246 THE LIFE OF THE FIELDS. 



at a regular angle, diminishing in size with altitude 

 till its end in comparison with the commencement 

 may be called pointed, though in reality blunt. To 

 the pointed end it would be a long climb ; it would 

 need a ladder. The dull red of the vast beam is 

 obscured by the neutral tint of the ropes which are 

 attached to it; colour generally gives a sense of 

 lightness by defining shape, but this red is worn 

 and weatherbeaten, rubbed and battered, so that 

 its uncertain surface adds to the weight of the 

 boom. 



It hangs, an immense arm thrust across the sky ; it is 

 so high it is scarcely noticed in walking under it ; it 

 is so great and ponderous, and ultra in size, that the 

 eye and mind alike fail to estimate it. For it is a 

 common effect of great things to be overlooked. A 

 moderately large rock, a moderately large house, is 

 understood and mentally put down, as it were, at a 

 certain figure, but the immense — which is beyond the 

 human — cannot enter the organs of the senses. The 

 portals of the senses are not wide enough to receive it ; 

 you must turn your back on it and reflect, and add 

 a little piece of it to another little piece, and so build 

 up your understanding. Human things are small ; 

 you live in a large house, but the space you actually 

 occupy is very inconsiderable ; the earth itself, great 

 as it is, is overlooked, it is too large to be seen. The 

 eye is accustomed to the little, and cannot in 

 moment receive the immense. Only by slow com- 

 parison with the bulk of oak trees, by the height of a 

 trapeze, by the climbing of a ladder, can I convey 

 my mind a true estimate and idea of this gigantic' 



