Chapter 14 - Page 2

Mary. "About
serious reading, I mean."

"Quite right, Mary, quite right," Mr. Scogan answered. "I had
forgotten there were any serious people in the room."

"I like the idea of the Biographies," said Denis. "There's room
for us all within the scheme; it's comprehensive."

"Yes, the Biographies are good, the Biographies are excellent,"
Mr Scogan agreed. "I imagine them written in a very elegant
Regency style--Brighton Pavilion in words--perhaps by the great
Dr. Lempriere himself. You know his classical dictionary? Ah!"
Mr. Scogan raised his hand and let it limply fall again in a
gesture which implied that words failed him. "Read his biography
of Helen; read how Jupiter, disguised as a swan, was 'enabled to
avail himself of his situation' vis-a-vis to Leda. And to think
that he may have, must have written these biographies of the
Great! What a work, Henry! And, owing to the idiotic
arrangement of your library, it can't be read."

"I prefer the 'Wild Goose Chase'," said Anne. "A novel in six
volumes--it must be restful."

"Restful," Mr. Scogan repeated. "You've hit on the right word.
A 'Wild Goose Chase' is sound, but a bit old-fashioned--pictures
of clerical life in the fifties, you know; specimens of the
landed gentry; peasants for pathos and comedy; and in the
background, always the picturesque beauties of nature soberly
described. All very good and solid, but, like certain puddings,
just a little dull. Personally, I like much better the notion of
'Thom's Works and Wanderings'. The eccentric Mr. Thom of Thom's
Hill. Old Tom Thom, as his intimates used to call him. He spent
ten years in Thibet organising the clarified butter industry on
modern European lines, and was able to retire at thirty-six with
a handsome fortune. The rest of his life he devoted to travel
and ratiocination; here is the result." Mr. Scogan tapped the
dummy books. "And now we come to the 'Tales of Knockespotch'.
What a masterpiece and what a great man! Knockespotch knew how
to write fiction. Ah, Denis, if you could only read Knockespotch
you wouldn't be writing a novel about the wearisome development
of a young man's character, you wouldn't be describing in
endless, fastidious detail, cultured life in Chelsea and
Bloomsbury and Hampstead. You would be trying to write a
readable book. But then, alas! owing to the peculiar arrangement
of our host's library, you never will read Knockespotch."

"Nobody could regret the fact more than I do," said Denis.

"It was Knockespotch," Mr. Scogan continued, "the great
Knockespotch, who delivered us from the dreary tyranny of the
realistic novel. My life, Knockespotch said, is not so long that
I can afford to spend precious hours writing or reading