ever quarrel with as. My one quarrel is with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar realism in literature. The man who could call a spade a spade should be pelled to use o is the only thing he is fit for."
"Then what should we call you, Harry?" she asked.
"His name is Prince Paradox," said Dorian.
"I reize him in a flash," exclaimed the duchess.
"I wont hear of it," laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a chair. "From a label there is no escape! I refuse the title."
"Royalties may not abdicate," fell as a warning from pretty lips.
"You wish me to defend my throhen?"
"Yes.
"I give the truths of to-morro;quot;
"I prefer the mistakes of to-day," she answered.
"You disarm me, Gladys," he cried, catg the wilfulness of her mood.
"Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear."
"I ilt against beauty," he said, with a wave of his hand.
"That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too much."
"How you say that? I admit that I think that it is better to be beautiful than to be good. But oher hand, no one is more ready than I am to aowledge that it is better to be good than to be ugly."
"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?" cried the duchess. "What bees of your simile about the orchid?"
"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good Tory, must not ue them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly virtues have made land what she is."
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