Before the dawn of European art he believed that the primitive huntsmen
and priests had built temples of massive stone slabs, had formed out of
the dark rocks and the great cedar trees majestic figures of gods and
of beasts, and symbols of the great forces, water, air, and forest among
which they lived. There might be prehistoric towns, like those in Greece
and Asia, standing in open places among the trees, filled with the works
of this early race. Nobody had been there; scarcely anything was known.
Thus talking and displaying the most picturesque of his theories,
Rachel's attention was fixed upon him.
She did not see that Hewet kept looking at her across the gangway,
between the figures of waiters hurrying past with plates. He was
inattentive, and Hirst was finding him also very cross and disagreeable.
They had touched upon all the usual topics--upon politics and
literature, gossip and Christianity. They had quarrelled over the
service, which was every bit as fine as Sappho, according to Hewet;
so that Hirst's paganism was mere ostentation. Why go to church, he
demanded, merely in order to read Sappho? Hirst observed that he had
listened to every word of the sermon, as he could prove if Hewet would
like a repetition of it; and he went to church in order to realise the
nature of his Creator, which he had done very vividly that morning,
thanks to Mr.
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