It is eat,
drink, sleep yawn and be bored. It is what shall I wear, where shall
I go, how shall I get rid of the time; it says, 'How do you do? how
is your husband? How are your children? '-it means, 'Now I have asked
all the conventional questions, and I don't care a fig what their
answer may be.'"
"This may be its meaning to some persons," I replied, "for instance,
to mere pleasure-seekers. But of course it is interpreted quite
differently by others. To some it means nothing but a dull, hopeless
struggle with poverty and hardship- and its whole aspect might be
changed to them, should those who do not know what to do to get rid
of the time, spend their surplus leisure in making this struggle less
brutalizing."
"Yes, I have heard such doctrine, and at one time I tried charity
myself. I picked up a dozen or so of dirty little wretches out of the
streets, and undertook to clothe and teach them. I might as well have
tried to instruct the chairs in my room. Besides the whole house had
to be aired after they had gone, and mamma missed two teaspoons and a
fork and was perfectly disgusted with the whole thing. Then I fell to
knitting socks for babies, but they only occupied my hands, and my
head felt as empty as ever. Mamma took me off on a journey, as she
always did when I took to moping, and that diverted me for a while.
But after that everything went on in the old way.
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