and slothfulness of habits. I have never
seen him smoke automatically as most men do. He had too much respect
for his own powers of enjoyment and for the sensibilities, perhaps, of
the best Havana tobacco. At a time of his own deliberate choosing,
often after many hours of hankering and renunciation, he smoked his
cigar. He smoked it with delight, with a sense of being rewarded, and
he used all the smoke there was in it.

He dearly loved the best food, the best champagne, and the best Scotch
whiskey. But these things were friends to him, and not enemies. He
had toward food and drink the Continental attitude; namely, that
quality is far more important than quantity; and he got his
exhilaration from the fact that he was drinking champagne and not from
the champagne. Perhaps I shall do well to say that on questions of
right and wrong he had a will of iron. All his life he moved
resolutely in whichever direction his conscience pointed; and, although
that ever present and never obtrusive conscience of his made mistakes
of judgment now and then, as must all consciences, I think it can never
once have tricked him into any action that was impure or unclean. Some
critics maintain that the heroes and heroines of his books are
impossibly pure and innocent young people. R. H. D. never called upon
his characters for any trait of virtue, or renunciation, or
self-mastery of which his own life could not furnish examples.

Fortunately, he did not have for his friends the same conscience that
he had for himself. His great gift of eyesight and observation failed
him in his judgments upon his friends. If only you loved him, you
could get your biggest failures of conduct somewhat more than forgiven,
without any trouble at all. And of your molehill virtues he made
splendid mountains. He only interfered with you when he was afraid
that you were going to hurt some one else whom he also loved. Once I
had a telegram from him which urged me for heaven's sake not to forget
that the next day was my wife's birthday. Whether I had forgotten it
or not is my own private affair. And when I declared that I had read a
story which I liked very, very much and was going to write to the
author to tell him so, he always kept at me till the letter was written.

Have I said that he had no habits? Every day, when he was away from
her, he wrote a letter to his mother, and no swift scrawl at that, for,
no matter how crowded and eventful the day,