irations Alvan Hervey and his wife spent five years
of prudent bliss unclouded by any doubt as to the moral propriety of
their existence. She, to give her individuality fair play, took up all
manner of philanthropic work and became a member of various rescuing and
reforming societies patronized or presided over by ladies of title. He
took an active interest in politics; and having met quite by chance a
literary man--who nevertheless was related to an earl--he was induced
to finance a moribund society paper. It was a semi-political, and wholly
scandalous publication, redeemed by excessive dulness; and as it was
utterly faithless, as it contained no new thought, as it never by any
chance had a flash of wit, satire, or indignation in its pages, he
judged it respectable enough, at first sight. Afterwards, when it paid,
he promptly perceived that upon the whole it was a virtuous undertaking.
It paved the way of his ambition; and he enjoyed also the special kind
of importance he derived from this connection with what he imagined to
be literature.

This connection still further enlarged their world. Men who wrote or
drew prettily for the public came at times to their house, and his
editor came very often. He thought him rather an ass because he had such
big front teeth (the proper thing is to have small, even teeth) and
wore his hair a trifle longer than most men do. However, some dukes wear
their hair long, and the fellow indubitably knew his business. The worst
was that his gravity, though perfectly portentous, could not be trusted.
He sat, elegant and bulky, in the drawing-room, the head of his
stick hovering in front of his big teeth, and talked for hours with
a thick-lipped smile (he said nothing that could be considered
objectionable and not quite the thing) talked in an unusual manner--not
obviously irritatingly. His forehead was too lofty--unusually so--and
under it there was a straight nose, lost between the hairless cheeks,
that in a smooth curve ran into a chin shaped like the end of a
snow-shoe. And in this face that resembled the face of a fat and
fiendishly knowing baby there glittered a pair of clever, peering,
unbelieving black eyes. He wrote verses too. Rather an ass. But the band
of men who trailed at the skirts of his monumental frock-coat seemed to
perceive wonderful things in what he said. Alvan Hervey put it down
to affectation. Those artist chaps, upon the whole, were so affected.
Still, all this was hig