DOI Artikel:
Traill, Henry D.: The papers of Basil Fillimer
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21806#0024
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The Papers of Basil Fillimer
had made that discovery his somewhat sudden death prevented
him from appointing some one of keener analytical acumen in my
place.
It would not be fair to the novel, in case it should ever be
published, to give any specimens of it here ; it might discount the
reader’s interest in the development of the plot. But this is the
sort of thing the diary consists of:
“June 15.—Went yesterday to call on my aunt Catherine and
found her more troubled than ever about the foundations of her
faith. It is a singulär phenomenon this awakening of doubt in
an elderly, mind—this c St. Martin’s summer ’ of scepticism if I
may so call it ; an intensely curious and at the same time a
painful study. For me it has so potent a fascination, that I
never say or do anything, even in what at the time seems to me
perfect good faith, to invite a continuance of my aunt’s con-
fidences, without afterwards suspecting my own motives. My
first inclination was to divert her mind to other subjects. Why,
I asked myself, should an old lady of seventy-two who has all her
life accepted the conventional religion without question be
encouraged to what the French call faire son äme at this
extremely late hour of the day ? Still you can’t very well teil any
old lady, even though she is your aunt, that you think she is too
old to begin bothering herseif with these high matters. You
have to put it just the other way, and suggest that she has
probably many years of life before her, and will have plenty of
time for such speculations later on. But the first sentence I tried
to frame in this sense reminded me so ludicrously of Mrs.
Quickly’s consolations of the dying Falstaff, that I had to stop
for fear of laughing, and allow her to go on. For reply I put her
off at the time with commonplaces, but she has since renewed the
conversation so offen that I feel I shall be obliged to disclose
some
The Papers of Basil Fillimer
had made that discovery his somewhat sudden death prevented
him from appointing some one of keener analytical acumen in my
place.
It would not be fair to the novel, in case it should ever be
published, to give any specimens of it here ; it might discount the
reader’s interest in the development of the plot. But this is the
sort of thing the diary consists of:
“June 15.—Went yesterday to call on my aunt Catherine and
found her more troubled than ever about the foundations of her
faith. It is a singulär phenomenon this awakening of doubt in
an elderly, mind—this c St. Martin’s summer ’ of scepticism if I
may so call it ; an intensely curious and at the same time a
painful study. For me it has so potent a fascination, that I
never say or do anything, even in what at the time seems to me
perfect good faith, to invite a continuance of my aunt’s con-
fidences, without afterwards suspecting my own motives. My
first inclination was to divert her mind to other subjects. Why,
I asked myself, should an old lady of seventy-two who has all her
life accepted the conventional religion without question be
encouraged to what the French call faire son äme at this
extremely late hour of the day ? Still you can’t very well teil any
old lady, even though she is your aunt, that you think she is too
old to begin bothering herseif with these high matters. You
have to put it just the other way, and suggest that she has
probably many years of life before her, and will have plenty of
time for such speculations later on. But the first sentence I tried
to frame in this sense reminded me so ludicrously of Mrs.
Quickly’s consolations of the dying Falstaff, that I had to stop
for fear of laughing, and allow her to go on. For reply I put her
off at the time with commonplaces, but she has since renewed the
conversation so offen that I feel I shall be obliged to disclose
some