In the meantime, Henrietta urgently returned to her proposition.

“We should be so happy,” she said.  “I would housekeep for you, and you could work as much as you pleased.  Our life would be a long idyll.”

“My love,” he said, shaking his head as she looked beseechingly at him, “I have too much Manchester cotton in my constitution for long idylls.  And the truth is, that the first condition of work with me is your absence.  When you are with me, I can do nothing but make love to you.  You bewitch me.  When I escape from you for a moment, it is only to groan remorsefully over the hours you have tempted me to waste and the energy you have futilized.”

“If you won’t live with me you had no right to marry me.”

“True.  But that is neither your fault nor mine.  We have found that we love each other too much—­that our intercourse hinders our usefulness—­and so we must part.  Not for ever, my dear; only until you have cares and business of your own to fill up your life and prevent you from wasting mine.”

“I believe you are mad,” she said petulantly.  “The world is mad nowadays, and is galloping to the deuce as fast as greed can goad it.  I merely stand out of the rush, not liking its destination.  Here comes a barge, the commander of which is devoted to me because he believes that I am organizing a revolution for the abolition of lock dues and tolls.  We will go aboard and float down to Lyvern, whence you can return to London.  You had better telegraph from the junction to the college; there must be a hue and cry out after us by this time.  You shall have my address, and we can write to one another or see one another whenever we please.  Or you can divorce me for deserting you.”

“You would like me to, I know,” said Henrietta, sobbing.

“I should die of despair, my darling,” he said complacently.  “Ship aho-o-o-y!  Stop crying, Hetty, for God’s sake.  You lacerate my very soul.”

“Ah-o-o-o-o-o-o-oy, master!” roared the bargee.

“Good arternoon, sir,” said a man who, with a short whip in his hand, trudged beside the white horse that towed the barge.  “Come up!” he added malevolently to the horse.

“I want to get on board, and go up to Lyvern with you,” said Trefusis.  “He seems a well fed brute, that.”

“Better fed nor me,” said the man.  “You can’t get the work out of a hunderfed ’orse that you can out of a hunderfed man or woman.  I’ve bin in parts of England where women pulled the barges.  They come cheaper nor ’orses, because it didn’t cost nothing to get new ones when the old ones we wore out.”

“Then why not employ them?” said Trefusis, with ironical gravity.  “The principle of buying laborforce in the cheapest market and selling its product in the dearest has done much to make Englishmen—­what they are.”

“The railway comp’nies keeps ’orspittles for the like of ’im,” said the man, with a cunning laugh, indicating the horse by smacking him on the belly with the butt of the whip.  “If ever you try bein’ a laborer in earnest, governor, try it on four legs.  You’ll find it far preferable to trying on two.”