Page:Under Dispute (1924).pdf/103

 in the days of Charles the Second headed her manuscript: "A True Relation of the Birth, Breeding and Life of Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle. Written by Herself." Mr. Theodore Dreiser's "A Book About Myself" sounds like nothing but a loud human purr. The intimate wording of "Margot Asquith, an Autobiography," gives the key to all the cheerful confidences that follow. Never before or since has any book been so much relished by its author. She makes no foolish pretence of concealing the pleasure that it gives her; but passes on with radiant satisfaction from episode to episode, extracting from each in turn its full and flattering significance. The volumes are as devoid of revelations as of reticence. If at times they resemble the dance of the seven veils, the reader is invariably reassured when the last veil has been whisked aside, and he sees there is nothing behind it.