NATURE NEAR LONDON 



the grass are exposed ; the chalk is about to break 

 away in flakes. 



You cannot lean over as over a parapet, lest 

 such a flake should detach itself lest a mere 

 trifle should begin to fall, awakening a dread and 

 dormant inclination to slide and finally plunge like 

 it. Stand back; the sea there goes out and out, 

 to the left and to the right, and how far is it to the 

 blue overhead ? The eye must stay here a long 

 period, and drink in these distances, before it can 

 adjust the measure, and know exactly what it sees. 



The vastness conceals itself, giving us no land- 

 mark or milestone. The fleck of cloud yonder, 

 does it part it in two, or is it but a third of the 

 way ? The world is an immense caldron, the 

 ocean fills it, and we are merely on the rim this 

 narrow land is but a ribbon to the limitlessness 

 yonder. The wind rushes out upon it with wild 

 joy; springing from the edge of the earth, it leaps 

 out over the ocean. Let us go back a few steps 

 and recline on the warm, dry turf. 



It is pleasant to look back upon the green slope 

 and the hollows and narrow ridges, with sheep and 

 stubble and some low hedges, and oxen, and that 

 old, old sloth the plough creeping in his path. 

 The sun is bright on the stubble and the corners 

 of furze; there are bees humming yonder, no doubt, 

 and flowers, and hares crouching the dew dried 

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