"Do witty people fascinate?"
"In a different way. They amuse and astonish more than they inspire respect."
"How I should like to be witty!" I say, laughing. "It is a great power, is it not, to be able to say clever, brilliant, sparkling things?"
"Yes, but one not often to be coveted. A very witty person is no one's enemy so much as his own: he amuses people at the expense of others, and the former have a pleasant conviction that their turn will come presently, and no one feels safe."
"Like Lady Hester Stanhope," I say, "who lost all her friends through her tongue, and was also known to boast that no one could give such a slap on the face as she could!"
"Yes, her wit worked her ruin," says Paul, "as did poor Brummel's, although indeed his was but barefaced effrontery!"
"I always admired that man," I say, laughing: "he was so bold, and his insolence was so splendidly audacious. I wonder what master of ceremonies now-a-days would dare say to a duchess, 'In heaven's name, my dear duchess, what is the meaning of that extraordinary back of yours? I declare I must put you on a back-board. You must positively walk out of the room backwards that I mayn't see it!'" We both laugh heartily.
"It makes one feel very small, does it not?" says Paul, "that people should feel so much more angry at being made fun of, than being called ugly, or wicked, or disagreeable? Is it not Macaulay who says, 'Alas for human nature, that the wounds of vanity should smart and bleed so much longer than the wounds of affliction?'"
"One can forgive unkindness, ill-usage, neglect even—but ridicule never!" I say, laughing; "and yet it is curious, is it not? to see how people like to make fools of themselves comfortably, but hate to be told of it. That, I suppose, is why you men
