And afterward I intended to become excessively dis-
tinguished in this or that profession, not as yet irrevoc-
ably fixed upon, but for choice as a writer of immortal



36 THE CORDS OF VANITY

verse; and I was used to dwell at this time very feel-
ingly, and very frequently, upon the wholesome re-
straint which matrimony imposes upon the possessor of
an artistic temperament.
Stella promised to place my name upon her waiting
list, and to take up the matter in due season; and she
lamented, with a tiny and pre-meditated yawn, that as a
servitor of system she was compelled to list her "little
lovers and suitors in alphabetical order, Mr. Townsend.
Besides, you would probably strangle me before the
year was out."

"I would thoroughly enjoy doing it,*' I said, grimly,
"right now."

She regarded me for a while. "You would, too," she
said at last, with an alien gravity; "and that is why —
Oh, Rob dear, you are out of my dimension. I am
rather afraid of you. I am a poor bewildered triangle
who is being wooed by a cube !" the girl wailed, and but
half humorously.
And I began to plead. It does not matter what I said.
It never mattered.
And persons more sensible than I found then far
more important things to talk about, such as General
Alger's inefficiency, and General Miles's hammock, and
"embalmed beef," and the folly of taking over the Philip-
pines, and Admiral von Diedrich's behavior, and the
yellow fever in our camps and the comparative claims
of Messrs. Sampson and Schley to be made rear-admiral ;
and everybody more or less was demanding "an inves-
tigation," as the natural aftermath of a war.
