Page:Encounters (Bowen).djvu/32

 Fair daffodils, we weep to see

You fade away so soon."

She wondered if any of her class could weep for the departure of a daffodil. Mostly they had disclaimed responsibility for such weakness by the stern prefix, "As the poet says." Flora Hopwood had, she remembered, introduced a "Quotation Dictionary," which must have been the round of her circle.

"I must forbid it. Why can't they see things for themselves, think them out? I don't believe they ever really see anything, just accept things on the authority of other people. I could make them believe anything. What a responsibility teaching is But is it? They'd believe me, but they wouldn't care. It wouldn't matter, really.

"They're so horribly used to things. Nothing ever comes new to them that they haven't grown up with. They get their very feelings out of books. Nothing ever surprises or impresses them. When spring comes they get preoccupied, stare dreamily out of the windows. They're thinking out their new