"Tell me everything, by all means," I answered, smiling. "I desire
nothing better than to lie here in the shade and hear everything."

"Ah, but the question is, will you understand it? No matter; you think
me a queer fellow already. It's not easy, either, to tell you what I
feel--not easy for so queer a fellow as I to tell you in how many ways he
is queer!" He got up and walked away a moment, passing his hand over his
eyes, then came back rapidly and flung himself on the grass again. "I
said just now I always supposed I was happy; it's true; but now that my
eyes are open, I see I was only stultified. I was like a poodle-dog that
is led about by a blue ribbon, and scoured and combed and fed on slops.
It was not life; life is learning to know one's self, and in that sense I
have lived more in the past six weeks than in all the years that preceded
them. I am filled with this feverish sense of liberation; it keeps
rising to my head like the fumes of strong wine. I find I am an active,
sentient, intelligent creature, with desires, with passions, with
possible convictions--even with what I never dreamed of, a possible will
of my own! I find there is a world to know, a life to lead, men and
women to form a thousand relations with. It all lies there like a great
surging sea, where we must plunge and dive and feel the breeze and breast
the waves. I stand shivering here on the brink, staring, longing,
wondering, charmed by the smell of the brine and yet afraid of the water.
The world beckons and smiles and calls, but a nameless influence from the
past, that I can neither wholly obey nor wholly resist, seems to hold me
back. I am full of impulses, but, somehow, I am not full of strength.
Life seems inspiring at certain moments, but it seems terrible and
unsafe; and I ask myself why I should wantonly measure myself with
merciless forces, when I have learned so well how to stand aside and let
them pass. Why shouldn't I turn my back upon it all and go home to--what
awaits me?--to that sightless, soundless country life, and long days