He could never have written about red mullets as
Perrelli writes when he compares their skin to the fiery waves of
Phelgethon, to the mantle of rosy-fingered dawn, to the blush of a
maiden surprised in her bath, and then goes on to tell you how to cook
the b east in thirty different ways and how to spit out the bones in
the most noiseless, genteel fashion. That is Perrelli--so original, so
leisurely. Always himself! He smiled as he wrote; there is not a shadow
of doubt about it. In another section, on the fountains of the island,
he deliberately indulges in the humour of some old mediaeval schoolman.
Then there is a chapter on the ecclesiastical conditions of the place
under Florizel the Fat--it is full of veiled attacks on the religious
orders of his own day; I suspect it got him into trouble, that chapter.
I am sorry to say there is a good deal of loose talk scattered about
his pages. I fear he was not altogether a pure-minded man. But I cannot
bring myself to despise him. What do you think? Certain problems are
always cropping up, aren't they?"
Mr.
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