IN THE FOREST OF ARDEN. 137 



other hour had ever pressed its cup of experience 

 to my lips. The great world of which I was once 

 part disappeared out of memory like a mist that 

 recedes into a faint cloud and lies faint and far on 

 the boundaries of the day ; my own personal life, to 

 which I had been bound by such a multitude of gos 

 samer threads that when I tried to unloose one I 

 seemed to weave a hundred in its place, seemed to 

 sink below the surface of consciousness. I ceased to 

 think, to feel ; I was conscious only of the vast and 

 glorious world of tree and sky which surrounded 

 me. I felt a thrill of wonder that I should be so 

 placed. I had often lain thus under other trees, 

 but never in such a mood as this. It was as if I 

 had detached myself from the hitherto unbroken 

 current of my personal life, and by some mira 

 cle of that marvelous place become part of the 

 inarticulate life of Nature. Clouds and trees, dim 

 vistas of shadow and flower-starred space of sun 

 light, were no longer alien to me ; I was akin with 

 the vast and silent movement of things which 

 encompassed me. No new sound came to me, no 

 new sight broke on my vision ; but I heard with ears, 

 and I saw with eyes, to which all other sounds and 

 sights had ceased to be. I cannot translate into 

 words the mystery and the thrill of that hour when, 

 for the first time, I gave myself wholly into the 

 keeping of Nature, and she received me as her child. 

 What I felt, what I saw and heard, belong only to 

 that place ; outside the Forest of Arden they are 



