In Paris they paint
the babies' faces."
"You can hardly lay the blame for that upon civilisation," pleaded
the Girton Girl. "The ancient Briton had a pretty taste in woads."
"Man's first feeble steps upon the upward path of Art," assented the
Minor Poet, "culminating in the rouge-pot and the hair-dye."
"Come!" laughed the Old Maid, "you are narrow-minded. Civilisation
has given us music. Surely you will admit that has been of help to
us?"
"My dear lady," replied the Minor Poet, "you speak of the one
accomplishment with which Civilisation has had little or nothing to
do, the one art that Nature has bestowed upon man in common with the
birds and insects, the one intellectual enjoyment we share with the
entire animal creation, excepting only the canines; and even the
howling of the dog--one cannot be sure--may be an honest, however
unsatisfactory, attempt towards a music of his own. I had a fox
terrier once who invariably howled in tune. Jubal hampered, not
helped us. He it was who stifled music with the curse of
professionalism; so that now, like shivering shop-boys paying gate-
money to watch games they cannot play, we sit mute in our stalls
listening to the paid performer.
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