The woman in white, a novel . oda of gayly-painted wire-work,designed and made by himself They are almost as tame as thecanaries, and they are peqietually let out, like the canaries. Theycrawl all over him, popping in and out of his waistcoat, and sittingin couples, white as snow, on his capacious shoulders. He seems tobe even fonder of his mice than of his other pets, smiles at them,and kisses them, and calls them by all sorts of endearing it be possible to suppose an Englishman with any taste for suchchildish interests and amusements as these, that Englishman wouldcertainly feel rat
The woman in white, a novel . oda of gayly-painted wire-work,designed and made by himself They are almost as tame as thecanaries, and they are peqietually let out, like the canaries. Theycrawl all over him, popping in and out of his waistcoat, and sittingin couples, white as snow, on his capacious shoulders. He seems tobe even fonder of his mice than of his other pets, smiles at them,and kisses them, and calls them by all sorts of endearing it be possible to suppose an Englishman with any taste for suchchildish interests and amusements as these, that Englishman wouldcertainly feel rather ashamed of them, and would be anxious to apol-ogize for them, in the company of grown-up people. But the Count,apparently, sees nothing ridiculous in the amazing contrast betweenhis colossal self and his frail little pets. He would blandly kiss hiswhite mice, and twitter to his canary-birds, amidst an assembly ofICnglish fox-hunters, and would only pity them as barbarians wlientliy were all laughing their loudest *t COUNT FOSCO AND THE DOG. THE WOMAN IX WHITE. 195 It seems hardly credible while I am writing it down, but it is cer-tainly true, that this same man, who has all the fondness of an oldmaid for his cockatoo, and all the siiiall dexterities of an organ-boyin managing his white mice, can talk, when any thing happens torouse him, with a daring independence of thought, a knowledge ofbooks in ever\^ language, and an experience of society in half thecapitals of Europe, which would make him the prominent person-age of any assembly in the civilized world. This trainer of canary-birds, this arcliitect of a pagoda for white mice, is (as Sir Percivalhimself has told me) one of the fii-st experimental chemists living,and has discovered, among other wonderful inventions, a means ofpetrifying the l^ody after death, so as to preserve it, as hard as mar-ble, to the end of time. This fat, indolent, elderly man, whose nervesare so finely strung that he starts at chance noise
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Keywords: ., bookauthorcollinswilkie18241889, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870
