e hard on her, Harry!" said Hallward,
listlessly.

"My dear fellow, she tried to found a _salon_, and only succeeded in
opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, what did she
say about Mr. Dorian Gray?"

"Oh, something like, 'Charming boy--poor dear mother and I absolutely
inseparable. Quite forget what he does--afraid he--doesn't do
anything--oh, yes, plays the piano--or is it the violin, dear Mr. Gray?'
Neither of us could help laughing, and we became friends at once."

"Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far
the best ending for one," said the young lord, plucking another daisy.

Hallward shook his head. "You don't understand what friendship is,
Harry," he murmured--"or what enmity is, for that matter. You like
everyone; that is to say, you are indifferent to everyone."

"How horribly unjust of you!" cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back,
and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of glossy
white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the summer
sky. "Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference between
people. I choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for
their good characters, and my enemies for their good intellects. A man
cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. I have not got one
who is a fool. They are all men of some intellectual power, and
consequently they all appreciate me. Is that very vain of me? I think it
is rather vain."

"I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I must be
merely an acquaintance."

"My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance."

"And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?"

"Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die,
and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else."

"Harry!" exclaimed Hallward, frowning.

"My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can't help detesting my
relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand
other people having the same faults as ourselves. I quite sympathise
with the rage of the English democracy against what they call the vices
of the upper orders. The masses feel that drunkenness, stupidity, and
immorality should be their own special property, and that if anyone of
us makes an ass of himself he is poaching on their preserves. When poor
Southwark got into the Divorce Court, their indignation was quite
magnificent. And