But the second would weep bitter tears to think what a
rayless and barren life that must be which could extract enjoyment from
the miserable flimsy wand that has such magic attraction for sauntering
youths and simpering maidens. What a dynamometer of happiness are these
paltry toys, and what a rudimentary vertebrate must be the freckled
adolescent whose yearning for the infinite can be stayed even for a
single hour by so trifling a boon from the venal hands of the finite!
Pardon these polysyllabic reflections, Beloved, but I never contemplate
these dear fellow-creatures of ours without a delicious sense of
superiority to them and to all arrested embryos of intelligence, in which
I have no doubt you heartily sympathize with me. It is not merely when I
look at the vacuous countenances of the mastigophori, the whip-holders,
that I enjoy this luxury (though I would not miss that holiday spectacle
for a pretty sum of money, and advise you by all means to make sure of it
next Fourth of July, if you missed it this), but I get the same pleasure
from many similar manifestations.
I delight in Regalia, so called, of the kind not worn by kings, nor
obtaining their diamonds from the mines of Golconda. I have a passion
for those resplendent titles which are not conferred by a sovereign and
would not be the open sesame to the courts of royalty, yet which are as
opulent in impressive adjectives as any Knight of the Garter's list of
dignities.
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