Page:In the dozy hours, and other papers.djvu/181

 Rh that "The trade of governing is a coarse pursuit;" and also that "War is the dirty work of a nation; one of the indecencies of life." She cannot even endure to hear it alluded to when she is near; but, like Athene, whose father, Zeus, "by chance spake of love matters in her presence," she flies chastely from the very sound of such ill-doing. Now on first reading this sensitive criticism, one is tempted to a great shout of laughter, quite as coarse, I fear, as the pursuit of governing, and almost as indecent as war. Ah! founders of empires, and masters of men, where are your laurels now? If some people in public life were acquainted with Mrs. Wititterly's real opinion of them," says Mr. Wititterly to Kate Nickleby, "they would not hold their heads perhaps quite as high as they do." But in moments of soberness such distorted points of view seem rather more melancholy than diverting. Evadne is, after all, but the feeble reflex of an over-anxious age which has lost itself in a labyrinth of responsibilities. Shelley, whose rigidity of mind was at times almost inconceivable, did not hesitate to deny every attribute of greatness wherever he felt