book_id
stringlengths 2
6
| title
stringclasses 1
value | author
stringclasses 1
value | conversations
listlengths 1
5.07k
|
|---|---|---|---|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And he --his eyes were resting on Shakespeare's features as a man might look upon the face of a brother--"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, said Walkham, the sculptor,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How our dreams of yesterday stare at us like strangers to-day."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "On the contrary, remarked Reginald,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It sometimes seems, said the sculptor,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why not, under favorable conditions?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But where do they go? Surely they cannot perish utterly?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, that is the question. Or, rather, it is not a question. Nothing is ever lost in the spiritual universe."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But what, inquired Ernest,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is this, the sculptor replied;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I had a striking motive and lost it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do you remember, he continued, speaking to Reginald,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes; it was a striking thing and impressed me very much, though I cannot recall it at the moment."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, it was a commission. An eccentric young millionaire had offered me eight thousand dollars for it. I had an absolutely original conception. But I cannot execute it. It's as if a breeze had carried it away."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is very regrettable."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, I should say so,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "By Jove! he cried."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is this?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It's an epic of the French Revolution,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But, man, do you know that I have discovered my motive in it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What do you mean?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Listen!"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I forget you haven't a sculptor's mind. I am so constituted that, with me, all impressions are immediately translated into the sense of form. I do not hear music; I see it rise with domes and spires, with painted windows and Arabesques. The scent of the rose is to me tangible. I can almost feel it with my hand. So your prose suggested to me, by its rhythmic flow, something which, at first indefinite, crystallised finally into my lost conception of Narcissus."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is extraordinary, murmured Reginald."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I had not dreamed of it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "So you do not think it rather fantastic?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, it is quite possible. Perhaps his Narcissus was engaging the sub-conscious strata of my mind while I was writing this passage. And surely it would be strange if the undercurrents of our mind were not reflected in our style."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do you mean, then, that a subtle psychologist ought to be able to read beneath and between our lines, not only what we express, but also what we leave unexpressed?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Undoubtedly."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Even if, while we are writing, we are unconscious of our state of mind? That would open a new field to psychology."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Only to those that have the key, that can read the hidden symbols. It is to me a matter-of-course that every mind-movement below or above the threshold of consciousness must, of a necessity, leave its imprint faintly or clearly, as the case may be, upon our activities."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "This may explain why books that seem intolerably dull to the majority, delight the hearts of the few,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, to the few that possess the key. I distinctly remember how an uncle of mine once laid down a discussion on higher mathematics and blushed fearfully when his innocent wife looked over his shoulder. The man who had written it was a roué."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then the seemingly most harmless books may secretly possess the power of scattering in young minds the seed of corruption,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If they happen to understand, Clarke observed thoughtfully."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I can very well conceive of a lecherous text-book of the calculus, or of a reporter's story of a picnic in which burnt, under the surface, undiscoverable, save to the initiate, the tragic passion of Tristram and Iseult."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Your friend Jack is delightful, Reginald remarked, looking up from his papers."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And his ebon-coloured hair contrasts prettily with the gold in yours. I should imagine that you are temperamental antipodes."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "So we are; but friendship bridges the chasm between."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "How long have you known him?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We have been chums ever since our sophomore year."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What attracted you in him?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is no simple matter to define exactly one's likes and dislikes. Even a tiny protoplasmic animal appears to be highly complex under the microscope. How can we hope to analyse, with any degree of certitude, our souls, especially when, under the influence of feeling, we see as through a glass darkly."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is true that personal feeling colours our spectacles and distorts the perspective. Still, we should not shrink from self-analysis. We must learn to see clearly into our own hearts if we would give vitality to our work. Indiscretion is the better part of literature, and it behooves us to hound down each delicate elusive shadow of emotion, and convert it into copy."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is because I am so self-analytical that I realise the complexity of my nature, and am at a loss to define my emotions. Conflicting forces sway us hither and thither without neutralising each other. Physicology isn't physics. There were many things to attract me to Jack. He was subtler, more sympathetic, more feminine, perhaps, than the rest of my college-mates."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That I have noticed. In fact, his lashes are those of a girl. You still care for him very much?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It isn't a matter of caring. We are two beings that live one life."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A sort of psychic Siamese twins?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Almost. Why, the matter is very simple. Our hearts root in the same soil; the same books have nourished us, the same great winds have shaken our being, and the same sunshine called forth the beautiful blossom of friendship."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He struck me, if you will pardon my saying so, as a rather commonplace companion."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "There is in him a hidden sweetness, and a depth of feeling which only intimate contact reveals. He is now taking his post-graduate course at Harvard, and for well-nigh two months we have not met; yet so many invisible threads of common experience unite us that we could meet after years and still be near each other."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You are very young,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What do you mean?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah--never mind."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "So you do not believe that two hearts may ever beat as one?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, that is an auditory delusion. Not even two clocks beat in unison. There is always a discrepancy, infinitesimal, perhaps, but a discrepancy nevertheless."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hello, Ernest! How are you, old man?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have come to take Ernest away from you, said Jack."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He looks a trifle paler than usual, and a day's outing will stir the red corpuscles in his blood."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have no doubt that you will take very good care of him,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Where shall we go?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Lion Palace."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you notice the ferocious look in the mien of the average frequenter of this island resort?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is, he continued, speaking to himself for want of an audience,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But they are interesting."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I cannot find so."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And then I had a stroke of luck. The manager of a vaudeville was my friend and decided to give me a trial. He thought I had a voice. They called me Betsy, the Hyacinth Girl. At first it seemed as if people liked to hear me. But I suppose that was because I was new. After a month or two they discharged me."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And why?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I suppose I was just used up, that's all."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Frightful!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I never had much of a voice--and the tobacco smoke--and the wine--I love wine."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And do you like your present occupation?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why not? Am I not young? Am I not pretty?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Jack--and you really enjoyed this conversation?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Didn't you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do you mean this?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, yes; she was--very agreeable."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "We're twenty, Ernest. And then, you see, it's like a course in sociology. Susie--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Susie, was that her name?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "So she had a name?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Of course."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "She shouldn't. It should be a number."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "They may not be pillars of society; still, they're human."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, said Ernest,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Say, Ernest, you should spout some poetry as of old. Are your lips stricken mute, or are you still thinking of Coney Island?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, no, the swift wind has taken it away. I am clean, I am pure. Life has passed me. It has kissed me, but it has left no trace."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And ever listens in the ceaseless din, Waiting for him, her lover, who shall come, Whose singing lips shall boldly claim their own, And render sonant what in her was dumb, The splendour, and the madness, and the sin, Her dreams in iron and her thoughts of stone."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And are you dreaming of becoming the lyric mouth of the city, of giving utterance to all its yearnings, its 'dreams in iron and its thoughts of stone'?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, replied Ernest, simply,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Will it deal with her?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, no. She personally has nothing to do with it. At least not directly. It was the commotion of blood and--brain. The air--the change. I don't know what."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What will it be?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A play, a wonderful play. And its heroine will be a princess, a little princess, with a yellow veil."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What of the plot?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That I shall not tell you to-day. In fact, I shall not breathe a word to any one. It will take you all by surprise--and the public by storm."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "So it will be playable?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If I am not very much mistaken, you will see it on Broadway within a year. And, he added graciously,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will let you have two box-seats for the first night."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I hope you will finish it soon, Jack observed after a while."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You haven't done much of late."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A similar reflection was on my mind when you came yesterday. That accounts for the low spirits in which you found me."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah, indeed, Jack replied, measuring Ernest with a look of wonder."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But now your face is aglow. It seems that the blood rushes to your head swifter at the call of an idea than at the kiss of a girl."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Thank God! Ernest remarked with a sigh of relief."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mighty forces within me are fashioning the limpid thought. Passion may grip us by the throat momentarily; upon our backs we may feel the lashes of desire and bathe our souls in flames of many hues; but the joy of activity is the ultimate passion."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You must be frightfully busy?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "So I am, Reginald replied."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I always work in a white heat. I am restless, nervous, feverish, and can find no peace until I have given utterance to all that clamours after birth."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is it that is so engaging your mind, the epic of the French Revolution?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, no. I should never have undertaken that. I haven't done a stroke of work on it for several weeks. In fact, ever since Walkham called, I simply couldn't. It seemed as if a rough hand had in some way destroyed the web of my thought. Poetry in the writing is like red hot glass before the master-blower has fashioned it into birds and trees and strange fantastic shapes. A draught, caused by the opening of a door may distort it. But at present I am engaged upon more important work. I am modelling a vessel not of fine-spun glass, but of molten gold."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You make me exceedingly anxious to know what you have in store for us. It seems to me you have reached a point where even you can no longer surpass yourself."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Your praise is too generous, yet it warms like sunshine. I will confess that my conception is unique. It combines with the ripeness of my technique the freshness of a second spring."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "When, he cried,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If the gods are propitious, he remarked,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I shall complete it to-night. To-morrow is my reception, and I have half promised to read it then."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Perhaps I shall be in the position soon to let you see my play."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Let us hope so,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Jack! he exclaimed in surprise,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I thought you a hundred miles away from here."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That shows that you no longer care for me, Jack playfully answered."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "When our friendship was young, you always had a presentiment of my presence."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, perhaps I had. But tell me, where do you hail from?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Clarke called me up on the telephone--long-distance, you know. I suppose it was meant as a surprise for you. And you certainly looked surprised--not even pleasantly. I am really head-over-heels at work. But you know how it is. Sometimes a little imp whispers into my ears daring me to do a thing which I know is foolish. But what of it? My legs are strong enough not to permit my follies to overtake me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It was certainly good of you to come. In fact, you make me very glad. I feel that I need you to-night--I don't know why. The feeling came suddenly--suddenly as you. I only know I need you. How long can you stay?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I must leave you to-morrow morning. I have to hustle somewhat. You know my examinations are taking place in a day or two and I've got to cram up a lot of things."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Still, remarked Ernest,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I don't know. I only know it's the real thing. It's worth all the wisdom bald-headed professors may administer to you in concentrated doses at five thousand a year."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Come now, Jack could not help saying,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Jack, cried Ernest in honest indignation,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, because your sonnet on Cartesian geometry roused even the math-fiend to compassion. And don't you remember Professor Squeeler, whose heart seemed to leap with delight whenever he could tell you that, in spite of incessant toil on your part, he had again flunked you in physics with fifty-nine and a half per cent.?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And he wouldn't raise the mark to sixty! God forgive him,--I cannot."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Jack, Jack!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is my play!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You mean that you inspired it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, I have written it, or rather, was going to write it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Wake up, Ernest! You are mad!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, in all seriousness. It is mine. I told you--don't you remember--when we returned from Coney Island--that I was writing a play."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah, but not this play."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, this play. I conceived it, I practically wrote it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The more's the pity that Clarke had preconceived it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But it is mine!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Did you tell him a word about it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, to be sure."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Did you leave the manuscript in your room?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I had, in fact, not written a line of it. No, I had not begun the actual writing."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why should a man of Clarke's reputation plagiarise your plays, written or unwritten?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I can see no reason. But--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Tut, tut."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, he observed,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You cannot imagine how real it all seemed to me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Even now it is as if something has gone from me, some struggling thought that I cannot--cannot remember."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You must not think, my boy, that I bear you any malice for your extraordinary delusion. Before Jack went away he gave me an exact account of all that has happened. Divers incidents recurred to him from which it appears that, at various times in the past, you have been on the verge of a nervous collapse."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But what shall a man do? Shall he sacrifice art to hygiene and surrender the one attribute that makes him chiefest of created things? Animals, too, think. Some walk on two legs. But introspection differentiates man from the rest. Shall we yield up the sweet consciousness of self that we derive from the analysis of our emotion, for the contentment of the bull that ruminates in the shade of a tree or the healthful stupidity of a mule?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Assuredly not."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But what shall a man do?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah, that I cannot tell. Mathematics offers definite problems that admit of a definite solution. Life states its problems with less exactness and offers for each a different solution. One and one are two to-day and to-morrow. Psychical values, on each manipulation, will yield a different result. Still, your case is quite clear. You have overworked yourself in the past, mentally and emotionally. You have sown unrest, and must not be surprised if neurasthenia is the harvest thereof."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you think--that I should go to some sanitarium?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "God forbid! Go to the seashore, somewhere where you can sleep and play. Take your body along, but leave your brain behind--at least do not take more of it with you than is necessary. The summer season in Atlantic City has just begun. There, as everywhere in American society, you will be much more welcome if you come without brains."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How do you account for my strange obsession--one might almost call it a mania?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "If it could be accounted for it would not be strange."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Can you suggest no possible explanation?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Perhaps a stray leaf on my desk a few indications of the plot, a remark--who knows? Perhaps thought-matter is floating in the air. Perhaps--but we had better not talk of it now. It would needlessly excite you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You are right, answered Ernest gloomily,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You flatter me. There is nothing in it that you may not be able to do equally well--some day."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, no, the boy replied, looking up to Reginald with admiration."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You are the master."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Surely, he thought,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Tell me, she said wistfully,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why are you trying so hard to make love to me?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Child, child, she said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Pshaw! You exaggerate. Of course, there is a measure of truth in what you say, but it is only one side of the truth, and the truth, you know, is always Janus-faced. In fact, it often has more than two faces. I can assure you that I have cared deeply for the women to whom my love-poetry was written. And you will not deny that it is genuine."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "God forbid! Only you have been using the wrong preposition. You should have said that it was written at them."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "By Jove! you are too devilishly clever!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And do you apply your theory to all artists, or only to us makers of rhyme?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "To all,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, she said, with a new sadness in her voice,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I, too, have paid the price."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You mean?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I loved."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And art?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That was the sacrifice."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Perhaps you have chosen the better part,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, she replied,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You love him still?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Come, come, she said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah! she cried triumphantly,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "More."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Because you think love would repay you with compound interest,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Tell me, she said, negligently fanning herself,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, he exclaimed enthusiastically,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The great American novel?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Perhaps."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Who will be your hero--Clarke?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, he replied after a while, a little piqued by her suggestion,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Clarke is not the hero. What makes you think that he casts a spell on everything I do?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Dear child, she replied,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I know him. He cannot fail to impress his powerful personality upon all with whom he comes in contact, to the injury of their intellectual independence. Moreover, he is so brilliant and says everything so much better than anybody else, that by his very splendor he discourages effort in others. At best his influence will shape your development according to the tenets of his mind--curious, subtle and corrupted. You will become mentally distorted, like one of those hunchback Japanese trees, infinitely wrinkled and infinitely grotesque, whose laws of growth are not determined by nature, but by the diseased imagination of the East."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am no weakling, Ernest asserted,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Here the Princess Marigold seemed to peer at him through the veil of the past, but he waved her aside."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "As for my story, he continued,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Who can it be? Ethel remarked, with a merry twinkle,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ethel, he said sulkingly,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am immensely flattered, she replied."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Really, nothing pleases me better than to be immortalised in print, since I have little hope nowadays of perpetuating my name by virtue of pencil or brush. I have been put into novels before and am consumed with curiosity to hear the plot of yours."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If you don't mind, I had rather not tell you just yet, Ernest said."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It's going to be called Leontina--that's you. But all depends on the treatment. You know it doesn't matter much what you say so long as you say it well. That's what counts. At any rate, any indication of the plot at this stage would be decidedly inadequate."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I think you are right, she ventured."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "By all means choose your own time to tell me. Let's talk of something else. Have you written anything since your delightful book of verse last spring? Surely now is your singing season. By the time we are thirty the springs of pure lyric passion are usually exhausted."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is something, he said."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Besides, who can turn out a masterpiece every week? An artist's brain is not a machine, and in the respite from creative work I have gathered strength for the future. But, he added, slightly annoyed,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ethel, the boy repeated, impatiently,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Foolish boy, she said softly; then, lowering her voice to a whisper:"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You may kiss me before you go."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Poet though you are, Ethel whispered,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, you must not miss your train. Go by all means."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Go to him, she said, and again,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do not go! Do not return to that house."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Professional writers, he was wont to say,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No man, he remarked,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Leontina."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Good stuff, Reginald remarked, laying down the manuscript;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The night when you were out of town,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I see,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What do you see?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Nothing, Reginald replied, with immovable calm,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It was inevitable, Reginald said."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I expected it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, she replied,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why should the first word between us be a lie?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And is your love for the boy so great that it overcame your hate of me?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He has told you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Not a word."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, she replied,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Compassion?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, compassion for your victim."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You mean?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Reginald!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I am all ear."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I implore you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Speak."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You have ruined one life."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, she continued fiercely,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have never wilfully ruined any one's life."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You have ruined mine."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Wilfully?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "How else shall I explain your conduct?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I warned you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Warning, indeed! The warning that the snake gives to the sparrow helpless under its gaze."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, but who tells you that the snake is to blame? Is it not rather the occult power that prescribes with blood on brazen scroll the law of our being?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "This is no solace to the sparrow. But whatever may be said, let us drop the past. Let us consider the present. I beg of you, leave this boy--let him develop without your attempting to stifle the life in him or impressing upon it the stamp of your alien mind."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ethel, he protested,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What if I knew?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You shall know, he said, simply."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Are you strong?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Strong to withstand anything at your hand. There is nothing that you can give me, nothing that you can take away."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, he remarked,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We both have changed. We meet now upon equal grounds. You are no longer the idol I made of you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Don't you think that to the idol this might be a relief, not a humiliation? It is a terrible torture to sit in state with lips eternally shut. Sometimes there comes over the most reticent of us a desire to break through the eternal loneliness that surrounds the soul. It is this feeling that prompts madmen to tear off their clothes and exhibit their nakedness in the market-place. It's madness on my part, or a whim, or I don't know what; but it pleases me that you should know the truth."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You promised me long ago that I should."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "To-day I will redeem my promise, and I will tell you another thing that you will find hard to believe."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And that is?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That I loved you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You have loved often."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, he replied."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Loved, seriously loved, I have, only once."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You must pardon me, he commenced,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "At that time, he continued,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I was not held to be particularly bright. The reason was that my mind, being pre-eminently and extraordinarily receptive, needed a stimulus from without. The moment I was sent to school, however, a curious metamorphosis took place in me. I may say that I became at once the most brilliant boy in my class. You know that to this day I have always been the most striking figure in any circle in which I have ever moved."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Like the chameleon, I have the power of absorbing the colour of my environment."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you mean that you have the power of absorbing the special virtues of other people?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That is exactly what I mean."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh!"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, but that is not all, he observed, smilingly."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That is nothing. We all possess that faculty in a degree. The secret of my strength is my ability to reject every element that is harmful or inessential to the completion of my self. This did not come to me easily, nor without a struggle. But now, looking back upon my life, many things become transparent that were obscure even to me at the time. I can now follow the fine-spun threads in the intricate web of my fate, and discover in the wilderness of meshes a design, awful and grandly planned."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The first friend I ever cared for was a boy marvellously endowed for the study of mathematics. At the time of our first meeting at school, I was unable to solve even the simplest algebraical problem. But we had been together only for half a month, when we exchanged parts. It was I who was the mathematical genius now, whereas he became hopelessly dull and stuttered through his recitations only with a struggle that brought the tears to his eyes. Then I discarded him. Heartless, you say? I have come to know better. Have you ever tasted a bottle of wine that had been uncorked for a long time? If you have, you have probably found it flat--the essence was gone, evaporated. Thus it is when we care for people. Probably--no, assuredly--there is some principle prisoned in their souls, or in the windings of their brains, which, when escaped, leaves them insipid, unprofitable and devoid of interest to us. Sometimes this essence--not necessarily the finest element in a man's or a woman's nature, but soul-stuff that we lack--disappears. In fact, it invariably disappears. It may be that it has been transformed in the processes of their growth; it may also be that it has utterly vanished by some inadvertence, or that we ourselves have absorbed it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then we throw them away?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That boy was followed by others. I absorbed many useless things and some that were evil. I realised that I must direct my absorptive propensities. This I did. I selected, selected well. And all the time the terrible power of which I was only half conscious grew within me."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is indeed a terrible power, she cried;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The invisible hand that smites in the dark is certainly more fearful than a visible foe. It is also more merciful. Think how much you would have suffered had you been conscious of your loss."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Still it seems even now to me that it cannot have been an utter, irreparable loss. There is no action without reaction. Even I--even we--must have received from you some compensation for what you have taken away."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "In the ordinary processes of life the law of action and reaction is indeed potent. But no law is without exception. Think of radium, for instance, with its constant and seemingly inexhaustible outflow of energy. It is a difficult thing to imagine, but our scientific men have accepted it as a fact. Why should we find it more difficult to conceive of a tremendous and infinite absorptive element? I feel sure that it must somewhere exist. But every phenomenon in the physical world finds its counterpart in the psychical universe. There are radium-souls that radiate without loss of energy, but also without increase. And there are souls, the reverse of radium, with unlimited absorptive capacities."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Vampire-souls,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "In every age, he replied, with solemnity,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Cruel, she sobbed,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What matter? he asked."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Their strength is taken from them, but the spirit of humanity, as embodied in us, triumphantly marches on."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You said you loved me,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I did."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But why, then--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I could not help it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Did you ever make the slightest attempt?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "In the horrible night hours I struggled against it. I even implored you to leave me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, but I loved you!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You would not be warned, you would not listen. You stayed with me, and slowly, surely, the creative urge went out of your life."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But what on earth could you find in my poor art to attract you? What were my pictures to you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I needed them, I needed you. It was a certain something, a rich colour effect, perhaps. And then, under your very eyes, the colour that vanished from your canvases reappeared in my prose. My style became more luxurious than it had been, while you tortured your soul in the vain attempt of calling back to your brush what was irretrievably lost."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why did you not tell me?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You would have laughed in my face, and I could not have endured your laugh. Besides, I always hoped, until it was too late, that I might yet check the mysterious power within me. Soon, however, I became aware that it was beyond my control. The unknown god, whose instrument I am, had wisely made it stronger than me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But why, retorted Ethel,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The law of being, Reginald replied, almost sadly,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You mean that day when I lay before you on my knees,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That day I buried my last dream of personal happiness. I would have gladly raised you from the floor, but love was utterly gone. If I am tenderer to-day than I am wont to be, it is because you mean so much to me as the symbol of my renunciation. When I realised that I could not even save the thing I loved from myself, I became hardened and cruel to others. Not that I know no kindly feeling, but no qualms of conscience lay their prostrate forms across my path. There is nothing in life for me but my mission."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But you have grown into one of the master-figures of the age. Why not be content with that? Is there no limit to your ambition?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ambition! Shakespeare stopped when he had reached his full growth, when he had exhausted the capacity of his contemporaries. I am not yet ready to lay down my pen and rest."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And will you always continue in this criminal course, a murderer of other lives?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I do not know."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Are you the slave of your unknown god?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "We are all slaves, wire-pulled marionettes: You, Ernest, I. There is no freedom on the face of the earth nor above. The tiger that tears a lamb is not free, I am not free, you are not free. All that happens must happen; no word that is said is said in vain, in vain is raised no hand."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then, Ethel retorted, eagerly,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Assuredly. But I am his chosen."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Can you--can you not set him free?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I need him--a little longer. Then he is yours."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But can you not, if I beg you again on my knees, at least loosen his chains before he is utterly ruined?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is beyond my power. If I could not rescue you, whom I loved, what in heaven or on earth can save him from his fate? Besides, he will not be utterly ruined. It is only a part of him that I absorb. In his soul are chords that I have not touched. They may vibrate one day, when he has gathered new strength. You, too, would have spared yourself much pain had you striven to attain success in different fields--not where I had garnered the harvest of a lifetime. It is only a portion of his talent that I take from him. The rest I cannot harm. Why should he bury that remainder?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "For God's sake, he cried, in his sleep,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I declare, he exclaimed,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It isn't laziness, Ernest replied, looking up rather pleased at the interruption."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But I've a splitting headache."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Perhaps those naps are not good for your health."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Probably. But of late I have frequently found it necessary to exact from the day-hours the sleep which the night refuses me. I suppose it is all due to indigestion, as you have suggested. The stomach is the source of all evil."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is also the source of all good. The Greeks made it the seat of the soul. I have always claimed that the most important item in a great poet's biography is an exact reproduction of his menu."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "True, a man who eats a heavy beefsteak for breakfast in the morning is incapable of writing a sonnet in the afternoon."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, Reginald added,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Good-bye."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Au revoir."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The Princess With the Yellow Veil,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ethel, he cried,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, she replied,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I kept the key; but I had not dreamed that I would ever again cross this threshold."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Turn on the light,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You were not always so cruel."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No matter, I have not come to speak of love."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, then, have you come?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Your letter? She smiled a little sadly."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Surely you did not expect me to answer that?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why not? He had again approached her and his lips were close to hers."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why not? I have yearned for you. I love you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You love me now--you did not love me then. The music of your words was cold--machine-made, strained and superficial. I shall not answer, I told myself: in his heart he has forgotten you. I did not then realise that a dangerous force had possessed your life and crushed in your mind every image but its own."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I don't understand."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you think I would have come here if it were a light matter? No, I tell you, it is a matter of life and death to you, at least as an artist."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What do you mean by that?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Have you done a stroke of work since I last saw you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, let me see, surely, magazine articles and a poem."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is not what I want to know. Have you accomplished anything big? Have you grown since this summer? How about your novel?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I--I have almost finished it in my mind, but I have found no chance to begin with the actual writing. I was sick of late, very sick."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Tell me, she ventured,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do you mean--are there thieves?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Thieves! Against thieves one can protect oneself."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Have you ever had ideas, plans that you began without having strength to complete them? Have you had glimpses of vocal visions that seemed to vanish no sooner than seen? Did it ever seem to you as if some mysterious and superior will brutally interfered with the workings of your brain?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Child, she cried,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Don't! For Christ's sake, do not pronounce his name! he sobbed."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do not breathe it. I could not endure it. I should go mad."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, he cried,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But he has himself confessed it,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Perhaps he has spoken in symbols. We all absorb to some extent other men's ideas, without robbing them and wrecking their thought-life. Reginald may be unscrupulous in the use of his power of impressing upon others the stamp of his master-mind. So was Shakespeare. No, no, no! You are mistaken; we were both deluded for the moment by his picturesque account of a common, not even a discreditable, fact. He may himself have played with the idea, but surely he cannot have been serious."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And your own experience, and Abel Felton's and mine--can they, too, be dismissed with a shrug of the shoulder?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But, come to think of it, the whole theory seems absurd. It is unscientific. It is not even a case of mesmerism. If he had said that he hypnotised his victims, the matter would assume a totally different aspect. I admit that something is wrong somewhere, and that the home of Reginald Clarke is no healthful abode for me. But you must also remember that probably we are both unstrung to the point of hysteria."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You are still under his spell,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Reginald is utterly incapable of such an action, even granting that he possessed the terrible power of which you speak. A man of his splendid resources, a literary Midas at whose very touch every word turns into gold, is under no necessity to prey on the thoughts of others. Circumstances, I admit, are suspicious. But in the light of common day this fanciful theory shrivels into nothing. Any court of law would reject our evidence as madness. It is too utterly fantastic, utterly alien to any human experience."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Is it though?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, what do you mean?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Surely, she answered,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "All this is impressive. I admit it is very impressive. But you yourself speak of such stories as legends. They are unfounded upon any tangible fact, and you cannot expect a man schooled in modern sciences to admit, as having any possible bearing upon his life, the crude belief of the Middle Ages!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why not? she responded."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Our scientists have proved true the wildest theories of mediæval scholars. The transmutation of metals seems to-day no longer an idle speculation, and radium has transformed into potential reality the dream of perpetual motion. The fundamental notions of mathematics are being undermined. One school of philosophers claims that the number of angles in a triangle is equal to more than two right angles; another propounds that it is less. Even great scientists who have studied the soul of nature are turning to spiritism. The world is overcoming the shallow scepticism of the nineteenth century. Life has become once more wonderful and very mysterious. But it also seems that, with the miracles of the old days, their terrors, their nightmares and their monsters have come back in a modern guise."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, he observed,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then, pacing the room nervously, he exclaimed:"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And still I find it impossible to believe your explanation. Reginald a vampire! It seems so ludicrous. If you had told me that such creatures exist somewhere, far away, I might have discussed the matter; but in this great city, in the shadow of the Flatiron Building--no!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yet they exist--always have existed. Not only in the Middle Ages, but at all times and in all regions. There is no nation but has some record of them, in one form or another. And don't you think if we find a thought, no matter how absurd it may seem to us, that has ever occupied the minds of men--if we find, I say, such a perennially recurrent thought, are we not justified in assuming that it must have some basis in the actual experience of mankind?"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Still, he observed triumphantly,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah, she replied,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I must go now, she said."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Will you not come with me, after all? I am so afraid to think of you still here."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, dear, he replied."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I shall not desert my post. I must solve the riddle of this man's life; and if, indeed, he is the thing he seems to be, I shall attempt to wrest from him what he has stolen from me. I speak of my unwritten novel."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do not attempt to oppose him openly. You cannot resist him."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Be assured that I shall be on my guard. I have in the last few hours lived through so much that makes life worth living, that I would not wantonly expose myself to any danger. Still, I cannot go without certainty--cannot, if there is some truth in our fears, leave the best of me behind."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What are you planning to do?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My play--I am sure now that it is mine--I cannot take from him; that is irretrievably lost. He has read it to his circle and prepared for its publication. And, no matter how firmly convinced you or I may be of his strange power, no one would believe our testimony. They would pronounce us mad. Perhaps we _are_ mad!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No; we are not mad; but it is mad for you to stay here,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I shall not stay here one minute longer than is absolutely essential. Within a week I shall have conclusive proof of his guilt or innocence."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How will you go about it?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "His writing table--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, perhaps I can discover some note, some indication, some proof--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It's a dangerous game."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have everything to gain."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I wish I could stay here with you, she said."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Have you no friend, no one whom you could trust in this delicate matter?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, yes--Jack."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do you know, she said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have a feeling that you care more for him than for me?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Nonsense, he said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Are you still as intimate with him as when I first met you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not quite; of late a troubling something, like a thin veil, seems to have passed between us. But he will come when I call him. He will not fail me in my hour of need."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When can he be here?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "In two or three days."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Meanwhile be very careful. Above all, lock your door at night."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will not only lock, but barricade it. I shall try with all my power to elucidate this mystery without, however, exposing myself to needless risks."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will go, then. Kiss me good-bye."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "May I not take you to the car?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You had better not."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Write me every day, or call me up on the telephone."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I need you. Come."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You are late this morning, Ernest, he remarked in his mildest manner."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Have you been about town, or writing poetry? Both occupations are equally unhealthy."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It would be very convenient and pleasant. Still, some way, I feel that it is not right for me, of all men, to take his place here."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That need not concern you, Reginald deliberately replied;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "This seems hardly surprising after the terrible attack he had when you read your play."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That idea has since then developed into a monomania."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am awfully sorry for him. I cared for him much, perhaps too much. But I always feared that he would come to such an end. Of late his letters have been strangely unbalanced."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You will find him very much changed. In fact, he is no longer the same."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, said Jack,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Was your novel finished?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I think so."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then you are out of danger. He will want nothing else of you. But you should have taken it with you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I had only sufficient presence of mind to slip it back into the drawer. To-morrow I shall simply demand it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You will do nothing of the kind. It is in his handwriting, and you have no legal proof that it is yours. You must take it away secretly. And he will not dare to reclaim it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And Jack?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You must warn him,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He would laugh at me. However, I must speak to Reginald."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is of no avail to speak to him. At least, you must not do so before you have obtained the manuscript. It would unnecessarily jeopardise our plans."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And after?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "After, perhaps. But you must not expose yourself to any danger."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, dear, he said, and kissed her;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Be careful, nevertheless."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I shall. In fact, I think he is not at home at this moment. If I go now I may be able to get hold of the manuscript and hide it before he returns."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I cannot but tremble to think of you in that house."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You shall have no more reason to tremble in a day or two."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Shall I see you to-morrow?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I don't think so. I must go over my papers and things so as to be ready at any moment to leave the house."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And then?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, she replied--"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "As I cannot expect you to-morrow, I shall probably go to the opera, but I shall be at home before midnight. Will you call me up then? A word from you will put me at ease for the night, even if it comes over the telephone."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will call you up. We moderns have an advantage over the ancients in this respect: the twentieth-century Pyramus can speak to Thisbe even if innumerable walls sever his body from hers."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A quaint conceit! But let us hope that our love-story will end less tragically, she said, tenderly caressing his hair."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, we shall be happy, you and I, she added, after a while."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The iron finger of fate that lay so heavily on our lives is now withdrawn. Almost withdrawn. Yes, almost. Only almost."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, she cried,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, dear, he rejoined,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why should you expose yourself to God knows what danger for a friend who is ready to betray you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You forget friendship is a gift. If it exacts payment in any form, it is no longer either friendship or a gift. And you yourself have assured me that I have nothing to fear from Reginald. I have nothing to give to him."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Leontina."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Thief!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Vampire!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "So Ethel has infected you with her absurd fancies! Poor boy! I am afraid.... I have been wanting to tell you for some time.... But I think... We have reached the parting of our road!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And that you dare to tell me!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Really, he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I fail to understand.... I must ask you to leave my room!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You fail to understand? You cad!"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Have you come to play havoc with my manuscripts?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Your manuscripts? Reginald Clarke, you are an impudent impostor! You have written no word that is your own. You are an embezzler of the mind, strutting through life in borrowed and stolen plumes!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why stolen? he coolly said, with a slight touch of irritation."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I absorb. I appropriate. That is the most any artist can say for himself. God creates; man moulds. He gives us the colours; we mix them."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is not the question. I charge you with having wilfully and criminally interfered in my life; I charge you with having robbed me of what was mine; I charge you with being utterly vile and rapacious, a hypocrite and a parasite!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Foolish boy, Reginald rejoined austerely."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is through me that the best in you shall survive, even as the obscure Elizabethans live in him of Avon. Shakespeare absorbed what was great in little men--a greatness that otherwise would have perished--and gave it a setting, a life."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A thief may plead the same. I understand you better. It is your inordinate vanity that prompts you to abuse your monstrous power."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You err. Self-love has never entered into my actions. I am careless of personal fame. Look at me, boy! As I stand before you I am Homer, I am Shakespeare ... I am every cosmic manifestation in art. Men have doubted in each incarnation my individual existence. Historians have more to tell of the meanest Athenian scribbler or Elizabethan poetaster than of me. The radiance of my work obscured my very self. I care not. I have a mission. I am a servant of the Lord. I am the vessel that bears the Host!"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "By what right, he cried,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I am a light-bearer. I tread the high hills of mankind.... I point the way to the future. I light up the abysses of the past. Were not my stature gigantic, how could I hold the torch in all men's sight? The very souls that I tread underfoot realise, as their dying gaze follows me, the possibilities with which the future is big.... Eternally secure, I carry the essence of what is cosmic ... of what is divine.... I am Homer ... Goethe ... Shakespeare.... I am an embodiment of the same force of which Alexander, Cæsar, Confucius and the Christos were also embodiments.... None so strong as to resist me."
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Jack,"
}
]
|
17144 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mr. Fielding,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ernest!"
}
]
|
382720 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yell again?"
}
]
|
921691 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Three times!"
}
]
|
310281 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I've slept by the week on the ice."
}
]
|
678104 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I won't quench it."
}
]
|
660849 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Got you that time--didn't I, you old devil!"
}
]
|
220008 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Anything I do in this town I'm not ashamed to do in broad daylight."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Titianus must take me for a crocodile, or rather for two crocodiles,"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "To be read without an instant's delay, he added, bowing with theatrical dignity to the assembled artists."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "One of the prefect's lictors brought this letter, which, if my wishes be granted, brings nothing that is unwelcome. Hold your noise you little blackguards or I will be the death of you."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I invite the three little guests to the remains of our feast. Give them anything that is fit for them, Euphorion, and whatever seems to you most suitable to your own stomach you may put into it."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "For men or for dogs?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "For the gods! replied Pollux."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Take it to mother; she will like to eat ambrosia for once."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A jolly evening to you!"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Our Deucalion, our more than Deucalion--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Pardon me, interrupted Pontius."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If I once more stop your discourse which began so promisingly; this letter contains important news and our revels must be over for the night. We must postpone our symposium and your drinking-speech."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It was not a drinking-speech, for if ever there was a moderate man--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Titianus writes me word that he proposes coming to Lochias this evening. He may arrive at any moment; and not alone, but with my fellow-artist, Claudius Venator from Rome, who is to assist me with his advice."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I never even heard his name,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I wonder at that,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Can he do anything?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "More than any one of us, replied Pontius."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He is a mighty man."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is splendid! exclaimed Pollux."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I like to see great men. When one looks me in the eye I always feel as if some of his superabundance overflowed into me, and irresistibly I draw myself up and think how fine it would be if one day I might reach as high as that man's chin."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Beware of morbid ambition, said Papias to his pupil in a warning voice."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is not the man who stands on tiptoe, but he who does his duty diligently, that can attain anything great."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He honestly does his, said the architect rising, and he laid his hand on the young sculptor's shoulder."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "We all do; to-morrow by sunrise each must be at his post again. For my colleague's sake it will be well that you should all be there in good time."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You will not escape the continuation of this evening's entertainment,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "When we next meet I will show you what I understand by a drinking- speech. It will do perhaps for your Roman guest. I am curious to hear what he will say about our Urania. Pollux has done his share of the work very well, and I have already devoted an hour's work to it, which has improved it. The more humble our material, the better I shall be pleased if the work satisfies Caesar; he himself has tried his hand at sculpture."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If only Hadrian could hear that! cried one of the painters."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He likes to think himself a great artist--one of the foremost of our time. It is said that he caused the life of the great architect, Apollodorus--who carried out such noble works for Trajan--to be extinguished--and why? because formerly that illustrious man had treated the imperial bungler as a mere dabbler, and would not accept his plan for the temple of Venus at Rome."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mere talk! answered Pontius to this accusation."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Apollodorus died in prison, but his incarceration had little enough to do with the Emperor's productions--excuse me, gentlemen, I must once more look through the sketches and plans."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Only I cannot understand how a man who practises so many arts at once as Hadrian does, and at the same time looks after the state and its government, who is a passionate huntsman and who dabbles in every kind of miscellaneous learning, contrives, when he wants to practise one particular form of art, to recall all his five senses into the nest from which he has let them fly, here, there, and everywhere. The inside of his head must be like that salad-bowl--which we have reduced to emptiness--in which Papias discovered three sorts of fish, brown and white meat, oysters and five other substances."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And who can deny, added Papias,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "True, said a painter."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Without the restraint and worry of apprenticeship no one can ever rise to happy and independent creativeness; and in the schools of rhetoric or in hunting or fighting no one can study drawing. It is not till a pupil has learned to sit steady and worry himself over his work for six hours on end that I begin to believe he will ever do any good work. Have you any of you seen the Emperor's work?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have, answered a mosaic worker."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Many years ago Hadrian sent a picture to me that he had painted; I was to make a mosaic from it. It was a fruit piece. Melons, gourds, apples, and green leaves. The drawing was but so-so, and the color impossibly vivid, still the composition was pleasing from its solidity and richness. And after all, when one sees it, one cannot but feel that such superfluity is better than meagreness and feebleness. The larger fruits, especially under the exuberant sappy foliage, were so huge that they might have been grown in the garden of luxury itself, still the whole had a look of reality. I mitigated the colors somewhat in my transcript; you may still see a copy of the picture at my house, it hangs in the studio where my men draw. Nealkes, the rich hanging-maker, has had a tapestry woven from it which Pontius proposes to use as a hanging for a wall of the work-room, but I have made a fine frame on purpose for it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Say rather for its designer."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Or yet rather, added the most loquacious of the painters,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I only wish the Emperor may come to ours too! I should like to sell him my picture of Alexander saluted by the priests in the temple of Jupiter Ammon."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I hope that when you agree about the price you will remember we are partners,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will follow your example strictly,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then you will certainly not be a loser, cried Papias,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is said, continued Eustorgius, laughing,"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But my friend you forget that he is a monarch among monarchs--and not merely among those of today--in the fullest meaning of the word. Each of us separately can produce something better and more perfect in his own line; but how great is the man who by earnestness and skill can even apprehend everything that the mind has ever been able to conceive of, or the creative spirit of the artist to embody! I know him, and I know that he loves a really thorough master, and tries to encourage him with princely liberality. But his ears are everywhere, and he promptly becomes the implacable enemy of those who provoke his resentment. So bridle your restive Alexandrian tongues, and let me tell you that my colleague from Rome is in the closest intimacy with Hadrian. He is of the same age, resembles him greatly, and repeats to him everything that he hears said about him. So cease talking about Caesar and pass no severer judgments on dilettanti in the purple than on your wealthy pupils, who paint and chisel for the mere love of it, and for whom you find it so easy to lisp out 'charming,' or 'wonderfully pretty,' or 'remarkably nice.' Take my warning in good part, you know I mean it well."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have come out of my cage to say something more to you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The hour is approaching when I may hope to repay the beneficent deeds, which, at various times, you have done to my interior. My mother will to-morrow morning, set before you that dish of cabbage. It could not be done sooner, because the only perfect sausage-maker, the very king of his trade, prepares these savory cylinders only once a week. A few hours ago he completed the making of the sausages, and to-morrow morning my mother will warm up for our breakfasts the noble mess, which she is preparing for us this evening--for, as I have told you, it is in its warmed-up state that it is the ideal of its kind. What will follow by way of sweets we shall owe again to my mother's art; but the cheering and invigorating element--I mean the wine that I drives dull care away, we owe to my sister."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will come, said Pontius,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The words fit into the metre, replied Pollux."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I inherit from my father--who, when he is not gate-keeping, sings and recites-- a troublesome tendency whenever anything incites me to drift into rhythm."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But to-day you have been more silent than usual, and yet you seemed to me to be extraordinarily content. Not your face only, but your whole length--a good measure--from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head was like a brimming cask of satisfaction."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, there is much that is lovely in this world!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Has anything specially pleasant happened to you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There is no need for that! Here I live in excellent company, the work progresses, and--well, why should I deny it? There was something specially to mark to-day; I met an old acquaintance again."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "An old one?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have already known her sixteen years; but when I first saw her she was in swaddling clothes."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then this venerable damsel friend is more than sixteen, perhaps seventeen! Is Eros the friend of the happy, or does happiness only follow in his train?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Who can be passing out there at this hour? Do you not hear the bark of a big dog mingle with the snapping of the three Graces?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is Titianus conducting the architect from Rome,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will go to meet him. But one thing more my friend, you too have an Alexandrian tongue. Beware of laughing at the Emperor's artistic efforts in the presence of this Roman. I repeat it: the man who is now coming is superior to us all, and there is nothing more repellant to me than when a small man assumes a strutting air of importance because he fancies he has discovered in some great man a weak spot where his own little body happens to be sound. The artist I am expecting is a grand man, but the Emperor Hadrian is a grander. Now retire behind your screens, and tomorrow morning I will be your guest."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Splendid, splendid! cried Hadrian, pointing into the little house."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "An idyl, a perfect idyl. Who would have expected to find such a smiling nook of peace in the most restless and busy town in the empire."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I and Pontius were equally surprised at this little nest, and we therefore left it untouched,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Intelligent people understand each other, and I owe you thanks for preserving this little home, answered the Emperor."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What an omen, what a favorable, in every way favorable augury, it offers me. The Graces receive me here into these old walls, Aglaia, Thalia and Euphrosyne!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Good luck to you, Master,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We come late,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That does not matter, said the old woman."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Here at Lochias for the last week we have quite forgotten to distinguish day from night, and a blessing can never come too late."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have brought with me to-day an illustrious guest, said Titianus."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The great Roman architect Claudius Venator. He only disembarked a few minutes since."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then a draught of wine will do him good. We have in the house some good white Mareotic from my daughter's garden by the lake. If your friend will do us humble folks so much honor, I beg he will step into our room; it is clean, is it not sir? and the cup I will give him to drink it out of would not disgrace the Emperor himself. Who knows what you will find up in the midst of all the muddle yonder?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will accept your invitation with pleasure, answered Hadrian."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I can see by your face that you have a pleasure in entertaining us, and any one might envy you your little house."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When the climbing-rose and the honey-suckle are out it is much prettier, said Doris, as she filled the cup."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Here is some water for mixing."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A masterpiece, dame; what would Caesar find to drink out of here where the gate-keeper uses such a treasure? Who executed this admirable work, pray?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My son carved it for me in his spare time."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He is a highly-skilled sculptor,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A very noble drink! I thank you, mother."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And I you, for styling me mother: there is no better title a woman can have who has brought up good children; and I have three who need never be ashamed to be seen."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I wish you all luck with them, good little mother,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We shall meet again, for I am going to spend some days at Lochias."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Now, in all this bustle?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "This great architect, said Titianus, in explanation,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He needs no help! cried the old woman."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He is a man of the best stamp. His foresight and energy, my son says, are incomparable. I have seen him giving his orders myself, and I know a man when I see him!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And what particularly pleased you in him?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He never for a moment loses his temper in all the hurry, never speaks a word too much or too little; he can be stern when it is necessary, but he is kind to his inferiors. What his merits are as an artist I am not capable of judging, but I am quite certain that he is a just and able man."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I know him myself, replied Caesar,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Being a man he must be able to be severe; but he is so only when it is. necessary, and how kind he can be he shows himself every day. A man grows to the mould of his own mind when he is a great deal alone; and this I have noticed, that a man who is repellant and sharp to those beneath him is not in himself anything really great; for it shows that he considers it necessary to guard against the danger of being looked upon as of no more consequence than the poorer folks he deals with. Now, a man of real worth knows that it can be seen in his bearing, even when he treats one of us as an equal. Pontius does so, and Titianus, and you who are his friend, no less. It is a good thing that you should have come-- but, as I said before, the architect up there can do very well without you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You do not seem to rate my capacity very highly, and I regret it, for you have lived with your eyes open and have learned to judge men keenly."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You--you are a great man too--it is quite possible that you might see things that would escape Pontius. There are a few choice souls whom the Muses particularly love and you are one of them."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What leads you to suppose so?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I see it in your gaze--in your brow."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You have the gift of divination, then?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, I am not one of that sort; but I am the mother of two sons on whom also the Immortals have bestowed the special gift, which I cannot exactly describe. It was in them I first saw it, and wherever I have met with it since in other men and artists--they have been the elect of their circle. And you too--I could swear to it, that you are foremost of the men among whom you live."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do not swear lightly, laughed the Emperor."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We will meet and talk together again little mother, and when I depart I will ask you again whether you have not been deceived in me. Come now, Telemachus, the dame's birds seem to delight you very much."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is that your son?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, dame, he is only my pupil; but I feel as if he were my son."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He is a beautiful lad!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, the old lady still looks after the young men!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We do not give that up till we are a hundred or till the Parcae cut the thread of life."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What a confession!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Let me finish my speech.--We never cease to take pleasure in seeing a handsome young fellow, but so long as we are young we ask ourselves what he may have in store for us, and as we grow old we are perfectly satisfied to be able to show him kindness. Listen young master. You will always find me here if you want anything in which I can serve you. I am like a snail and very rarely leave my shell."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Till our next meeting,"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A fine tall man, said Euphorion,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not a bit, replied Doris."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Only think of the full-length statue of Hadrian in the garden of the Paneum; it has a dissatisfied satirical expression, and the architect has a grave brow, it is true, but pure friendly kindness lights up his features. It is only the beard that reminds you of the one when you look at the other. Hadrian might be very glad if he were like the prefect's guest."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, he is handsomer--how shall I say it--more like the gods than that cold marble figure, Euphorion declared."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A grand noble, he is no doubt, but still an artist too; I wonder whether he could be induced by Pontius or Papias or Aristeas or one of the great painters to take the part of Calchas the soothsayer in our group at the festival? He would perform it in quite another way than that dry stick Philemon the ivory carver. Hand me my lute; I have already forgotten again the beginning of the last verse. Oh! my wretched memory! Thank you."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I bless my decision to come here now! I have had a good evening, a quite delightful evening."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Here we may see that even in our sordid times miracles may be wrought by good-will, industry, and skill. Explain to me my good Pontius how you were able to construct that enormous scaffold."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Charming, quite delightful, cried the Emperor, as he entered his room."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "One might fancy you had some industrious demons at your command. Pour some water over my hands, Mastor, and then to supper! I am as hungry as a beggar's clog."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I think we shall find all you need,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Have you eaten all that I sent down to Lochias to-day, my dear Pontius?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Alas! we have,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But I gave orders that a supper for five should be sent."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It sufficed for six hungry artists, answered the architect,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That must satisfy us, said the Emperor, as he wiped his face."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "In the Dacian war, in Numidia, and often when out hunting, I have been glad if only one or the other was to be obtained."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But youth needs something more to live upon than bread and wine. You pointed out to me just now the residence of the palace-steward. Might we not find there a morsel of meat or cheese, or something of the kind?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hardly, replied Pontius."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "For the man stuffs his fat stomach and his eight children with bread and porridge. But an attempt will at any rate be worth making."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then send to him; but conduct us at once to the hall where the Muses have preserved some bread and wine for me and these good fellows, though they do not always provide them for their disciples."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Is the steward so miserably paid that he is forced to content himself with such meagre fare?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He has a residence rent free, and two hundred drachmae a month."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That is not so very little. What is the man's name, and of what kith and kin is he?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He is called Keraunus, and is of ancient Macedonian descent. His ancestors from time immemorial have held the office he now fills, and he even supposes himself to be related to the extinct royal dynasty through the mistress of some one of the Lagides. Keraunus sits in the town council and never stirs out in the streets without his slave, who is one of the sort which the merchants in the slave market throw into the bargain with the buyer. He is as fat as a stuffed pig, dresses like a senator, loves antiquities and curiosities, for which he will let himself be cheated of his last coin, and bears his poverty with more of pride than of dignity; and still he is an honorable man, and can be made useful, if he is taken on the right side."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Altogether a queer fellow. And you say he is fat, is he jolly?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "As far from it as possible."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah, people who are fat and cross are my aversion. What is this by way of an erection?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Behind that screen works Papias' best scholar. His name is Pollux, and he is the son of the couple who keep the gate-house. You will be pleased with him."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Call him here,"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is very kind in him, and still more kind in you, Pollux answered from above,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Nay, stop where you are, answered Hadrian."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We, as fellow-artists, may waive ceremony.--What are you doing in there?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will push the screen back in a moment and show you our Urania. It is very good for an artist to hear the opinion of a man who thoroughly understands the thing."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Presently, friend-presently; first let me enjoy a scrap of bread, for the severity of my hunger might very possibly influence my judgment."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is prisoners' fare, Pontius; have we nothing better in the house than that?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Possibly you yourself assisted in demolishing the dainty dishes I had sent down for the architect,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You are defacing a fair memory, sighed the sculptor, with mock melancholy."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But, by Hercules, I did my fair share of the work of destruction. If only now--but stay! I have an idea worthy of Aristotle himself! that breakfast, to which I invited you to-morrow morning, most noble Pontius, is all ready at my mother's, and can be warmed up in a few minutes. Do not be alarmed, worthy sir, but the dish in question is cabbage with sausages--a mess which, like the soul of an Egyptian, possesses at the instant of resurrection, nobler qualities than when it first sees the light."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Excellent, cried Hadrian."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Cabbage and sausages! He wiped his full lips with his hand, smiling with gratification, and he broke into a hearty laugh of amusement as he heard a loud"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah! of satisfaction from Antinous, who drew nearer to the canvas screen."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There is another whose mouth waters and whose imagination revels in a happy future,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "In a quarter of an hour I shall set before you the breakfast which has been turned into a supper. Mitigate your worst hunger with some bread and salt, and then my mother's cabbage-stew will not only satisfy you, but will be enjoyed with calm appreciation."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Greet dame Doris from me,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What a splendid young fellow. I am curious to see what he can do as an artist."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then follow me,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What do you say to this Urania? Papias made the head of the Muse, but the figure and the drapery Pollux formed with his own hand in a few days."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A well-considered work, and carried out with remarkable freedom; this mantle drawn over the bosom would not disgrace a Phidias. All is broad, characteristic and true. Did the young artist work from the model here at Lochias?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have seen no model, and I believe that he evolved the whole figure out of his head,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Impossible, perfectly impossible, cried the Emperor, in the tone of a man who knows well what he is talking about."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Such lines, such forms not Praxiteles himself could have invented. He must have seen them, have formed them as he stood face to face with the living copy. We will ask him. What is to be made out of that newly-set-up mass of clay?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Possibly the bust of some princess of the house of the Lagides. To-morrow you shall see a head of Berenice by our young friend, which seems to me to be one of the best things ever done in Alexandria."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And is the lad a proficient in magic? asked Hadrian."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It seems to me simply impossible that he should have completed this statue and a woman's bust in these few days."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How came these people by such a pasty as this?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Where did you get it from?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "From the banquet which the architect gave to the artists here, answered Euphorion."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The bones were given to the Graces and this dish, which had not been touched, to me and my wife. She devoted it with pleasure to Pontius' guest."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "This then accounts for the total disappearance of the handsome supper which we sent down to the architect. This pasty-allow me to look at it-- this pasty was prepared by a recipe obtained from Verus. He invited us to breakfast yesterday and instructed my cook how to prepare it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No Platonist ever propagated his master's doctrines with greater zeal than Verus does the merits of this dish, said the Emperor, who had recovered his good humor as soon as he perceived that no artful preparation for his arrival was to be suspected in this matter."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What follies that spoilt child of fortune can commit! Does he still insist on cooking with his own hands?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, not quite that, replied the prefect."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But he had a couch placed for him in the kitchen on which he stretched himself at full length and told my cook exactly how to prepare the pasty, of which you are--I should say, of which the Emperor is particularly fond. It consists of pheasant, ham, cow's udder and a baked crust."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I am quite of Hadrian's opinion, laughed the Emperor; doing all justice to the excellent pie."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You entertain me splendidly my friend, and I am very much your debtor. What did you say your name is young man?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Pollux."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Your Urania, Pollux, is a fine piece of work, and Pontius says you executed the drapery without a model. I said, and I repeat, that it is simply impossible."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You judge rightly, a young girl stood for it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When? I have never seen a female form within these walls."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Recently."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But I have never quitted Lochias for a minute. I have never gone to rest before midnight, and have been on my legs again long before sunrise."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But still there were several hours between your going to sleep, and waking up again, replied Pollux."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, youth--youth!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Part Damon and Phyllis by iron doors, and they will find their way to each other through the key-hole."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What is this to be?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A portrait of a girl."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Probably of the complaisant model who ventures into Lochias at night?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No; a lady of rank will sit to me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "An Alexandrian?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, no. A beauty in the train of the Empress."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What is her name? I know all the Roman ladies."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Balbilla."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Balbilla? There are many of that name. What is she like, the lady you mean?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That is easier to ask than to answer, replied the artist, who, seeing his gray-bearded companion smile, recovered his gay vivacity,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But stay-- you have seen a peacock spread its tail--now only imagine that every eye in the train of Hera's bird was a graceful round curl, and that in the middle of the circle there was a charming, intelligent girl's face, with a merry little nose, and a rather too high forehead, and you will have the portrait of the young damsel who has graciously permitted me to model from her person."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Stand aside--I know your maiden--and if I mean a different one you shall tell me."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is as surely she, as you are not merely a great architect, but an admirable sculptor. The thing is coarse, but unmistakably characteristic."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "This is the best evening I have enjoyed for years. Is Antinous comfortably in bed?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "As much so as in Rome."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And the big dog?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will lay his rug in the passage at your door."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Has he had any food?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Bones, bread and water."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I hope you have had something to eat this evening."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I was not hungry, and there was plenty of bread and wine."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "To-morrow we shall be better supplied. Now, good-night. Weigh your words for fear you should betray me. A few days here undisturbed would be delightful!"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Let be, or"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh yes, I know!"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "or a sleepy"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "See what it is,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The dog has attacked a woman who wanted to come this way,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hold him off, but do not beat him, the Emperor shouted after him."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Argus has only done his duty."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Argus seems only to have pulled her down, not to have wounded her; she has lost consciousness however. Go quickly into my room and bring me the blue phial out of my medicine-case and a cup of water."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Wake up, oh! wake up! he cried to Selene--and when still she did not move, he repeated more urgently and tenderly,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Pray, pray wake up."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Caesar called me."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Wake, wake."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Save me, Pollux, save me! The monster is devouring me."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What is it? Who are you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The gods be praised that you are still alive. Our big hound threw you down-and he has terrible teeth."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do, you feel any pain?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Did he bite you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I think not--pick up that pin, it has fallen out of my dress."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Who are you? How came the dog in our palace?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He belongs--he belongs to us. We arrived late last night, and Pontius put us--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then you are with the architect from Rome?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, but who are you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Selene is my name, I am the daughter of the palace-steward."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And who is Pollux, whom you were calling to help you when you recovered your senses?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What does that matter to you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I was startled when you suddenly roused up, with his name so loudly on your lips, when I brought you back to life with water and this essence."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, I was roused--and now I can walk again. People who bring furious dogs into a strange place, should know how to take better care of them. Tie the dog up safely, for the children--my little brothers and sisters-- come this way when they want to go out. Thank you for your help--and my pitcher?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is infamous!"
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And am I to have no water to-day?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is the matter?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The pitcher is broken,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I was thrown down,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Thrown down! by whom?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "By the architect's big dog--the architect who came last night from Rome, and to whom we gave that meat and salt in the middle of the night. He slept here, at Lochias."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And he set his clog on my child!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The hound was alone in the passage when I went there."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Did it bite you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, but it pulled me down, and stood over me, and gnashed its teeth--oh! it was horrible."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The cursed, vagabond scoundrel! growled the steward,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will teach him how to behave in a strange house!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Let him be,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is done cannot be undone, and if quarrels and dissentions come of it, it will make you ill."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Vagabonds! impudent rascals! who fill my palace with quarrelsome curs, muttered Keraunus without listening to his daughter, and as he settled the folds of his pallium he growled"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Arsinoe! why is it that girl never hears me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "They are ready by the fire, answered Arsinoe."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Come into the kitchen with me."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father, do you know why I am sorry I cannot see?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Because I should so like to see you for once with the beautiful curls which Arsinoe makes with the irons."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Have you thought any more about the Emperor's arrival, father? I smarten and dress you so fine every day--but to-day you ought to think of dressing me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We will see about it, said Keraunus evasively."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do you know, said Arsinoe, after a short pause, as she twisted the last lock in the freshly-heated tongs,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I thought it all over last night again. If we cannot succeed any way in scraping together the money for my dress, we can still--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Even Selene can say nothing against it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Against what?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But, you will be angry!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Speak out."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You pay taxes like the rest of the citizens."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What has that to do with it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well then, we are justified in expecting something from the city,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What for?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "To pay for my dress for the festival which is got up for the Emperor, not by an individual, but by the citizens as a body. We could not accept alone, but it is folly to refuse what a rich municipality offers. That is neither more nor less than making them a present."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You be silent, cried Keraunus, really furious, and trying in vain to remember the argument with which, only yesterday, he had refused the same suggestion."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Be silent, and wait till I begin to talk about such matters."
}
]
|
5485 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Wounded!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Look at the swelling! cried the old woman in broken Greek, raising Selene's snow-white foot in her black hands for her father to see."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Thousands of fine ladies have hands that are not so small. Poor, poor little foot,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The cut on my head is nothing to speak of, but the muscles and veins here at the ancle are swelled and my leg hurts me rather when I tread. When the dog threw me down I must have hit it against the stone step."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is outrageous! cried Keraunus, the blood again mounting to his head,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, no, entreated Selene,"
}
]
|
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.