the inevitable111 verdict reluctantly. The loyalty of the hostess battled against an invincible112 truthfulness113.
Stupids! . . .
She had got together a houseful of Stupids. . . .
Pervasive114 and contagious115 Stupids. The struggle overnight to get the great talk going had been a serious one, exemplary, illuminating. Nowadays people like the Bullaces, the Mathisons, and Puppy Clarges, seemed to assume they had the conversational116 right of way. They had no respect for consecutiveness117. They hated to listen. They felt effaced118 unless they had something to vociferate, and it hardly mattered to them what they vociferated.
How stupid and needless Colonel Bullace’s intervention119 had been! And how characteristic of all his tribe of Stupids!
He had pricked120 up his ears at the word Utopia and coughed and turned a rather deeper pink; and after the third repetition and apropos121 of nothing in particular, he had addressed Mr. Sempack in an abrupt66, caustic122 and aggressive manner. He cut across an unfinished sentence to do so.
“I suppose, Sir,” he had said, ”you find your Utopia in Moscow?”
Mr. Sempack had regarded him as a landscape might regard a puppy. “What makes you suppose that?” he asked.
“Well! isn’t it so, Sir? Isn’t it so?”
Mr. Sempack had turned away his face again. “No,” he said over his shoulder and resumed his interrupted sentence.
Then Bombaccio, wisest and most wonderful of servants, had nudged Colonel Bullace’s elbow with the peas and the new potatoes and diverted his attention and effaced him. But surely it was wrong to have people in one’s house at all if they required that amount of suppression. Yet how often in the last few months had she heard talk effaced by Stupids like Colonel Bullace. Full of ready-made opinions they were, full of suspicions they would not even assuage123 by listening to what they wanted to condemn124.
Dear Miss Fenimore again was a demi-Stupid, a Stupid in effect, an acquiescent125 Stupid, willing perhaps but diluent to everything that had point and quality, and Lady Grieswold had been knowingly and wilfully127 invited as a Stupid, a bridge Stupid to gratify and complete the Bullaces. Her bridge was awful it seemed, but then Mrs. Bullace’s bridge was awful.
The Mathisons were a less clamorous128 sort of Stupid than Colonel Bullace, but more insidious42 and perhaps more deadly. They did not contradict and deny fine things; silently they denied. These Mathisons had been brought along by Philip and Geoffry and they were to exercise him at tennis. They did, every day. For two of his best hours in the morning and sometimes after tea Philip strove to play a better game than the Mathisons, with either Geoffry or Puppy as his partner. It tried him. It exasperated129 him. He detested130 and despised Mathison, she perceived, as much as she did, but he would not let him go and he would always play against him. He could not endure, and that was where the Stupids had him fast, that a man so inferior as Mathison, so cheap-minded, so flat-mannered, should have the better of him at anything.
They all conspired131 to put it upon Phil that his form at tennis mattered. She would go down to the court helplessly distressed132 to see her god, hot and over-polite and in a state of furious self-control, while Puppy and the others — who was it? — Miss Fenimore and some one? Mr. Haulbowline! that shadow, sat in wicker chairs and either applauded or regretted — working him up.
She smiled and affected133 interest and all the time her soul was crying out: “Philip, my darling! It’s the cream of your strength and the heart of your day you’re giving to the conquest of Mr. Mathison. And it doesn’t matter in the least. It doesn’t matter in the very least, whether you beat him or whether you don’t.”
Geoffry too it seemed played a better game than Philip. But that was an accepted superiority.
Geoffry was a deeper, more complex kind of Stupid altogether than these others. And yet so like Philip; as like Philip as a mask is like a face. Geoffry was the bad brother of the family; he had been sent down from Eton; he did nothing; he looked at his sister-in-law askance. Philip was too kind to him. He drifted in and out of Casa Terragena at his own invitation. A moral Stupid, she knew he was, with challenge and disbelief in his eyes, and yet with a queer hold upon Philip. And an occult understanding with Puppy. When Geoffry was about, Philip would rather die than say a serious thing.
And then as the accent upon all this Stupid side of the house-party was Puppy Clarges, strident and hard, a conflict of scent126 and cigarette smoke, with the wit of a music hall and an affectedly134 flat loud voice. She was tall as Catherine, but she had no grace, no fluency135 of line. Her body ran straight and hard and then suddenly turned its corners as fast as possible.
No, they made an atmosphere, an atmosphere in which it was impossible for Philip to get free from his limitations. It was his wife’s task — if it was anyone’s task — to dispel136 that atmosphere. Drive it out by getting in something better — of which Mr. Sempack was to be regarded as a type.
It wasn’t going to be easy to change this loose Terragena atmosphere. It was not to be thought of that a wife should set brother against brother . . .
Her mind was too indolent this morning to face baffling problems. For a time it lost itself and then she found herself thinking again with a certain unavoidable antagonism137 of Puppy Clarges. Why was a girl of that sort tolerated? She was rude, she was troublesome, she was occasionally indecent and she professed138 to be unchaste. Yet when Mrs. Rylands had mentioned the possibility of Puppy moving on somewhere, if other visitors were to be invited, Philip had said: “Oh, don’t turn out old Puppy. She’s all right. She’s amusing. She’s very good fun. She’s so good for Lady Tamar.”
The shadow of perplexed speculation139 rested upon the pretty face against the pillows. It was not so much that Mrs. Rylands disliked Puppy as that she failed so completely and distressingly140 even to begin to understand the reaction of her world to this angular and aggressive young woman.
Puppy boasted by implication and almost by plain statement of her lovers.
Who could love that body of pot-hooks and hangers141? Love was an affair of beauty; first and last it had to be beautiful. How could anyone set about making love to Puppy? When men made love — Mrs. Rylands generalised boldly from the one man she knew — when men made love, they were adorably diffident, they trembled, they were inconceivably, wonderfully tender and worshipful. Love, when one dared to think of love, came into one’s mind as a sacrament, a miracle, a mutual142 dissolution, as whispers in the shadows, as infinite loveliness and a glory. Love was pity, was tears, was a great harmony of all that was gentle, gracious, proud and aspiring143 in existence, towering up to an ecstasy144 of sense and spirit. But Puppy? The very thought of Puppy and a lover was obscene.
And she had lovers.
How different must be their quality from Philip’s!
The idea came from nowhere into Mrs. Rylands’ mind that life had two faces and that one was hidden from her. Life and perhaps everything in life had two faces. This queer idea had come into her mind like an uninvited guest. She had always thought before of Stupids as defective145 and troublesome people against whom one had to maintain one’s life, but against whom there was no question whatever of being able to maintain one’s life. But suppose there was something behind the Stupid in life, nearly as great, if not quite as great as greatness, nearly as great, if not quite so great as nobility and beauty?
Suppose one lay in bed too long, and held emptiness of life, idleness, shallowness, noise and shamelessness, too cheaply? Suppose while one lay in bed, they stole a march upon one?
The mistress of Casa Terragena lay very still for some moments and then her hand began to feel for the bell-push that was swathed in the old-fashioned silk bell-pull behind her. She had decided146 to get up.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
contemplated
|
|
| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
sipped
|
|
| v.小口喝，呷，抿( sip的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
fatigue
|
|
| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
plagiarism
|
|
| n.剽窃，抄袭 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
exhausted
|
|
| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
diabolical
|
|
| adj.恶魔似的，凶暴的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
lapse
|
|
| n.过失，流逝，失效，抛弃信仰，间隔；vi.堕落，停止，失效，流逝；vt.使失效 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
fabric
|
|
| n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
propped
|
|
| 支撑，支持，维持( prop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
sapphire
|
|
| n.青玉，蓝宝石；adj.天蓝色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
ruffled
|
|
| adj. 有褶饰边的, 起皱的 动词ruffle的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
canopy
|
|
| n.天篷，遮篷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
dressing
|
|
| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
enamel
|
|
| n.珐琅，搪瓷，瓷釉；(牙齿的)珐琅质 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
promontory
|
|
| n.海角；岬 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
conspiracies
|
|
| n.阴谋，密谋( conspiracy的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
thoroughly
|
|
| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
doze
|
|
| v.打瞌睡；n.打盹，假寐 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
minion
|
|
| n.宠仆；宠爱之人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
onset
|
|
| n.进攻，袭击，开始，突然开始 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
maternity
|
|
| n.母性，母道，妇产科病房；adj.孕妇的，母性的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
feminists
|
|
| n.男女平等主义者，女权扩张论者( feminist的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
well-being
|
|
| n.安康，安乐，幸福 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
tune
|
|
| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
murmur
|
|
| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
prolific
|
|
| adj.丰富的，大量的；多产的，富有创造力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
drowsy
|
|
| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
velvet
|
|
| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
imperative
|
|
| n.命令，需要；规则；祈使语气；adj.强制的；紧急的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
aisles
|
|
| n. (席位间的)通道, 侧廊 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
cloisters
|
|
| n.（学院、修道院、教堂等建筑的）走廊( cloister的名词复数 )；回廊；修道院的生活；隐居v.隐退，使与世隔绝( cloister的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
amazement
|
|
| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
parental
|
|
| adj.父母的；父的；母的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
apparently
|
|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
Oxford
|
|
| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
singed
|
|
| v.浅表烧焦( singe的过去式和过去分词 )；（毛发）燎，烧焦尖端[边儿] | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
knowledgeable
|
|
| adj.知识渊博的；有见识的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
vigour
|
|
| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
militant
|
|
| adj.激进的，好斗的；n.激进分子，斗士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
actively
|
|
| adv.积极地，勤奋地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
eminently
|
|
| adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
insidious
|
|
| adj.阴险的，隐匿的，暗中为害的，（疾病）不知不觉之间加剧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
insidiously
|
|
| 潜在地，隐伏地，阴险地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
venerated
|
|
| 敬重（某人或某事物），崇敬( venerate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
apprehended
|
|
| 逮捕，拘押( apprehend的过去式和过去分词 )； 理解 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
subsided
|
|
| v.（土地）下陷（因在地下采矿）( subside的过去式和过去分词 )；减弱；下降至较低或正常水平；一下子坐在椅子等上 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
entrenched
|
|
| adj.确立的，不容易改的(风俗习惯) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
humility
|
|
| n.谦逊，谦恭 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
rebellious
|
|
| adj.造反的，反抗的，难控制的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
ingratitude
|
|
| n.忘恩负义 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
paradox
|
|
| n.似乎矛盾却正确的说法；自相矛盾的人(物) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
apprehension
|
|
| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
forth
|
|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
questionable
|
|
| adj.可疑的，有问题的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
penetrate
|
|
| v.透(渗)入；刺入，刺穿；洞察，了解 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
illuminating
|
|
| a.富于启发性的，有助阐明的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
gnaw
|
|
| v.不断地啃、咬；使苦恼，折磨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
ultimatums
|
|
| 最后通牒( ultimatum的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
fascists
|
|
| n.法西斯主义的支持者( fascist的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
fascist
|
|
| adj.法西斯主义的；法西斯党的；n.法西斯主义者，法西斯分子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
organisation
|
|
| n.组织，安排，团体，有机休 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
disarming
|
|
| adj.消除敌意的，使人消气的v.裁军( disarm的现在分词 )；使息怒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
canine
|
|
| adj.犬的，犬科的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
muzzle
|
|
| n.鼻口部；口套；枪(炮)口；vt.使缄默 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
abruptly
|
|
| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
abrupt
|
|
| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
defiantly
|
|
| adv.挑战地，大胆对抗地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
perplexed
|
|
| adj.不知所措的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
subsidies
|
|
| n.补贴，津贴，补助金( subsidy的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
pestering
|
|
| 使烦恼，纠缠( pester的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
pounced
|
|
| v.突然袭击( pounce的过去式和过去分词 )；猛扑；一眼看出；抓住机会（进行抨击） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
instinctive
|
|
| adj.(出于)本能的；直觉的；(出于)天性的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
inexplicable
|
|
| adj.无法解释的，难理解的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
formulated
|
|
| v.构想出( formulate的过去式和过去分词 )；规划；确切地阐述；用公式表示 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
devour
|
|
| v.吞没；贪婪地注视或谛听，贪读；使着迷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
spacious
|
|
| adj.广阔的，宽敞的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
lucid
|
|
| adj.明白易懂的，清晰的，头脑清楚的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
spoke
|
|
| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
enjoyment
|
|
| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
luminous
|
|
| adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
socialist
|
|
| n.社会主义者；adj.社会主义的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
custodian
|
|
| n.保管人，监护人；公共建筑看守 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
underlying
|
|
| adj.在下面的，含蓄的，潜在的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
motive
|
|
| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
aristocrat
|
|
| n.贵族，有贵族气派的人，上层人物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
suburban
|
|
| adj.城郊的，在郊区的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
craving
|
|
| n.渴望,热望 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
fatigued
|
|
| adj. 疲乏的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
strand
|
|
| vt.使（船）搁浅，使（某人）困于（某地） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
futile
|
|
| adj.无效的，无用的，无希望的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
adventurous
|
|
| adj.爱冒险的；惊心动魄的，惊险的，刺激的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
afflicted
|
|
| 使受痛苦，折磨( afflict的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
rambling
|
|
| adj.[建]凌乱的，杂乱的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
delightful
|
|
| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
marred
|
|
| adj. 被损毁, 污损的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
ineffable
|
|
| adj.无法表达的，不可言喻的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
abased
|
|
| 使谦卑( abase的过去式和过去分词 )； 使感到羞耻； 使降低（地位、身份等）； 降下 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
collapse
|
|
| vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
loyalty
|
|
| n.忠诚，忠心 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
virgins
|
|
| 处女，童男( virgin的名词复数 )； 童贞玛利亚（耶稣之母） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
awakening
|
|
| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
biased
|
|
| a.有偏见的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
pervaded
|
|
| v.遍及，弥漫( pervade的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
frantic
|
|
| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
enquiring
|
|
| a.爱打听的，显得好奇的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
stimulating
|
|
| adj.有启发性的，能激发人思考的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
dexterous
|
|
| adj.灵敏的；灵巧的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
stimulate
|
|
| vt.刺激，使兴奋；激励，使…振奋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
sprawling
|
|
| adj.蔓生的，不规则地伸展的v.伸开四肢坐[躺]( sprawl的现在分词 )；蔓延；杂乱无序地拓展；四肢伸展坐着（或躺着） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
meditated
|
|
| 深思，沉思，冥想( meditate的过去式和过去分词 )； 内心策划，考虑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
inevitable
|
|
| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
invincible
|
|
| adj.不可征服的，难以制服的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
truthfulness
|
|
| n. 符合实际 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
pervasive
|
|
| adj.普遍的；遍布的，(到处)弥漫的；渗透性的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
contagious
|
|
| adj.传染性的，有感染力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
conversational
|
|
| adj.对话的，会话的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
consecutiveness
|
|
| Consecutiveness | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
118
effaced
|
|
| v.擦掉( efface的过去式和过去分词 )；抹去；超越；使黯然失色 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
intervention
|
|
| n.介入，干涉，干预 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
pricked
|
|
| 刺，扎，戳( prick的过去式和过去分词 )； 刺伤； 刺痛； 使剧痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
apropos
|
|
| adv.恰好地；adj.恰当的；关于 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
caustic
|
|
| adj.刻薄的，腐蚀性的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
assuage
|
|
| v.缓和，减轻，镇定 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
124
condemn
|
|
| vt.谴责，指责；宣判(罪犯)，判刑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
125
acquiescent
|
|
| adj.默许的，默认的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
126
scent
|
|
| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
127
wilfully
|
|
| adv.任性固执地；蓄意地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
128
clamorous
|
|
| adj.吵闹的，喧哗的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
129
exasperated
|
|
| adj.恼怒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
130
detested
|
|
| v.憎恶，嫌恶，痛恨( detest的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
131
conspired
|
|
| 密谋( conspire的过去式和过去分词 )； 搞阴谋； （事件等）巧合； 共同导致 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
132
distressed
|
|
| 痛苦的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
133
affected
|
|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
134
affectedly
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
135
fluency
|
|
| n.流畅，雄辩，善辩 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
136
dispel
|
|
| vt.驱走，驱散，消除 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
137
antagonism
|
|
| n.对抗，敌对，对立 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
138
professed
|
|
| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
139
speculation
|
|
| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
140
distressingly
|
|
| adv. 令人苦恼地；悲惨地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
141
hangers
|
|
| n.衣架( hanger的名词复数 )；挂耳 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
142
mutual
|
|
| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
143
aspiring
|
|
| adj.有志气的；有抱负的；高耸的v.渴望；追求 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
144
ecstasy
|
|
| n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
145
defective
|
|
| adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
146
decided
|
|
| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |