iscovered, rather injudiciously."

"Now, by holy Paul and Pollux! I do not understand this at all,
Miramon."

"Why, Manuel, you must know she was a very charming girl, and in
appearance just the type that I had always fancied for a wife. But
perhaps it is not wise to be guided entirely by appearances. For I find
now that she has a strong will in her white bosom, and a tireless tongue
in her glittering head, and I do not equally admire all four of these
possessions."

"Still, Miramon, if only a few months back your love was so great as to
lead you into abducting her--"

The prince of the seven madnesses said gravely:

"Love, as I think, is an instant's fusing of shadow and substance. They
that aspire to possess love utterly, fall into folly. This is forbidden:
you cannot. The lover, beholding that fusing move as a golden-hued
goddess, accessible, kindly and priceless, wooes and ill-fatedly wins
all the substance. The golden-hued shadow dims in the dawn of his
married life, dulled with content, and the shadow vanishes. So there
remains, for the puzzled husband's embracing, flesh which is fair and
dear, no doubt, yet is flesh such as his; and talking and talking and
talking; and kisses in all ways desirable. Love, of a sort, too remains,
but hardly the love that was yesterday's."

Now the unfinished design came out of the fireplace, and climbed up
Miramon's leg, still faintly whimpering. He looked at it meditatively,
then twisted off the creature's head and dropped the fragments into his
waste-basket.

Miramon sighed. He said:

"This is the cry of all husbands that now are or may be
hereafter,--'What has become of the girl that I married? and how should
I rightly deal with this woman whom somehow time has involved in my
doings? Love, of a sort, now I have for her, but not the love that was
yesterday's--'"

While Miramon spoke thus, the two lads were looking at each other
blankly: for they were young, and their understanding of this matter was
as yet withheld.

Then said Miramon:

"Yes, he is wiser that shelters his longing from any such surfeit. Yes,
he is wiser that knows the shadow makes lovely the substance, wisely
regarding the ways of that irresponsible shadow which, if you grasp at
it, flees, and, when you avoid it, will follow, gilding all life with
its glory, and keeping always one woman young and most fair and most
wise, and unwon; and keeping you always never contented, but armed with
a self-respe