TWO DIANAS IN ALASKA 21 



to stir up jealousy. It is ever unwise to take jealousy 

 lightly, as if it were an insignificant thing that may 

 be disregarded. With people that feel deeply it is 

 a very serious thing, and it is a very curious thing, 

 for it is often strongest where there is least cause. 

 How came the Bard to paint Othello as he did ? Can 

 he' have tasted jealousy himself to portray it so? 



Ralph's ladye for of course a woman was the 

 cause of all the trouble was staying at our hotel, in 

 between moments of globe-trotting. We had not 

 talked to her for half-an-hour before she told us how 

 completely misunderstood she was by her lord and 

 master, an elderly, well-meaning person, far too good 

 for the draw he'd made from the matrimonial lucky- 

 bag. Yes, she was hopelessly misunderstood, her 

 " soul was starved," whatever that might mean. Her 

 husband, she said pitifully, was a " mere money- 

 making machine, an insensate log, who could never 

 do aught but drag her down from the heights of 

 poetic fancy." She had soaked herself in such a 

 lot of psychological nonsense it was really difficult 

 at times to follow her meanderings. 



First she slid out her minnow to the Leader, but 

 he would not bite, being by way of practising 

 misogyny; next she tried Ralph with a fine cast, and 

 he swallowed her bait greedily. Every one of us had 

 to listen to the mournful recital of imaginary woes 

 all brought about by the unsympathetic conduct of 

 the husband. Madam was looking, she said, for a 

 real love, which should be "an ethereal fantasy, 

 sweetly idealistic in short, a poem." 



