XXIV. 



CONCLUSION. 



DAY after day, month after month, year after year, 

 the labour of the Husbandman begins afresh. It 

 is without end, middle, or beginning. It defies 

 all the ' Unities ' of Time, and Action. And as its 

 nature is, so must be its everlasting development, 

 literary as well as otherwise. To give it a somewhat 

 livelier tongue, to rescue it, at least for an occasional 

 hour, from a tone and treatment which under the 

 boasted title of ' practical/ would scare away from its 

 deeply interesting discussion all that has adorned, as 

 well as advanced, so many other equally laborious 

 and less naturally attractive pursuits, was the motive 

 that suggested the too desultory chronicle of deeds, 

 of words, of thoughts, that these pages have imper- 

 fectly recorded. A story without an end, a soliloquy 

 without a speaker, a dialogue without a denouement, 



Q 



