HAPPY VILLAGE 23 



ate and drank : and the question proved difficult to 

 answer because you cannot go behind an axiom and argue 

 about its reasonableness. My answer was something like 

 this : I lived as a boy in the deep country, nine miles 

 from a town or railway and five miles (as Sydney Smith 

 used to lament) from a lemon. Our thoughts and ways 

 were country thoughts and ways ; and I do not think 

 any of us ever came near to feeling that any moment was 

 dull. There was always a choice of many things to do. 

 When a man is so bred, life loses half its meaning if he is 

 long in a town, however much he may enjoy the town 

 and desire to visit it. The daily touch with the year, 

 with the longer days and shorter days, with the seasons 

 and their weather, with the calendar marked by plant, 

 insect, bird, man, farm rotation and what not becomes 

 almost a spiritual or at least a sensuous necessity. In the 

 town the between-times always touch boredom. You 

 must try to achieve happiness by a succession of pleasure 

 or duties, and the method is as mistaken as attempting to 

 maintain a continuous light by striking matches. In the 

 country the between-times are the really satisfying times, 

 the glow of the fires when the flames are over or to come. 

 You dislike to go indoors even in winter. You want to 

 hear the blackbirds hilarious cackle before he goes to 

 roost. You want to move, as well as hear and see and 

 smell. 



I could of course give scores of little concrete reasons 

 why I live in the country, why I should feel cut off from 

 &quot; the free play of life &quot; (which is the best definition of 

 happiness) when prisoned among streets and houses ; 

 but the inner reason for preferring the country is beyond 

 particular detail and compelling ; no comparison is so 

 much as challenged. Some may call the reason mystic, 

 but th^t cannot be, helped : it is the real reason, and it is 



