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300 me—it's so wonderfully fresh and full of life, this air"

"Yes—but living in it forever, year after year—I rather think there wouldn't be anything left of one except the brute," said Crayven. "One could forgive the Swiss if they were nice brutes, like the cows. But how they drink!"

A look of disgust crossed his face.

"You hate drinking, don't you?" said Teresa curiously. "Do you never, yourself?"

"Never touch it. Why should I? Beastly stuff."

"I've noticed that you never take any wine or anything. Is it principle?"

"No, just taste. Don't see any use in muddling one's brain further than nature has already done it. My mother died of it—drugs and things. Went quite off her head, the last years of her life—lived in the dark, like a cat. Not pleasant."

"How oddly you English talk about your relatives!" said Teresa. "Now, if we have a person—not quite right—in the family, we try to keep it dark."

"Why? It's not your affair, after all, what your relatives do. Everybody's got some queer person or other about."

"You see, people like to muddle their heads," reflected Teresa. "Some of them have to do it—some of the best. A man, a very clever one, once said to me that some sort of 'dope' was