these ices to discover which were the most
delicious. Some of the fervour which has given
martyrs to science was mine. I understood and
sympathized with the impulse that drives a man
to explore the North Pole. I comprehended at last
the passionate recklessness of Bluebeard’s
Fatima. Even without dysentery and cystitis it
would have been impossible for any man to
sample every ice on that list, and I do not
remember that ever in my life I was so anxious
to make a right choice. Paris faced by the
problem of awarding an apple to the most
beautiful of three goddesses was in no
predicament at all compared with mine. I looked
at the waiter. Could I rely on his taste to direct
me aright, so that whatever pain I might suffer
on the morrow would not be embittered by the
thought that for all I was suffering I had chosen
the wrong ices? And while I was trying to decide
with what varieties I should make myself that
amount more ill than I was already I found
myself being introduced to the wives of various
members of the British Naval Mission whose
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