He
said,
'No doubt you are surprised at my menagerie. Every man has one side
of his character where the child remains. I have a love of animals
which, I suppose, I may call a passion. The kind of amusement they
can afford me is like none other. It is the self-consciousness of men
and women that makes them, in a general way, intensely unamusing. I
turn from them to the unconscious brutes, and often get a world of
enjoyment. To watch a kitten or a puppy play, or the funny antics of
a parrot or a cockatoo, or the wise movements of a wombat, will keep
me for hours from being bored.'
'And children,' I said--'do you like children?'
'Yes, so long as they remain like the young animals--until they
become self-conscious, I mean, and that is very soon. Then their
charm goes. Has it ever occurred to you how fascinating a beautiful
young girl would be if she were as unconscious as a young animal?
What makes you sigh?'
My thoughts had flown to Winifred breakfasting with her 'Prince of
the Mist' on Snowdon. And I said to myself, 'How he would have been
fascinated by a sight like that!'
My experience of men at that time was so slight that the opinion I
then formed of D'Arcy as a talker was not of much account.
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