262 The Unknown River. 



of flood, it is most likely to leave a deposit of sand and 

 pebbles ; the angler, too, may have followed it for a few 

 miles, and some professional landscape-painter or ama- 

 teur may have explored a few of its most picturesque 

 parts. But no man living knows the whole stream, and 

 so there is always a great mystery about it ; and any one 

 who cares to follow its course faithfully may enjoy all 

 the keen delights, and feel all the unceasing interest, 

 which belong to a true exploration. 



In this especial sense our little river is indeed un- 

 known, and as I lay idly on its bank on that bright 

 autumn afternoon, it occurred to me clearly for the first 

 time that the river came from far, and went yet farther ; 

 that it was not confined to the fields about my house, 

 and that this little scene was not a solitary gem, but 

 one only of a thousand links in a long chain of various 

 and unimagined beauty. 



Why had not this been equally clear to me years be- 

 fore ? Why do we dream ever in one place, or travel by 

 the same weary old roads, when infinite beauty and nov- 

 elty are open to us ? It is because the beauty and the 

 novelty are so very near to us that we miss them, and 

 often so cheap that our pitiful small dignity despises 

 them as something puerile. When we are weary of the 

 monotony of life, and the whole human organism longs 

 for the refreshment of change, we would go to the end 

 of the earth, and, in order to defeat our purposes as 

 completely as possible, carry our habits with us. We are 

 accustomed to railways and newspapers, to bitter ale and 

 sweet tea ; and we seek these things, and a thousand others 



