But the conditions are difficult.
Gooseberries burst at the wrong end and smother you; melons--as
the nigger boy discovered--make your ears sticky; currants, when
you have removed the skin and extracted the seeds, are
unsatisfying; blackberries have the faults of raspberries without
their virtues; plums are never ripe. Yet all these fruits are
excellent in their season. Their faults are faults which we can
forgive during a slight acquaintance, which indeed seem but
pleasant little idiosyncrasies in the stranger. But we could not
live with them.
Yet with the orange we do live year in and year out. That speaks
well for the orange. The fact is that there is an honesty about
the orange which appeals to all of us. If it is going to be bad--
for even the best of us are bad sometimes --it begins to be bad
from the outside, not from the inside. How many a pear which
presents a blooming face to the world is rotten at the core. How
many an innocent-looking apple is harbouring a worm in the bud.
But the orange has no secret faults. Its outside is a mirror of
its inside, and if you are quick you can tell the shopman so
before he slips it into the bag.
Signs of Character
Wellington is said to have chosen his officers by their noses and
chins. The standard for them in noses must have been rather high,
to judge by the portraits of the Duke, but no doubt he made
allowances.
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