Page:In the dozy hours, and other papers.djvu/137

 LECTURES.

" of us," says Mr. Walter Bagehot in one of his most cynical moods, "can bear the theory of our amusements. It is essential to the pride of man to believe that he is industrious."

Now, is it industry or a love of sport which makes us sit in long and solemn rows in an oppressively hot room, blinking at glaring lights, breathing a vitiated air, wriggling on straight and narrow chairs, and listening, as well as heat and fatigue and discomfort will permit, to a lecture which might just as well have been read peacefully by our own firesides? Do we do this thing for amusement, or for intellectual gain? Outside, the winter sun is setting clearly in a blue-green sky. People are chatting gayly in the streets. Friends are drinking cups of fragrant tea in pleasant lamp-lit rooms. There are concerts, perhaps, or matinées, where the deft comedian provokes continuous laughter. No; it is not amusement