244 IDLE DAYS IN PATAGONIA 



sudden, unexpected recovery of a lost sensation 

 affects us in some such way as the accidental dis- 

 covery of a store of gold, hidden away by our- 

 selves in some past period of our life and forgot- 

 ten ; or as it would affect us to be met face to face 

 by some dear friend, long absent and supposed to 

 be dead. The suddenly recovered sensation is 

 more to us for a moment than a mere sensation; 

 it is like a recovery of the irrecoverable past. We 

 are not moved in this way, or at all events not 

 nearly in the same degree, by seeing objects or 

 hearing sounds that are associated with and re- 

 call past scenes, simply because the old familiar 

 sights and sounds have never been forgotten; 

 their phantasms have always existed in the brain. 

 If, for instance, I hear a bird's note that I have 

 not heard for the last twenty years, it is not as if 

 I had not really heard it, since I have listened to 

 it mentally a thousand times during the interval, 

 and it does not surprise or come to me like some- 

 thing that was lost and is recovered, and conse- 

 quently does not move me. And so with the sen- 

 sation of sight; I cannot think of any fragrant 

 flower that grows in my distant home without see- 

 ing it, so that its beauty may always be enjoyed; 

 but its fragrance, alas, has vanished and returns 

 not! 



