But upon my word, I don't know how we put in our time. How
does one put in one's time? How is it possible to have achieved
nine years and to have nothing whatever to show for it? Nothing
whatever, you understand. Not so much as a bone penholder,
carved to resemble a chessman and with a hole in the top through
which you could see four views of Nauheim. And, as for
experience, as for knowledge of one's fellow beings--nothing
either. Upon my word, I couldn't tell you offhand whether the lady
who sold the so expensive violets at the bottom of the road that
leads to the station, was cheating me or no; I can't say whether the
porter who carried our traps across the station at Leghorn was a
thief or no when he said that the regular tariff was a lira a parcel.
The instances of honesty that one comes across in this world are
just as amazing as the instances of dishonesty. After forty-five
years of mixing with one's kind, one ought to have acquired the
habit of being able to know something about one's fellow beings.
But one doesn't.
I think the modern civilized habit--the modern English habit of
taking every one for granted--is a good deal to blame for this. I
have observed this matter long enough to know the queer, subtle
thing that it is; to know how the faculty, for what it is worth, never
lets you down.
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