Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.'



IV. MY WINTER GARDEN. {135}



So, my friend: you ask me to tell you how I contrive to support this
monotonous country life; how, fond as I am of excitement, adventure,
society, scenery, art, literature, I go cheerfully through the daily
routine of a commonplace country profession, never requiring a six-
weeks' holiday; not caring to see the Continent, hardly even to spend
a day in London; having never yet actually got to Paris.

You wonder why I do not grow dull as those round me, whose talk is of
bullocks--as indeed mine is, often enough; why I am not by this time
'all over blue mould;' why I have not been tempted to bury myself in
my study, and live a life of dreams among old books.

I will tell you. I am a minute philosopher: though one, thank
Heaven, of a different stamp from him whom the great Bishop Berkeley
silenced--alas! only for a while. I am possibly, after all, a man of
small mind, content with small pleasures. So much the better for me.
Meanwhile, I can understand your surprise, though you cannot
understand my content. You have played a greater game than mine;
have lived a life, perhaps more fit for an Englishman; certainly more
in accordance with the taste of our common fathers, the Vikings, and
their patron Odin 'the goer,' father of all them that go ahead. You
have gone ahead, and over many lands; and I reverence you for it,