142 UNDER THE TREES. 



pest as well as in the summer wind ; joy in arduous 

 service as well as in careless ease. A world in 

 which there were no labors to be accomplished, no 

 burdens to be borne, no storms to be endured, 

 would be a world without true joy, honest 

 pleasure, or noble aspiration. It would be a 

 fool s paradise. 



The Forest of Arden is not without its changes 

 of weather and season. Rosalind and I had fan 

 cied that it was always summer there, and that sun 

 light reigned from year s end to year s end ; if we 

 had been told that storms sometimes overshadowed 

 it, and that the icy fang of winter is felt there, we 

 should have doubted the report. We had a good 

 deal to learn when we first went to Arden ; in fact, 

 we still have a great deal to learn about this won 

 derful country, in which so many of the ideals and 

 standards with which we were once familiar are 

 reversed. It is one of the blessed results of living 

 in the Forest that one is more and more conscious 

 that he does not know and more and more eager 

 to learn. There are no shams of any sort in 

 Arden, and all pride in concealing one s ignorance 

 disappears ; one s chief concern is to be known 

 precisely as he is. We were a little sensitive at 

 first, a little disposed to be cautious about asking 

 questions that might reveal our ignorance ; but 

 we speedily lost the false shame we had brought 

 with us from a world where men study to conceal, 

 as a means of protecting, the things that are most 



