'
'Yes, yes,' my friend answered abstractedly. 'Of course, of course;
things were all so very big in those days, you know, my dear fellow.'
'Excuse me,' I replied with polite incredulity; 'I really don't know to
what particular period of time the phrase "in those days" may be
supposed precisely to refer.'
My friend shuffled inside his coat a little uneasily. (I will admit that
I was taking a mean advantage of him. The professorial lecture in
private life, especially when followed by a strict examination, is quite
undeniably a most intolerable nuisance.) 'Well,' he said, in a crusty
voice, after a moment's hesitation, 'I mean, you know, in geological
times ... well, there, my dear fellow, things used all to be so _very_
big in those days, usedn't they?'
I took compassion upon him and let him off easily. 'You've had enough of
the museum,' I said with magnanimous self-denial. 'The Atlantosaurus has
broken the camel's back. Let's go and have a quiet cigarette in the park
outside.'
But if you suppose, reader, that I am going to carry my forbearance so
far as to let you, too, off the remainder of that geological
disquisition, you are certainly very much mistaken. A discourse which
would be quite unpardonable in social intercourse may be freely admitted
in the privacy of print; because, you see, while you can't easily tell a
man that his conversation bores you (though some people just avoid doing
so by an infinitesimal fraction), you can shut up a book whenever you
like, without the very faintest or remotest risk of hurting the author's
delicate susceptibilities.
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