How then did it work out, all this? How did onejudge people, think of them? How did one add upthis and that and conclude that it was liking onefelt, or disliking? And to those words, what meaningattached, after all? Standing now, apparentlytransfixed, by the pear tree, impressions poured inupon her of those two men, and to follow her thoughtwas like following a voice which speaks too quickly tobe taken down by one’s pencil, and the voice was herown voice saying without prompting undeniable,everlasting, contradictory things, so that even thefissures and humps on the bark of the pear tree wereirrevocably fixed there for eternity. You have great-ness, she continued, but Mr Ramsay has none of it.He is petty, selfish, vain, egotistical; he is spoilt; heis a tyrant; he wears Mrs Ramsay to death; but hehas what you (she addressed Mr Bankes) have not;a fiery unworldliness; he knows nothing about trifles;he loves dogs and his children. He has eight. Youhave none. Did he not come down in two coats theother night and let Mrs Ramsay trim his hair into apudding basin? All of this danced up and down,like a company of gnats, each separate, but all mar-vellously controlled in an invisible elastic net—danced up and down in Lily's mind, in and about thebranches of the pear tree, where still hung in effigythe scrubbed kitchen table, symbol of her profound