THE SUMMIT OF THE YEARS 



student of life. I go to books and to nature as a bee 

 goes to the flower, for a nectar that I can make into 

 my own honey. My memory for the facts and the 

 arguments of books is poor, but my absorptive 

 power is great. What I meet in life, in my walks, 

 or in my travels, which is akin to me, or in the line 

 of my interest and sympathies, that sticks to me 

 like a burr, or, better than that, like the food I eat. 

 So with books : what I get from them I do not carry 

 in my memory, but it is absorbed as the air I 

 breathe or the water I drink. It is rarely ready on 

 my tongue or my pen, but makes itself felt in a 

 much more subtle and indirect way. 



There is no one, I suppose, who does not miss 

 some good fortune in his life. We all miss congenial 

 people, people who are going our way, and whose 

 companionship would make life sweeter for us. 

 Often we are a day too early, or a day too late, at 

 the point where our paths cross. How many such 

 congenial souls we miss we know not, but for my 

 part, considering the number I have met, I think it 

 may be many. 



I have missed certain domestic good fortunes, 

 such as a family of many children (I have only one), 

 which might have made the struggle of life harder, 

 but which would surely have brought its compensa- 

 tions. Those lives are, indeed, narrow and confined 

 which are not blessed with several children. Every 

 branch the tree puts out lays it open more to the 

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