TAKING A WALK. 91 



A man who has been over-tasking his brain all the 

 early part of the day, rises corporeally from his work 

 at a certain time, places his hat above his brain, 

 buttons his coat underneath it, and sallies forth to 

 take a walk. 



Whatever subject he may be working upon he 

 takes with him, and on that subject he concentrates 

 his attention. Supposing him to be a mathematician, 

 and that the prevalent idea in his mind is to prove 

 that aABC=(zDEF + zGHI). He takes 

 one final look at his Euclid while drawing on his 

 gloves, and sets off with ABC before his eyes. 



As he walks along, he sees nothing but ABC, 

 hoars nothing but D E F, feels nothing but GHI, 

 and thinks of nothing but the connection of all 

 three. 



An hour nas passed away and he re-enters his 

 room without any very definite recollection of the 

 manner in which he got there. He has mechanically 

 paced to a certain point, mechanically stopped and 

 turned round, mechanically retraced his steps, and 

 mechanically come back again. 



He has not the least recollection of anything that 

 happened during his walk ; he don't know whether 

 the sky was blue or cloudy, whether there was any 

 wind, nor would he venture to say decidedly whether 

 it was night or day. He does recollect seeing a tree 

 on a hill and a spire in a valley, because, together 

 with himself, they formed an angle that illustrated 



