THE WING-FOOTED 



courts, theatres, clubs, the whole ap- 

 paratus of the town-dweller's life, but 

 where one step beyond severs you in- 

 stantly and completely from all of these. 

 By more or less regular means of con- 

 veyance you approach the jumping-off 

 place. Boats and trains abide their ap- 

 pointed times. Horses ply on roads 

 beside which runs a telegraph line. The 

 day has still twenty-four hours, the hour 

 sixty minutes. But now these slavish 

 subdivisions of time disappear. The 

 evening and the morning are the first 

 and every following day. Distance is 

 measured no longer by miles but by the 

 sun's ascension and declension, the ebb 

 of physical strength, the primitive needs 

 of food and repose. Things that filled 

 the whole horizon dwindle and vanish; 

 what was of no consequence becomes 

 serious and vital. Arms, and legs, and 

 lungs begin to matter, and money loses 

 its purchasing power. 



84 



