DOI article:
Harland, Henry: The friend of man
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.38746#0064
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The Friend of Man
you, or played with you, or told you stories, or gave you things—
who never, in fact, took any notice of you at all, except to frown,
and say hist-hist, when you were enjoying yourself—well, he
might be one of the greatest, and best, and wisest men in the
world, but, anyhow, he was a charlatan and an impostor. I had
Aunt Elizabeth’s authority for that.
One day, after our return to Florence, my second-cousin
Isabel (she was thirteen, and I was in love with her)—my second-
cousin Isabel was playing the piano, alone with me, in the school-
room, when Mr. Ambrose opened the door, and said, in his
testiest manner : “ Stop that noise—stop that noise ! ”
“ He’s a horrid pig,” cried Isabel, as soon as his back was
turned.
“Oh, no; he isn’t a pig,” I protested. “He’s one of the
greatest, and wisest, and best men in thel world, so of course he
can’t be a horrid pig. But I’ll tell you what he is. He’s a
charlatan and an impostor.”
“ Really ? How do you know ? ” Isabel wondered.
“ I heard Aunt Elizabeth tell my father so.”
“Oh, well, then it must be true,” Isabel assented.'
He lived with us till I was ten or eleven, at first in Florence,
and afterwards in Paris. All day long he would sit in his room
and write, (on the most beautiful, smooth, creamy paper—what
wouldn’t I have given to have acquired some of it for my own
literary purposes !) and in the evening he would receive visitors :
oh, such funny people, so unlike the people who came to see my
mother and father. The men, for example, almost all of them,
as Mr. Ambrose himself did, wore their hair long, so that it fell
about their collars ; whilst almost all the women had their hair
cut
The Friend of Man
you, or played with you, or told you stories, or gave you things—
who never, in fact, took any notice of you at all, except to frown,
and say hist-hist, when you were enjoying yourself—well, he
might be one of the greatest, and best, and wisest men in the
world, but, anyhow, he was a charlatan and an impostor. I had
Aunt Elizabeth’s authority for that.
One day, after our return to Florence, my second-cousin
Isabel (she was thirteen, and I was in love with her)—my second-
cousin Isabel was playing the piano, alone with me, in the school-
room, when Mr. Ambrose opened the door, and said, in his
testiest manner : “ Stop that noise—stop that noise ! ”
“ He’s a horrid pig,” cried Isabel, as soon as his back was
turned.
“Oh, no; he isn’t a pig,” I protested. “He’s one of the
greatest, and wisest, and best men in thel world, so of course he
can’t be a horrid pig. But I’ll tell you what he is. He’s a
charlatan and an impostor.”
“ Really ? How do you know ? ” Isabel wondered.
“ I heard Aunt Elizabeth tell my father so.”
“Oh, well, then it must be true,” Isabel assented.'
He lived with us till I was ten or eleven, at first in Florence,
and afterwards in Paris. All day long he would sit in his room
and write, (on the most beautiful, smooth, creamy paper—what
wouldn’t I have given to have acquired some of it for my own
literary purposes !) and in the evening he would receive visitors :
oh, such funny people, so unlike the people who came to see my
mother and father. The men, for example, almost all of them,
as Mr. Ambrose himself did, wore their hair long, so that it fell
about their collars ; whilst almost all the women had their hair
cut