THE PIGEONS AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM. 253 



of the steps. To them the building is merely a rock, 

 pierced with convenient caverns ; they use its exterior 

 for their purpose, but penetrate no farther. . With air 

 and light, the sunlit gravel, the green lawn between it 

 and the outer railings — with these they are concerned, 

 and with these only. The heavy roll of the traffic in 

 Oxford Street, audible here, is nothing to them ; the 

 struggle for money does not touch them, they let it go 

 by. Nor the many minds searching and re-searching 

 in the great Library, this mental toil is no more to 

 them than the lading of the waggons in the street. 

 Neither the tangible product nor the intellectual 

 attainment is of any value — only the air and light. 

 There are idols in the galleries within upon whose 

 sculptured features the hot Eastern sun shone thou- 

 sands of years since. They were made by human 

 effort, however mistaken, and they were the outcome 

 of human thought and handiwork. The doves 

 fluttered about the temples in those days, full only of 

 the air and light. They fluttered about the better 

 temples of Greece and round the porticos where 

 philosophy was born. Still only the light, the sun- 

 light, the air of heaven. We labour on and think, and 

 carve our idols and the pen never ceases from its 

 labour ; but the lapse of the centuries has left us in 

 the same place. The doves who have not laboured 

 nor travailed in thought possess the sunlight. Is not 

 theirs the preferable portion ? 



The shade deepens as I turn from the portico to the 

 hall and vast domed house of books. The half-hearted 

 light under the dome is stagnant and dead. For it 

 is the nature of light to beat and throb ; it has a 



