228 THE EULOGY OF RICHARD JEFFERIES. 



closeness. It is indeed the first, but not the 

 finest, characteristic of Jefferies. It was the 

 point which most struck the critic in the 

 " Game-keeper at Home." But it is not the 

 point which most strikes the reader in his later 

 and more delicate work. Here the things which 

 he loves speak to him : they reply to his 

 questioning ; they support and raise his soul. 

 "So it has ever been to me," he says, " by 

 day or by night, summer or winter : beneath 

 trees the heart feels nearer to that depth of 

 life which the far sky means. The rest of spirit 

 found only in beauty, ideal and pure, comes 

 there because the distance seems within touch 

 of thought." 



In Jefferies' later books the whole of the 

 country life of the nineteenth century will be 

 found displayed down to every detail. The 

 life of the farmer is there ; the life of the 

 labourer ; the life of the gamekeeper ; the life 

 of the women who work in the fields, and of 

 those who work at home. If this were all. 

 he would well deserve the gratitude of the 

 English-speaking race, because in any genera- 

 tion to get so great a part of life described 



