8 2 Summer 



generate, and die ; yet every summer day the same 

 imperturbable smile plays on field, and moor, and sky. 

 The fitful gleam of the fields departs and returns again. 

 It has been seen for centuries from this hilltop, look- 

 ing down wherefrom the figures in the landscape have 

 been to each successive spectator as much alike as 

 this year's and last year's oak-leaves. Yet decay has 

 been busier than growth to torture and destroy. If 

 every living thing in this prodigal display were multi- 

 plied by the number of the countless years the earth 

 has endured, the result would still not equal the 

 number of those vanquished by death. 



The hours used to slip past rapidly here ; for the 

 barley and oat fields faded away, and the road show- 

 ing white patches between the wayside elms, and the 

 inhabited hamlets, and the smokeless and ivied ruins. 

 In place of them grew a golden territory of dream. 

 But it is not golden now, for it is built not in the future 

 but the past, and it is peopled not as of old with 

 glorified pictures of the living but with spectres of 

 the dead. At least that is how I try to explain the 

 element of sadness that has replaced the old exhilara- 

 tion from the shining and fertile fields. If I think of 

 them as changeless, it is as a contrast with the evan- 

 escence engraven on all else ; and Nature's smile seems 

 one of ironic pity for the generations of men who, 

 like the troops of birds, and beasts, and flowers, make 

 a momentary appearance on the stage, but, unlike 

 these, are conscious of transitoriness,and have sufficient 



