A GARDEN DIARY 227 



thin, lamentable, bleating of sheep floating up 

 from the valley ; all these set vibrating fibres 

 within us which have their roots as far back in 

 the history of the race as anything well can be. 

 Our life of to-day, with all its crowded impedi- 

 menta, tends at such moments to sink suddenly, 

 and to disappear. We realise if only during 

 the duration of a lightning flash that we are 

 standing, not in the least upon any apex, merely 

 upon some small peak on one of the sides of the 

 great organic mountain. That we are looking 

 at a scene which has witnessed the arrival of 

 our race, as of other races, upon it, and which 

 will assuredly one day witness its departure again. 

 That all that we can discern is but, as it were, a 

 few front streaks upon the surface of an ocean, 

 rolling on without bourne or limit. And at that 

 realisation the mind is apt to start, and to shiver 

 instinctively, as before some yawning gulf, opening 

 unexpectedly below the feet. 



Such little mental peaks afford, in truth, but 

 a dizzy standing ground, and are best, perhaps 

 for that reason, not ascended too often. Just as 

 the trade of the astronomer is said to need a 

 sound leaven of stolidity before it can be safely 

 embarked upon, so only a very strong head can 

 with safety peer long into a void, hardly less 

 perturbing and intoxicating than that into which 

 it is his business to pry. Those capricious little 

 particles, upon which all our comfort depends, 



