fit
for swine. His hand was going out to hers as he said good night. She
had put her lips up to be kissed, but he wasn't going to kiss her.
Somehow he was afraid of her. And then her hand closed on his and
pressed feverishly. He felt her callouses grind and grate on his, and a
great wave of pity welled over him. He saw her yearning, hungry eyes,
and her ill-fed female form which had been rushed from childhood into a
frightened and ferocious maturity; then he put his arms about her in
large tolerance and stooped and kissed her on the lips. Her glad little
cry rang in his ears, and he felt her clinging to him like a cat. Poor
little starveling! He continued to stare at the vision of what had
happened in the long ago. His flesh was crawling as it had crawled that
night when she clung to him, and his heart was warm with pity. It was a
gray scene, greasy gray, and the rain drizzled greasily on the pavement
stones. And then a radiant glory shone on the wall, and up through the
other vision, displacing it, glimmered Her pale face under its crown of
golden hair, remote and inaccessible as a star.

He took the Browning and the Swinburne from the chair and kissed them.
Just the same, she told me to call again, he thought. He took another
look at himself in the glass, and said aloud, with great solemnity:-

"Martin Eden, the first thing to-morrow you go to the free library an'
read up on etiquette. Understand!"

He turned off the gas, and the springs shrieked under his body.

"But you've got to quit cussin', Martin, old boy; you've got to quit
cussin'," he said aloud.

Then he dozed off to sleep and to dream dreams that for madness and
audacity rivalled those of poppy-eaters.

CHAPTER V

He awoke next morning from rosy scenes of dream to a steamy atmosphere
that smelled of soapsuds and dirty clothes, and that was vibrant with the
jar and jangle of tormented life. As he came out of his room he heard
the slosh of water, a sharp exclamation, and a resounding smack as his
sister visited her irritation upon one of her numerous progeny. The
squall of the child went through him like a knife. He was aware that the
whole thing, the very air he breathed, was repulsive and mean. How
different, he thought, from the atmosphere of beauty and repose of the
house wherein Ruth dwelt. There it was all spiritual. Here it was all
material, and meanly material.

"Come here, Alfred," he called to the crying child, a