ne possibly
imagine him doing anything ruthless, fine, terrible, strong or
difficult.

One expected his hose to be of the same tint as his shirt and
handkerchief, his dress-trousers to be braided, his tie to be delicate
and beautiful, his dainty shoes to be laced with black silk ribbon,--but
one would never expect him to go tiger-shooting, to ride a gay and giddy
young horse, to box, or to do his own cooking and washing in the desert
or jungle.

Augustus had been at College during that bright brief period of the
attempted apotheosis of the dirty-minded little Decadent whose stock in
trade was a few Aubrey Beardsley drawings, a widow's-cruse-like bottle
of Green Chartreuse, an Oscar Wilde book, some dubious blue china, some
floppy ties, an assortment of second-hand epigrams, scent and scented
tobacco, a _nil admirari_ attitude and long weird hair.

Augustus had become a Decadent--a silly harmless
conventionally-unconventional Decadent. But, as Carey, a contemporary
Rugger blood, coarsely remarked, he hadn't the innards to go far wrong.

It was part of his cheap and childish ritual as a Decadent to draw the
curtains after breakfast, light candles, place the flask of Green
Chartreuse and a liqueur-glass on the table, drop one drip of the liquid
into the glass, burn a stinking pastille of incense, place a Birmingham
"god" or an opening lily before him, ruffle his hair, and sprawl on the
sofa with a wicked French novel he could not read--hoping for visitors
and an audience.

If any fellow dropped in and, very naturally, exclaimed, "What the devil
_are_ you doing?" he would reply:--

"Wha'? Oh, sunligh'? Very vulgar thing sunligh'. Art is always superior
to Nature. You love the garish day being a gross Philistine, wha'? Now I
only live at night. Glorious wicked nigh'. So I make my own nigh'. Wha'?
Have some Green Chartreuse--only drink fit for a Hedonist. I drink its
colour and I taste its glorious greenness. Ichor and Nectar of Helicon
and the Pierian Spring. I loved a Wooman once, with eyes of just that
glowing glorious green and a soul of ruby red. I called her my
Emerald-eyed, Ruby-souled Devil, and we drank together deep draughts of
the red red Wine of Life----"

Sometimes the visitor would say: "Look here, Grobb, you ought to be in
the Zoo, you know. There's a lot there like you, all in one big cage,"
or similar words of disapproval.

Sometimes a young fresher would be impressed, especially if he had been
bro