is usually a mere fretful and foolish chatterbox, tout en dehors, and self-absorbed.'
'We are wandering far from the single-minded passion of Ronsard and Petrarca.
'And we have arrived at no definition. Were I to give one, I should be tempted to say that Love is, in health and perfection, the sense that another life is absolutely necessary to our own, is lovely despite its faults, and even in its follies is delightful and precious to us, we cannot probably say why, and is to us as the earth to the moon, as the moon to the tides, as the lodestone to the steel, as the dew of night to the flower.'
'Very well said, and applicable to both men and women, as descriptive of their emotions at certain periods of their lives. But———'
'For all their lives, until the ice of age glides into their veins.'
'You are poetical enough for Ronsard. Well, let us pass to another question. Does Love die sooner of starvation or of repletion?'
'Of repletion, unquestionably. Of a fit of indigestion he perishes never to rise again. Starved, he will linger on sometimes for a very
