“I’ve tried to plan you a house here with some self-respect of its own. If you don’t like it, you’d better say so. It’s certainly the last thing to be considered⁠—who wants self-respect in a house, when you can squeeze in an extra lavatory?” He put his finger suddenly down on the left division of the centre oblong: “You can swing a cat here. This is for your pictures, divided from this court by curtains; draw them back and you’ll have a space of fifty-one by twenty-three six. This double-faced stove in the centre, here, looks one way towards the court, one way towards the picture room; this end wall is all window; you’ve a southeast light from that, a north light from the court. The rest of your pictures you can hang round the gallery upstairs, or in the other rooms. In architecture,” he went on⁠—and though looking at Soames he did not seem to see him, which gave Soames an unpleasant feeling⁠—“as in life, you’ll get no self-respect without regularity. Fellows tell you that’s old fashioned. It appears to be peculiar anyway; it never occurs to us to embody the main principle of life in our buildings; we load our houses with decoration, gimcracks, corners, anything to distract the eye. On the contrary the eye should rest; get your effects with a few strong lines. The whole thing is regularity⁠—there’s no self-respect without it.”

Soames, the unconscious ironist, fixed his gaze on Bosinney’s tie, which was far from being in the perpendicular; he was unshaven too, and his dress not remarkable for order. Architecture appeared to have exhausted his regularity.

“Won’t it look like a barrack?” he inquired.

He did not at once receive a reply.

“I can see what it is,” said Bosinney, “you want one of Littlemaster’s houses⁠—one of the pretty and commodious sort, where the servants will live in garrets, and the front door be sunk so that you may come up again. By all means try Littlemaster, you’ll find him a capital fellow, I’ve known him all my life!”

Soames was alarmed. He had really been struck by the plans, and the concealment of his satisfaction had been merely instinctive. It was difficult for him to pay a compliment. He despised people who were lavish with their praises.