56 UNDER THE TREES. 



Redoubled and redoubled ; concourse wild 



Of mirth and jocund din. And when it chanced 



That pauses of deep silence mock d his skill, 



Then, sometimes, in that silence, while he hung 



Listening, a gentle shock of mild surprise 



Has carried far into his heart the voice 



Of mountain torrents ; or the visible scene 



Would enter unawares into his mind 



With all its solemn imagery, its rocks, 



Its woods, and that uncertain heaven, received 



Into the bosom of the steady lake. 



It is in such moods as this, when all things are 

 forgotten, and heart and mind are open to every 

 sight and sound, that Nature comes to the soul 

 with some deep, sweet message of her inner being, 

 and with invisible hand lifts the curtain of mystery 

 for one hushed and fleeting moment. 



As I write, the memory of a summer afternoon 

 long ago comes back to me. The old orchard 

 sleeps in the dreamy air, the birds are silent, a tran 

 quil spirit broods over the whole earth. Under the 

 wide-spreading branches a boy is intently reading. 

 He has fallen upon a bit of transcendental writing 

 in a magazine, and for the first time has learned 

 that to some men the great silent world about him, 

 that seems so real and changeless, is immaterial 

 and unsubstantial a vision projected by the soul 

 upon illimitable space. On the instant all things 

 are smitten with unreality ; the solid earth sinks 

 beneath him, and leaves him solitary and awestruck 

 in a universe that is a dream. He cannot under- 



