At last he suddenly laid
his hand on my arm, looked at me a moment appealingly, and cried, "Upon
my word, I should like to tell you everything!"
"Tell me everything, by all means," I answered, smiling. "I desire
nothing better than to lie here in the shade and hear everything."
"Ah, but the question is, will you understand it? No matter; you think
me a queer fellow already. It's not easy, either, to tell you what I
feel--not easy for so queer a fellow as I to tell you in how many ways he
is queer!" He got up and walked away a moment, passing his hand over his
eyes, then came back rapidly and flung himself on the grass again. "I
said just now I always supposed I was happy; it's true; but now that my
eyes are open, I see I was only stultified. I was like a poodle-dog that
is led about by a blue ribbon, and scoured and combed and fed on slops.
It was not life; life is learning to know one's self, and in that sense I
have lived more in the past six weeks than in all the years that preceded
them. I am filled with this feverish sense of liberation; it keeps
rising to my head like the fumes of strong wine. I find I am an active,
sentient, intelligent creature, with desires, with passions, with
possible convictions--even with what I never dreamed of, a possible will
of my own! I find there is a world to know, a life to lead, men and
women to form a thousand relations with.
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