“Yes,” he said, frowning, “I believe I do.  That’s just it!  I’m a critic, pure and simple.  I can’t look at anything, from a pigstye to a cathedral, or listen to anything, from a bird singing to an orchestra, or read anything, from Bradshaw to Shakespeare, without seeing when it is out of shape and how it ought to be done.  I’m like the man in Ezekiel, whose appearance was like the appearance of brass, with a line of flax in his hand and a measuring reed.  He goes on measuring everything for about five chapters, and nothing comes of it, as far as I can remember!  I suppose I ought to be content with that, but I can’t bear it.  I hate fault-finding.  I want to make beautiful things.  I spent months over my last novel, and, as Aaron said to Moses, ‘There came out this calf!’ I’m a very unfortunate man.  If I had not had to work so hard for many years for a bare living, I could have done something with writing, I think.  But now I’m a sort of plumber, mending holes in other people’s work.  Never mind.  I will waste my time!”

All this while he was eyeing the little clock on his table.  “Now be off!” he said suddenly, “My penance is over, and I won’t be disturbed!” He caught up his pen.  “You had better tell the others not to come near me, or I’m blessed if I won’t read the whole thing aloud after dinner!” And he was immersed in his work again.

Two or three days later I found Father Payne strolling in the garden, on a bright morning.  It was just on the verge of spring.  There were catkins in the shrubbery.  The lilacs were all knobbed with green.  The aconite was in full bloom under the trees, and the soil was all pricked with little green blades.  He was drinking it all in with delighted glances.  I said something about his book.

“Oh, the fit’s off!” said he; “I’m sober again!  I finished the chapter, and, by Jove, I think it’s the worst thing I have done yet.  It’s simply infamous!  I read it with strong sensations of nausea!  I really don’t know how I can get such deplorable rubbish down on paper.  No matter, I get all the rapture of creation, and that’s the best part of it.  I simply couldn’t live without it.  It clears off some perilous stuff or other, and now I feel like a convalescent.  Did you ever see anything so enchanting as that aconite?  The colour of it, and the way the little round head is tucked down on the leaves!  I could improve on it a trifle, but not much.  God must have had a delicious time designing flowers—­I wonder why He gave up doing it, and left it to the market-gardeners.  I can’t make out why new flowers don’t keep appearing.  I could offer a few suggestions.  I dream of flowers sometimes—­great banks of bloom rising up out of crystal rivers, in deep gorges, full of sunshine and scent.  How nice it is to be idle!  I’m sure I’ve earned it, after that deplorable chapter.  It really is a miracle of flatness!  You go back to your work, my boy, and thank God you can say what you mean!  And then you can bring it to me, and I’ll tell you to an inch what it is worth!”