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crawl? It’s very true that I don’t see you crawling; you stand
more upright than a good many poor creatures. Very good;
on the whole, I don’t think you’ll crawl. But the men, the
Americans; je vous demande un peu, what do they make of
it over here? I don’t envy them trying to arrange themselves.
Look at poor Ralph Touchett: what sort of a figure do you
call that? Fortunately he has a consumption; I say fortunate-
ly, because it gives him something to do. His consumption’s
his carriere; it’s a kind of position. You can say: ‘Oh Mr.
Touchett, he takes care of his lungs, he knows a great deal
about climates.’ But without that who would he be, what
would he represent? ‘Mr. Ralph Touchett: an American who
lives in Europe.’ That signifies absolutely nothing—it’s im-
possible anything should signify less. ‘He’s very cultivated,’
they say: ‘he has a very pretty collection of old snuff-box-
es.’ The collection is all that’s wanted to make it pitiful. I’m
tired of the sound of the word; I think it’s grotesque. With
the poor old father it’s different; he has his identity, and it’s
rather a massive one. He represents a great financial house,
and that, in our day, is as good as anything else. For an
American, at any rate, that will do very well. But I persist
in thinking your cousin very lucky to have a chronic mal-
ady so long as he doesn’t die of it. It’s much better than the
snuff-boxes. If he weren’t ill, you say, he’d do something?—
he’d take his father’s place in the house. My poor child, I
doubt it; I don’t think he’s at all fond of the house. How-
ever, you know him better than I, though I used to know
him rather well, and he may have the benefit of the doubt.
The worst case, I think, is a friend of mine, a countryman of

276 The Portrait of a Lady