“You can’t prevent the heathen being converted if they choose to be,” said Lady Caroline; “this is an age of toleration.”

“You could always deny it,” said the Rev. Poltimore, “like the Belgians do with regrettable occurrences in the Congo.  But I would go further than that.  I would stimulate the waning enthusiasm for Christianity in this country by labelling it as the exclusive possession of a privileged few.  If one could induce the Duchess of Pelm, for instance, to assert that the Kingdom of Heaven, as far as the British Isles are concerned, is strictly limited to herself, two of the under-gardeners at Pelmby, and, possibly, but not certainly, the Dean of Dunster, there would be an instant reshaping of the popular attitude towards religious convictions and observances.  Once let the idea get about that the Christian Church is rather more exclusive than the Lawn at Ascot, and you would have a quickening of religious life such as this generation has never witnessed.  But as long as the clergy and the religious organisations advertise their creed on the lines of ’Everybody ought to believe in us:  millions do,’ one can expect nothing but indifference and waning faith.”

“Time is just as exclusive in its way as Art,” said Lady Caroline.

“In what way?” said the Reverend Poltimore.

“Your pleasantries about religion would have sounded quite clever and advanced in the early ’nineties.  To-day they have a dreadfully warmed-up flavour.  That is the great delusion of you would-be advanced satirists; you imagine you can sit down comfortably for a couple of decades saying daring and startling things about the age you live in, which, whatever other defects it may have, is certainly not standing still.  The whole of the Sherard Blaw school of discursive drama suggests, to my mind, Early Victorian furniture in a travelling circus.  However, you will always have relays of people from the suburbs to listen to the Mocking Bird of yesterday, and sincerely imagine it is the harbinger of something new and revolutionising.”

“Would you mind passing that plate of sandwiches,” asked one of the trio of young ladies, emboldened by famine.

“With pleasure,” said Lady Caroline, deftly passing her a nearly empty plate of bread-and-butter.

“I meant the place of caviare sandwiches.  So sorry to trouble you,” persisted the young lady

Her sorrow was misapplied; Lady Caroline had turned her attention to a newcomer.

“A very interesting exhibition,” Ada Spelvexit was saying; “faultless technique, as far as I am a judge of technique, and quite a master-touch in the way of poses.  But have you noticed how very animal his art is?  He seems to shut out the soul from his portraits.  I nearly cried when I saw dear Winifred depicted simply as a good-looking healthy blonde.”