SELBORNE 293 



the reason of this is because most places are 

 approached by railroad. The station, which is 

 seen first, and cannot thereafter be dissociated 

 from the town, is invariably the centre of a 

 chaotic collection of ugly objects and dis- 

 cordant noises, all the more hateful because so 

 familiar. For in coming to a new place we look 

 instinctively for that which is new, and the old, 

 and in themselves unpleasant sights and sounds, 

 at such a moment have a disheartening, deaden- 

 ing effect on the stranger : — ^the same clanging, 

 puffing, grinding, gravel - crushing, banging, 

 shrieking noises ; the same big unlovely brick 

 and metal structure, the long platform, the con- 

 fusion of objects and people, the waiting 

 vehicles, and the gUttering steel rails stretching 

 away into infinitude, like unburied petrified 

 webs of some gigantic spider of a remote past — 

 webs in which mastodons were caught like flies. 

 Approaching a town from some other direction 

 — riding, driving, or walking — we see it with a 

 clearer, truer \dsion, and take away a better and 

 more lasting image. 



Selborne is one of the noted places where 

 pilgrims go that is happily without a station. 



