Clara Hopgood

'Let me see--check, you said, but it is not mate.'

She put her elbows on the table, rested her head between her hands,

and appeared to contemplate the game profoundly.

'Now, then, what do you say to that?'

It was really a very lucky move, and Clara, whose thoughts perhaps

were elsewhere, was presently most unaccountably defeated. Madge was

triumphant.

'Where are all your deep-laid schemes? Baffled by a poor creature

who can hardly put two and two together.' 'Perhaps your schemes were better than mine.'

'You know they were not. I saw the queen ought to take that bishop,

and never bothered myself as to what would follow. Have you not lost

your faith in schemes?'

'You are very much mistaken if you suppose that, because of one

failure, or of twenty failures, I would give up a principle.'

'Clara, you are a strange creature. Don't let us talk any more about

chess.' Madge swept all the pieces with her hand into the box, shut it,

closed the board, and put her feet on the fender.

'You never believe in impulses or in doing a thing just because here

and now it appears to be the proper thing to do. Suppose anybody

were to make love to you--oh! how I wish somebody would, you dear

girl, for nobody deserves it more--' Madge put her head caressingly

on Clara's shoulder and then raised it again. 'Suppose, I say,

anybody were to make love to you, would you hold off for six months

and consider, and consider, and ask yourself whether he had such and

such virtues, and whether he could make you happy? Would not that

stifle love altogether? Would you not rather obey your first

impression and, if you felt you loved him, would you not say "Yes"?'

'Time is not everything. A man who is prompt and is therefore

thought to be hasty by sluggish creatures who are never half awake,

may in five minutes spend more time in consideration than his critics

will spend in as many weeks. I have never had the chance, and am not

likely to have it. I can only say that if it were to come to me, I

should try to use the whole strength of my soul. Precisely because

the question would be so important, would it be necessary to employ

every faculty I have in order to decide it. I do not believe in

oracles which are supposed to prove their divinity by giving no

reasons for their commands.'

'Ah, well, I believe in Shakespeare. His lovers fall in love at

first sight.' 'No doubt they do, but to justify yourself you have to suppose that

you are a Juliet and your friend a Romeo. They may, for aught I

know, be examples in my favour. However, I have to lay down a rule

for my own poor, limited self, and, to speak the truth, I am afraid

that great men often do harm by imposing on us that which is

serviceable to themselves only; or, to put it perhaps more correctly,

we mistake the real nature of their processes, just as a person who

is unskilled in arithmetic would mistake the processes of anybody who

is very quick at it, and would be led away by them. Shakespeare is

much to me, but the more he is to me, the more careful I ought to be

to discover what is the true law of my own nature, more important to

me after all than Shakespeare's.'