He pictured to himself with silent amusement the tedious luncheon that he had missed by staying so long with Basil Hallward. [...] the whole conversation would be about the feeding of the poor, and the necessity for model lodging-houses. Each class would have preached the importance of those virtues, for whose exercise there was no necessity in their own lives. The rich would have spoken of the value of thrift, and the idle grown eloquent over the dignity of labour.