"
"Whoever has a desire for such information must be made very
different from me!" said Miss Graeme.
"Are you sure of that? Did you never make yourself unhappy about
what might be on its way to you, and wish you could know beforehand
something to guide you how to meet it?"
"I should have to think before answering that question."
"Now tell me--what can the art of writing, and its expansion, or
perhaps its development rather, in printing, do in the same
direction as necromancy? May not a man well long after personal
communication with this or that one of the greatest who have lived
before him? I grant that in respect of some it can do nothing; but
in respect of others, instead of mocking you with an airy semblance
of their bodily forms, and the murmur of a few doubtful words from
their lips, it places in your hands a key to their inmost thoughts.
Some would say this is not personal communication; but it is far
more personal than the other. A man's personality does not consist
in the clothes he wears; it only appears in them; no more does it
consist in his body, but in him who wears it."
As he spoke, Miss Graeme kept looking him gravely in the face,
manifesting, however, more respect than interest. She had been
accustomed to a very different tone in young men. She had found
their main ambition to amuse; to talk sense about other matters than
the immediate uses of this world, was an out-of-the-way thing! I do
not say Miss Graeme, even on the subject last in hand, appreciated
the matter of Donal's talk.
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