Is it a pose to behave amiably
when you are tired or cross?"
"No, but that is in order not to make other people uncomfortable," said
Vincent.
"Well, it's very hard to draw the line," said Father Payne: "but what we
really mean by pose is, I imagine, the attempt to appear to be something
which you frankly are not--and that is where the word has changed its
sense, Barthrop. An artist's pose is something characteristic, which makes
a man look his best. What we generally mean by pose is the affecting a best
which one never reaches. Come, tell a story, some one! That's the best way
to get at a quality. Won't some one quote an illustration?"
"What about my friend Pearce, the schoolmaster?" said Vincent. "He read a
book about schoolmastering, and he said he didn't think much of it. He
added that the author seemed only to be giving elegant reasons for doing
things which the born schoolmaster did by instinct."
"Well, that's not a bad criticism," said Father Payne; "but it was pose if
he meant to convey that _he_ was a born schoolmaster. Is he one, by
the way?"
"No," said Vincent, "he is not: he is much ragged by the boys; but he
comforts himself by thinking that all schoolmasters are ragged, but that he
is rather more successful than most in dealing with it. He has a great deal
of moral dignity, has Pearce! I don't know where he would be without it!"
"Well, there's an instance," said Father Payne, "of a pose being of some
use.
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