CLEAR WATERS 



with a pony to some friends of ours in Shropshire, 

 where from childish recollections I anticipated and 

 assuredly found a second paradise. The prospect 

 was faintly clouded, to be sure, by that of a holiday 

 tutor, whose instructions I was to share with the 

 remaining son of the house, then passing from Marl- 

 borough to Oxford, and consequently far my senior. 

 Like most of his race he was a mighty Nimrod even 

 then well on in the making, and long afterwards un- 

 happily killed in the hunting-field. He was very 

 kind to me, but hated fishing. So, except for occasional 

 rides when my pony and I were urged to jumping 

 adventures of a kind unprecedented in my modest 

 experience, I saw little of him except at meals and 

 during the tutorial interlude, which was happily limited 

 to a single hour after breakfast. During this weary 

 procedure I remember he always nursed a fox-terrier, 

 and seemed to me to make it bark by some subtle 

 action whenever he was involved in a difficult passage. 

 For myself, I think I looked out of the window most 

 of the time, to where the waters in the park shone in- 

 vitingly in the morning sun. Our tutor being only 

 an undergraduate was naturally not a disciplinarian, 

 though he became afterwards a distinguished Indian 

 official. 



For this, I should say, was a famous, nay, a historic 

 place, though now passed from its ancient owners. 

 My hosts being near relatives of the latter, I had the 

 free range of everything out of doors that would 

 make glad the heart of youth. But at this moment 

 many sheets of water of various sizes with their enor- 

 mous possibilities held my fancy fast. I had left 



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