the court, as strange a thing to enter there as sunlight itself.
Mademoiselle was amused. Sidonie, a wise echo, added a sepulchral
but faithful contralto. The laughter of the two seemed at last to
penetrate the candy man. He fumbled with his horseshoe pin. At length
Mademoiselle, exhausted, turned her flushed, beautiful face to the
window.

"Candy man," said she, "go away. When I laugh Sidonie pulls my hair.
I can but laugh while you remain there."

"Here is a note for Mademoiselle," said Felice, coming to the window
in the room.

"There is no justice," said the candy man, lifting the handle of his
cart and moving away.

Three yards he moved, and stopped. Loud shriek after shriek came from
the window of Mademoiselle. Quickly he ran back. He heard a body
thumping upon the floor and a sound as though heels beat alternately
upon it.

"What is it?" he called.

Sidonie's severe head came into the window.

"Mademoiselle is overcome by bad news," she said. "One whom she loved
with all her soul has gone--you may have heard of him--he is Monsieur
Ives. He sails across the ocean to-morrow. Oh, you men!"

XIV

SQUARING THE CIRCLE

At the hazard of wearying you this tale of vehement emotions must be
prefaced by a discourse on geometry.

Nature moves in circles; Art in straight lines. The natural is
rounded; the artificial is made up of angles. A man lost in the snow
wanders, in spite of himself, in perfect circles; the city man's
feet, denaturalized by rectangular streets and floors, carry him ever
away from himself.

The round eyes of childhood typify innocence; the narrowed line of
the flirt's optic proves the invasion of art. The horizontal mouth
is the mark of determined cunning; who has not read Nature's most
spontaneous lyric in lips rounded for the candid kiss?

Beauty is Nature in perfection; circularity is its chief attribute.
Behold the full moon, the enchanting golf ball, the domes of splendid
temples, the huckleberry pie, the wedding ring, the circus ring, the
ring for the waiter, and the "round" of drinks.

On the other hand, straight lines show that Nature has been
deflected. Imagine Venus's girdle transformed into a "straight
front"!

When we begin to move in straight lines and turn sharp corners our
natures begin to change. The consequence is that Nature, being more
adaptive than Art, tries to conform to its sterner regulations. The
result is often a rather curious product--for instance