A CANNIBAL AND A FREEBOOTER
of the moral, although I see clearly what you intended to prove. When your climax came”—and his eyes kindled—“I felt as if I were standing on some newly discovered cliff of modern thought, below which rolled a thick cloud of superstition rent suddenly by a flash of human sympathy and love. Below and beyond stretched immeasurable distances fading into the mists of the ages. You will excuse the way I put it—I do not mean to be fanciful nor pedantic—but it does not seem that I can express my meaning in any other way. Mon Dieu, what a lot of cheap dancing jacks we are! We dig and sell our product; we plead to save a criminal; we toil with our hands and scheme with our heads, and when it is all done it is to get a higher place in the little world we ourselves make. Once in a while there comes a flash of lightning like this from on high and the cloud is rent in twain and we look through and are ashamed. Thank you again, Monsieur Herbert. You have widened my skull—cracked it open an inch at least, and my heart not a little. Your savage should be canonized!”
And he left the room.
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