xiii CAUSE OF SNOW 187 



wrong thing for snow to be bought. 1 I see you 

 wish to drag me into a dispute with luxury, a 

 quarrel of daily occurrence that never leads to any 

 tangible result Let us withal brace ourselves for 

 the struggle ; even if luxury win the day, it must 

 find us fighting and resisting to the death. 



Well then ! do you suppose that the examination 

 of nature, irrelevant as it may appear, makes no 

 contribution to the object you have at heart ? When 2 

 we inquire how snow is formed, telling that its 

 character resembles hoar-frost, containing more air 

 than water, do you not think that it is a reproach 

 upon the epicures ? If it is a scandalous thing to 

 buy water, they are still worse, for they do not 

 get even water [but chiefly air] for their money. 

 Let us, I say, inquire rather how snow is formed 

 than how it is preserved. The means of pre- 

 servation have already been discovered ; not 

 content with racking wines of vintage, arranging 

 them by flavour and age, we have devised means 

 of compressing snow to overcome the power of 

 summer, and of protecting it by the coolness of 

 the icehouses from the hotness of the season. 

 And what have we accomplished by all our anxious 3 

 efforts ? The privilege of buyLig water that we 

 might have got for nothing ! We are vexed that 

 we cannot buy air and sunlight, and that the 

 atmosphere all around streams in easily and un- 

 bought upon the fastidious and the rich. How 

 badly nature treats us in leaving anything that is 

 common property ! Upon this other element, 

 water, which nature has allowed to flow for the 

 free use of mankind, and which she has given the 



1 I.e. the moral turpitude of sinking into such debased luxury as to require 

 snow should be set forth rather than mere theories of the formation of snow ; 

 the ethical should take precedence of the physical. 



