124 UNDER THE TREES. 



though at times I have lost sight of the line which 

 its foliage makes against the horizon. I have 

 always intended to cross that line some day and to 

 explore the Forest ; perhaps even to make a home 

 for myself there. But one s dreams must often 

 wait for their realization, and so it has come to 

 pass that I have gone all these years without per 

 sonal familiarity with these beautiful scenes. I 

 have since learned that one never comes to the 

 Forest until he is thoroughly prepared in heart and 

 mind, and I understand now that I could not have 

 come earlier even if I had made the attempt. As 

 it happened, I concerned myself with other things, 

 and never approached very near the Forest, al 

 though never very far from it. I was never quite 

 happy unless I caught frequent glimpses of its dis 

 tant boughs, and I searched more and more ea 

 gerly for those who had left some record of their 

 journeys to the Forest, and of their life within its 

 magical boundaries. I discovered, to my great 

 joy, that the libraries were full of books which had 

 much to say about the delights of Arden : its en 

 chanting scenery ; the music of its brooks ; the 

 sweet and refreshing repose of its recesses ; the 

 noble company that frequent it. I soon found that 

 all the greater poets have been there, and that their 

 lines had caught the magical radiance of the sky ; 

 and many of the prose writers showed the same 

 familiarity with a country in which they evidently 

 found whatever was sweetest and best in life. I 



