"
"But now, Miss Ida, your face is to me like this book after the
printed matter begins, only I read there that which interests me
far more than anything which this bulky tome contains, even under
the word Amsterdam."
"You imagine far more than you see. I think artists are like poets,
and are given to great flights. Besides, you are becoming versed
in my small talk. When you tried it on the evening I referred to,
you were just a trifle ponderous."
"Yes, I can now see myself performing like a lame elephant. Did
you propose to read this encyclopaedia entirely through?"
"I might have skipped art as a subject far too deep for me."
"When you come to that let me take the place of the encyclopaedia.
I will sit just here where you keep your book and give you a series
of familiar lectures."
"I never enjoyed being lectured, sir!"
"Then I'll teach you after the Socratic method, and ask you
questions."
"I fear some of them might be too personal. You have such a mania
for solving everything."
"And did you fear that at some of the many sittings I shall need
this fall I might again broach every subject under the sun, and so
you were led to read an encyclopaedia to be prepared?"
"Is that what you mean by the Socratic method? I decline any lessons
concerning art or anything else on that plan, for you would find
out everything.
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