Page:Margaret Sherwood--A Puritan in Bohemia.djvu/52

44 Saint Cloud one day on one of the little steamers, les hirondelles. I walked down the Allée du Château to Sèvres and bought this cup. And then and there I planned my domestic life. Oh don't speak of Paris! It makes me homesick. I can see the leaf-shadows on those tree-trunks now."

Sitting by the fire they discussed many things, art, philanthropy, Paris, hopes, and aims. They spoke with the tremendous earnestness of those who consider their abstract views of value; they listened with eager interest to one another's opinions. They had talked themselves sleepy and ambitious when Mrs. Kent begged to know more of Mr. Stanton's theory.

"It is very simple," he replied, "only this, that art must learn to reflect the great teaching of the age, the reality of human brotherhood. It can no longer stand aloof, the plaything of a favoured few. Its selfishness is self-destruction. To my mind its only fortune lies in identifying itself with common life."