DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.51521#0058
( 5° )
wonder whether I was really churlish by nature or mere-
ly playing a part, and then, feeling that I must excuse
myself to myself for my involuntary virtue, I meditated
on the recompense that I should have been obliged to give
the girl if I had wasted her time walking as far as Buck-
ingham Palace with me, relieving with pleasant trivial
chatter my almost intolerable boredom. Association with
harlots is incompatible with an income of two hundred a
year, and virtue apart, I could not afford it, and all thought
of her passing suddenly out of my mind I watched a
flight of ducks coming down from the sky with necks
outstretched just as in a Japanese print.
And as they came with rapid wing-beats I thought
their intention was to pass over St. James’s Park north-
ward to the lakes of Regent’s Park, but whatever it was
they changed it, and wheeling almost in a circle they
alighted on the lake in front of me with a flutter of wings,
to swim towards the reeds of the island, leaving long
trails of light behind them. So still was the night that I
could hear them chatter good-night to each other before
they tucked their heads under their wings for sleep.
There was light enough to distinguish the different spe-
cies, and I noted the common wild duck, which crowds
in thousands on Lough Carra, and there were some teal,
and then came the widgeon and another and other tribes
of duck, a sheldrake or two, but the light was beginning
to fail and I could not distinguish the plumage and so
wonder whether I was really churlish by nature or mere-
ly playing a part, and then, feeling that I must excuse
myself to myself for my involuntary virtue, I meditated
on the recompense that I should have been obliged to give
the girl if I had wasted her time walking as far as Buck-
ingham Palace with me, relieving with pleasant trivial
chatter my almost intolerable boredom. Association with
harlots is incompatible with an income of two hundred a
year, and virtue apart, I could not afford it, and all thought
of her passing suddenly out of my mind I watched a
flight of ducks coming down from the sky with necks
outstretched just as in a Japanese print.
And as they came with rapid wing-beats I thought
their intention was to pass over St. James’s Park north-
ward to the lakes of Regent’s Park, but whatever it was
they changed it, and wheeling almost in a circle they
alighted on the lake in front of me with a flutter of wings,
to swim towards the reeds of the island, leaving long
trails of light behind them. So still was the night that I
could hear them chatter good-night to each other before
they tucked their heads under their wings for sleep.
There was light enough to distinguish the different spe-
cies, and I noted the common wild duck, which crowds
in thousands on Lough Carra, and there were some teal,
and then came the widgeon and another and other tribes
of duck, a sheldrake or two, but the light was beginning
to fail and I could not distinguish the plumage and so