IN THE WHITE MOUNTAINS. 101 
of sunshine and peace, and the solitary cottage, 
from whose, doorstep might be seen in one di- 
rection the noble Mount Washington range, and 
in another the hardly less noble Franconias. 
How easy to live simply and well in such a 
grand seclusion! But soon there came a 
thought of Wordsworth’s sonnet, addressed to 
just such a mood, “ Yes, there is holy pleasure 
in thine eye,” and I felt at once the truth of his 
admonition. What if the cottage really were 
mine, — mine to spend a lifetime in? How 
quickly the poetry would turn to prose ! 
An hour afterwards, on my way back to the 
Sinclair House, I passed a group of men at 
work on the highway. One of them was a lit- 
tle apart from the rest, and out of a social im- 
pulse I accosted him with the remark, “I sup- 
pose, in heaven, the streets never will need 
mending.” Quick as thought came the reply: 
“ Well, I hope not. If I ever get there, I don’t 
want to work on the road.” Here spoke uni- 
versal human nature, which finds its strong 
argument for immortality in its discontent with 
matters as they now are. The one thing we 
are all sure of is that we were born for some- 
thing better than our present employment ; and 
even those who school themselves most relig- 
iously in the virtue of contentment know very 
well how to define that grace so as not to ex- 
