A JOURNAL KEPT IN THE COUNTRY. 141 



full of valorous hopes and splendid dreams. I never 

 saw her again ; but for two whole years (which in 

 our money means at least forty) I lived her knight : 

 until the gallopings among the kitchen garden plots 

 with a beanstick for lance, in glorious quests and 

 tourneys, were exchanged for copy-book Epics of 

 Carnelot, and Barbara was forsaken for an imaginary 

 damosel of imitative construction called (I think) 

 Lystrenore. I drew portraits of Lystrenore in a Pre- 

 Raphaelite vein, more than enough ; they have not 

 escaped the fire. But the devotion expressed by that 

 well-moistened pencil-point lives in the picture of 

 Bab 



" Vorbei sind die Kinderspiele 

 Und alles rollt vorbei " 



but not altogether, protests the little profile 

 " Glauben und Lieb' tmd Treu'." 



The study timepiece, the tall clock in the hall, and 

 the cuckoo on the stairs, give one o'clock with the 

 unanimity of (let us say) a School Managers' Meeting ; 

 and the morning has gone with half my idlenesses 

 undone. The rain still drips from the honeysuckle 

 at the window ; but after these indoor hours the open 

 air begins to call, and after lunch I propose one of 

 my favourite diversions, a thoroughly wet walk. The 



