Page:Arminell, a social romance (1896).djvu/100

92 "Do you not think," he said, "that they fribble from a sense of incompetence to grapple with these questions? The problems interest them up to a certain point. Then they see that they are too large for them, or they entail consequences they shrink from accepting, consequences that will cost them too dear, and they withdraw."

"Like the young man in the Gospel who went away sorrowful for he had great possessions. He was a fribbler."

"Exactly. He was a fribbler. He was insincere and unheroic."

"I could not fribble," said Arminell, vehemently. "If I see that a cause is right, I must pursue it at whatsoever consequence to myself. It is of the essence of humdrum to fribble. Do you know, Mr. Saltren, I have had a puzzling problem set before me to-day, and I shall have no rest till I have worked it out? Why is there so much wretchedness, so much inequality in the world?"

"Why was Giles' giraffe's leg broken?"

Arminell looked at him with surprise, suspecting that instead of answering her, he was about to turn off the subject with a joke.

"The world," said Saltren, "is like Giles' Noah's Ark, packed full—over full—of creatures of all kinds, and packed so badly that they impinge on, bruise, and break each other. Not only is the giraffe's leg broken, but so are the rim of Noah's hat, and the ear of the sheep, and the tusk of the elephant. It is a congeries of cripples. We may change their order, and we only make fresh abrasions. The proboscis of the elephant runs into the side of the lamb, and Noah's hat has been knocked off by the tail of the raven. However you may assort the beasts, however carefully you may pack them, you cannot prevent their doing each other damage."

Mr. Saltren turned to little Giles and said:—

"Bring us your box of bricks, my boy."