g sought to evade a happy ending out of a sort of moral cowardice,
lest I should be condemned as a superficially sentimental person. Where
(and of what sort) there are to be found in The Planter of Malata any
germs of happiness that could have fructified at the end I am at a loss
to see. Such criticism seems to miss the whole purpose and significance
of a piece of writing the primary intention of which was mainly
aesthetic; an essay in description and narrative around a given
psychological situation. Of more seriousness was the spoken criticism of
an old and valued friend who thought that in the scene near the rock,
which from the point of view of psychology is crucial, neither Felicia
Moorsom nor Geoffrey Renouard find the right things to say to each
other. I didn't argue the point at the time, for, to be candid, I didn't
feel quite satisfied with the scene myself. On re-reading it lately for
the purpose of this edition I have come to the conclusion that there is
that much truth in my friend's criticism that I have made those people a
little too explicit in their emotion and thus have destroyed to a
certain extent the characteristic illusory glamour of their
personalities. I regret this defect very much for I regard The Planter
of Malata as a nearly successful attempt at doing a very difficult thing
which I would have liked to have made as perfect as it lay in my power.
Yet considering the pitch and the tonality of the whole tale it is very
difficult to imagine what else those two people could have found to say
at that time and on that particular spot of the earth's surface. In the
mood in which they both were, and given the exceptional state of their
feelings, anything might have been said.

The eminent critic who charged me with false realism, the outcome of
timidity, was quite wrong. I should like to ask him what he imagines
the, so to speak, lifelong embrace of Felicia Moorsom and Geoffrey
Renouard could have been like? Could it have been at all? Would it have
been credible? No! I did not shirk anything, either from timidity or
laziness. Perhaps a little mistrust of my own powers would not have been
altogether out of place in this connection. But it failed me; and I
resemble Geoffrey Renouard in so far that when once engaged in an
adventure I cannot bear the idea of turning back. The moment had
arrived for these people to disclose themselves. They had to do it. To
render a crucial point of feelings in terms of human