NATURE NEAR LONDON 



rambling across furze and heath, or through dark 

 fir woods ; after lingering in the meadows among 

 the buttercups, or by the copses where the pheas- 

 ants crow ; after gathering June roses, or, in later 

 days, staining the lips with blackberries or cracking 

 nuts, by-and-by the path brings you in sight of a 

 railway station. And the railway station, through 

 some process of mind, presently compels you to go 

 up on the platform, and after a little puffing and 

 revolution of wheels you emerge at Charing-cross, 

 or London Bridge, or Waterloo, or Ludgate-hill, 

 and, with the freshness of the meadows still cling- 

 ing to your coat, mingle with the crowd. 



The inevitable end of every footpath round 

 about London is London. All paths go thither. 



If it were far away in the distant country, you 

 might sit down in the shadow upon the hay and 

 fall asleep, or dream awake hour after hour. 

 There would be no inclination to move. But if 

 you sat down on the sward under the ancient 

 pollard oak in the little mead with the brook, and 

 the wood of which I spoke just now as like a glade 

 in the enchanted Forest of Arden, this would not 

 be possible. It is the proximity of the immense 

 City which induces a mental, a nerve, restlessness. 

 As you sit and would dream, a something plucks 

 at the mind with constant reminder; you cannot 

 dream for long, you must up and away, and, turn 



