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it was no laughing matter. For me it marked the end of a chapter, the death of something young and precious. ‘There were the years—years of childhood and innocence—when I had believed that carminative meant —well, carminative. And now, before me lies the rest of my life—a day, perhaps, ten years, half a century, when I shall know that carminative means windtreibend.
‘Plus ne suis ce que j’ai été
Et ne le saurai jamais étre.’
It is a realization that makes one rather melancholy.”
“Carminative,” said Mr. Scogan thoughtfully.
“Carminative,”Denis repeated, and they were silent for a time. “Words,” said Denis at last, “words—I wonder if you can realize how much I love them. You are too much preoccupied with mere things and ideas and people to understand the full beauty of words. Your mind is not a literary mind. The spectacle of Mr. Gladstone finding thirty-four rhymes to the name ‘ Margot ’ seems to you rather pathetic than anything else. Mallarmé’s envelopes with their versified addresses