ON LOOKING AT THE SKY 



looked up into the blue depths, I saw no 

 camel, no dog, no kangaroo. The high 

 wind-blown cirrus was spread against the 

 azure heavens in strands of unspeakable 

 grace, yet in a form of power, and with a 

 feeling of virility. It would be a close com- 

 parison to say that these clouds suggest 

 the sweeping lines in the best paintings of 

 Sargent, or Whistler, or Dewing. So 

 to-day, instead of seeing fanciful animals 

 and birds among the clouds, I could rather 

 imagine that I saw the souls of great artists 

 blown against the sky. That graceful, 

 awkward, powerful trailing shape, spread- 

 ing upward for ten miles opposite the sun, 

 pure, spotless and serene, might be the soul 

 of Lincoln; and the one sporting and 

 laughing in the sunshine might be Robert 

 Louis Stevenson. 



It is not alone when the sky is warm 

 and full of sunshiny clouds that it is 

 beautiful and greatly to be loved. I have 

 laid on my back, too, when it rained, look- 

 ing up to see where the drops come from. 

 Indeed, one can see. One catches sight of 

 them a great way off, and it is jolly fun to 

 see them hurrying down to find me. They 

 come from far up in the sky, and yet from a 



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