The danger of art as an occupation is that one uses life, looks at
life, as so much material for one's art. Life becomes a province of
art, instead of art being a province of life. That is all a sad
mistake, perhaps an irreparable mistake! I walked to-day on the
crisp frozen snow, down the valley, by field-paths, among leafless
copses and wood-ends. The stream ran dark and cold, between its
brambly banks; the snow lay pure and smooth on the high-sloping
fields. It made a heart of whiteness in the covert, the trees all
delicately outlined, the hazels weaving an intricate pattern. All
perfectly and exquisitely beautiful. Sight after sight of subtle
and mysterious beauty, vignette after vignette, picture after
picture. If I could but sing it, or say it, depict or record it, I
thought to myself! Yet I could not analyse what the desire was. I
do not think I wished to interpret the sight to others, or even to
capture it for myself. No matter at what season of the year I pass
through the valley, it is always filled from end to end with
beauty, ever changing, perishing, ever renewing itself. In spring
the copse is full of tender points of green, uncrumpling and
uncurling. The hyacinths make a carpet of steely blue, the anemones
weave their starred tapestry. In the summer, the grove hides its
secret, dense with leaf, the heavy-seeded grass rises in the field,
the tall flowering plants make airy mounds of colour; in autumn,
the woods blaze with orange and gold, the air is heavy with the
scent of the dying leaf. In winter, the eye dwells with delight
upon the spare low tints; and when the snow falls and lies, as it
does to-day, the whole scene has a still and mournful beauty, a
pure economy of contrasted light and gloom. Yet the trained
perception of the artist does not dwell upon the thought of the
place as upon a perpetual feast of beauty and delight. Rather, it
shames me to reflect, one dwells upon it as a quarry of effects,