My Mary and my George--favoured guests--have sat with us through our
meal; but how fleeting our converse with those others--with Mr.
William Wyvern, with Margaret, with Mrs. Major and with Mr. Marrapit!
I grant you cause to grumble at their introduction, so purposeless has
been their part. I grant you they have been as the guests at whose
arrival, disturbing the intimate chatter, impatient glances are
exchanged; at whose departure there is shuffle of relief.
Well, I promise you we shall now link our personages and set our
history bounding to its conclusion. We have collected them; now to
switch on the connection and set them acting one against the other
until the sparks do fly; watching those sparks shall be your
entertainment.
The switch which thus sets active the play of forces I shall call
circumstance. If it has been long delayed, I have the precedent of all
the story of human life as my excuse. For we are the children of
circumstance. We move each in our little circle by a stout hedge
encompassed. Circumstance suddenly will break the wall: some fellow
man or woman is flung against us, and immediately the quiet ambulation
of our little circle is for some conflict sharp exchanged. To-day we
are at peace with the world, to-morrow warring with all mankind.
I say with all mankind, because so narrow and so selfish is our
outlook upon life that one single man or woman--a dullard neighbour or
a silly girl--who may interfere with us, throws into turmoil our whole
existence.
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