A HEATHER EPISODE. 



heath at all. He had walked over square 

 miles of English moorland, but never a 

 lizard had he seen, out of all their millions. 

 Imagination, he observed, was an invaluable 

 property to poets and naturalists. It was 

 part of their stock-in-trade. He didn't seek 

 to deprive them of it. As Falstaff says, a 

 man may surely labour at his vocation. 



I was put on my mettle. For once in 

 my life, I did a rash thing ; I ventured 

 to prophesy. " If you wish," I cried, " I'll 

 catch a lizard, and show you." The Editor's 

 face was a study to behold. Phil May 

 would have paid him ten guineas for the 

 copyright. " As you like," he answered 

 grimly. " Produce your lizards." 



Fortune favours the brave. But I confess 

 I trembled. Never before had I bragged ; 

 and now I wondered whether Fortune or 

 Nemesis would carry it. 'Twas two to one 

 on Nemesis. Yet the gods, as Swinburne 

 tells us in " Les Noyades," are sometimes 

 kindly. We lay still on the heather still 

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