TO THE LIGHTHOUSE

released it, the load of her accumulated impres-
sions of him jtiljed up, and down poured in a
ponderous avalanche all she felt about him. That
was one sensation. Then up rose in a fume the
essence of his being. That was another. She
felt herself transfixed by the intensity of her per-
ception; it was his seventy; his goodness. I
respect you (she addressed him silently) in every
atom; you are not vain; you are entirely im-
personal; you are finer than Mr. Ramsay; you
are the finest human being that I know; you have
neither wife nor child (without any sexual feeling,
she longed to cherish that loneliness), you live
for science (involuntarily, sections of potatoes
rose before her eyes); praise would be an insult
; to you; generous, pure-hearted, heroic man!
But simultaneously, she remembered how he had
brought a valet all the way up here; objected
to dogs on chairs; would prose for hours (until
Mr. Ramsay slammed out of the room) about
salt in vegetables and the iniquity of English
cooks.

How then did it work out, all this? How
did one judge people, think of them? How did
one add up this and that and conclude that it
was liking one felt, or disliking? And to those
words, what meaning attached, after all? Stand-
ing now, apparently transfixed, by the pear tree,
42