The Marsh's were at that time
giving rather large weekly receptions in the fine rooms of their
villa, and our friends accompanied us to one of these. It was very
easy to see that both ladies appreciated each other. There was a
large gathering, mostly of Americans, and Lewes exerted himself to be
agreeable and amusing--which he always was, when he wished to be, to a
degree rarely surpassed.
He and I used to walk about the country together when "Polly" was
indisposed for walking; and I found him an incomparable companion,
whether a gay or a grave mood were uppermost. He was the best
_raconteur_ I ever knew, full of anecdote, and with a delicious
perception of humour. She also, as I have said--very needlessly
to those who have read her books--had an exquisite feeling and
appreciation of the humorous, abundantly sufficient if unsupported by
other examples, to put Thackeray's dicta on the subject of woman's
capacity for humour out of court. But George Eliot's sense of humour
was different in quality rather than in degree from that which Lewes
so abundantly possessed. And it was a curious and interesting study to
observe the manifestation of the quality in both of them. It was not
that the humour, which he felt and expressed, was less delicate
in quality or less informed by deep human insight and the true
_nihil-humanum-a-me-alienum-puto_ spirit than hers, but it was less
wide and far-reaching in its purview of human feelings and passions
and interests; more often individual in its applicability, and less
drawn from the depths of human nature as exhibited by types
and classes.
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