THE MAYFLY. at 



whence a member of Parliament was accused of drawing 

 his facts — ^namely, the imagination. There is no objection 

 to your knowing that the spot is not far from the cradle of 

 the queenly Thames ; so near, in fact, that you may almost 

 hear the first babblings of the infant river. Green hills 

 stand in rich undulations of pasture high above the surround- 

 ing country, giving to the sheep grazing on the luscious 

 downs a name that is distinctive and far known. The 

 Brawl does not rise, as many streams do, through the silver- 

 sanded floor of a bul)bling spring sequestered in the dell, 

 but it spurts sharply out of a hillside, and commences its 

 course, as it were, with a grand flourish of trumpets and 

 waving of flags. Tennyson might have had the Brawl (but 

 of course had not) in his mind's eye when he wrote " The 

 Brook." The forget-me-nots are there, and the cresses, 

 and the shallows, and the windings, and all the melody 

 which tinkles in the Poet-Laureate's exquisite song. 



When a man travels the best part of a hundred miles 

 for one day's amusement he is generally prepared to crowd 

 as much work into that day as human possibihties allow. 

 How fresh the country looks in its May garment of many 

 colours, and how majestically the sun rolls behind the great 

 hills towards which I am rattling in the ravenous express ! 

 As if the landscape is not already gay enough with its 

 foliage and flowers, the sun clasps it in a parting em- 

 brace, and at the touch it becomes radiant and rosy and 

 soft. 



The village is hushed in repose by the time I am left, 

 the only passenger, on the rude platform, and the ancient 

 churchyard is -ivrapped in shadow that becomes weird and 

 black in the avenue of cypress and yew. The bats wheel 



