"There's a vicious point hit already," she said. "You sympathize with that proud patrician who does not sympathize with his famished fellow-men, and insults them. There, go on." He proceeded. The warlike portions did not rouse him much; he said all that was out of date, or should be; the spirit displayed was barbarous; yet the encounter single-handed between Marcius and Tullus Aufidius he delighted in. As he advanced, he forgot to criticise; it was evident he appreciated the power, the truth of each portion; and, stepping out of the narrow line of private prejudices, began to revel in the large picture of human nature, to feel the reality stamped upon the characters who were speaking from that page before him.
He did not read the comic scenes well; and Caroline, taking the book out of his hand, read these parts for him. From her he seemed to enjoy them, and indeed she gave them with a spirit no one could have expected of her, with a pithy expression with which she seemed gifted on the spot, and for that brief moment only. It may be remarked, in passing, that the general character of her conversation that evening, whether serious or sprightly, grave or gay, was as of something untaught, unstudied, intuitive, fitful--when once gone, no more to be reproduced as it had been than the glancing ray of the meteor, than the tints of the dew-gem, than the colour or form of the sunset cloud, than the fleeting and glittering ripple varying the flow of a rivulet.

"There's a vicious point already," she said. "You sympathize with that proud patrician who insults his famished fellow-men. Go on."
He proceeded. The warlike parts did not rouse him much; yet the single-handed fight between Marcius and Tullus Aufidius he delighted in. As he went on, he began to revel in the picture of human nature, to feel the reality stamped upon the characters on the page.
He did not read the comic scenes well; so Caroline read these parts for him, with unexpected spirit and expression. Indeed, her conversation that evening, whether grave or gay, was intuitive - glittering like the fleeting ripple on a stream.
