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The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given to him, so

many years ago now, was standing on the table, and the

white-limbed Cupids laughed round it as of old. He took it up, as

he had done on that night of horror when he had first noted the

change in the fatal picture, and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes

looked into its polished shield. Once, some one who had terribly

loved him had written to him a mad letter, ending with these

idolatrous words: "The world is changed because you are made of

ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite history." The

phrases came back to his memory, and he repeated them over and

over to himself. Then he loathed his own beauty, and flinging the

mirror on the floor, crushed it into silver splinters beneath his

heel. It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty and the

youth that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his life

might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him but a

mask, his youth but a mockery.