practically, with the thought of the habitable globe."

"And with the emotive force of mankind," said Paul.

"What is that?" asked Lady Angela.

Why Paul, after the first glance of courtesy at the speaker, should
exchange a quick glance with the Princess would be difficult to say. It
was instinctive; as instinctive as the reciprocal flash of mutual
understanding.

"I think I know, but tell us," she said.

Paul, challenged, defined it as the swift wave of sympathy that surged
over the earth. A famine in India, a devastating earthquake in Mexico,
a bid for freedom on the part of an oppressed population, a deed of
heroism at sea--each was felt within practically a few moments,
emotionally, in an English, French or German village. Our hearts were
throbbing continuously at the end of telegraph wires.

"And you call that pleasure?" asked Count Lavretsky.

"It isn't hedonism, at any rate," said Paul.

"I call it life," said the Princess. "Don't you?"--she turned to Doon.

"I think what Mr. Savelli calls the emotive force of mankind helps to
balance our own personal emotions," said be.

"Or isn't it rather a wear and tear on the nervous system?" laughed his
wife.

"It seems so to me," said Count Lavretsky. "Perhaps, being a Russian, I
am more primitive and envy a nobleman of the time of Pharaoh who never
heard of devastations in Mexico, did not feel his heart called upon to
pulsate at anything beyond his own concerns. But he in his wisdom at
his little world was vanity and was depressed. We moderns, with our
infinitely bigger world and our infinitely greater knowledge, have no
more wisdom than the Egyptian, and we see that the world is all the
more vanity and are all the more overwhelmed with despair."

"But--" said Paul.

"But--" cried the Princess.

Both laughed, and paused. Paul bowed with a slight gesture.

"I am not overwhelmed with despair," the Princess continued.

"Neither am I," said Paul.

"I am keeping my end up wonderfully," said Lady Angela.

"I am in a nest of optimists," Count Lavretsky groaned. "But was it not
you, Lady Angela, who talked of wear and tear.

"That was only to contradict my husband."

"What is all this about?" asked the Countess Lavretsky, who had been
discussing opera with Lord Bantry and Mademoiselle de Cressy.

Doon scientifically crystallized the argument. It held the octette,
while men-servants in powder and gold-laced livery offered poires
Zobraska, a subtle creat