'
'Yes; so they do. And what have you been doing lately?'
'Doing? Nothing.'
'Where have you been?'
'I can hardly tell you. In the main, going about Europe; and it
may perhaps interest you to know that I have been attempting the
serious study of Continental art of the Middle Ages. My notes on
each example I visited are at your service. They are of no use to
me.'
'I shall be glad with them....Oh, travelling far and near!'
'Not far,' said Knight, with moody carelessness. 'You know, I
daresay, that sheep occasionally become giddy--hydatids in the
head, 'tis called, in which their brains become eaten up, and the
animal exhibits the strange peculiarity of walking round and round
in a circle continually. I have travelled just in the same way--
round and round like a giddy ram.'
The reckless, bitter, and rambling style in which Knight talked,
as if rather to vent his images than to convey any ideas to
Stephen, struck the young man painfully. His former friend's days
had become cankered in some way: Knight was a changed man. He
himself had changed much, but not as Knight had changed.
'Yesterday I came home,' continued Knight, 'without having, to the
best of my belief, imbibed half-a-dozen ideas worth retaining.'
'You out-Hamlet Hamlet in morbidness of mood,' said Stephen, with
regretful frankness.
Knight made no reply.
'Do you know,' Stephen continued, 'I could almost have sworn that
you would be married before this time, from what I saw?'
Knight's face grew harder.
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