lewes’s sea-side studies. 
99 . 
which runs a stream fringed with wild flowers, and clear as crystal; every twenty or 
thirty yards the stream falls over an artificial precipice of stones, making a dulcet music. 
The slopes on each side are richly wooded; and the sequestered silence of this spot adds 
to its many charms. Who has not felt the deep peace which settles on the soul, when 
one is lying in the long grass beside a stream, under a summer sun, no sound of traffic, 
contention, or care, to vex or sadden ? Who has not sat upon a gate, less to rest than 
to enjoy the peaceful idleness of noon, and looked upon the marvellous forms of life ac¬ 
tive around him, dreaming all the while of pleasant scenes which revisit the memory, or 
of pleasant hopes rising ‘ like exhalations of the dawn.’ In such a mood we one day rested 
on a gate under the trees beside this stream ; presently, a blind man felt his way also to 
the gate, and rested there. We spoke to him : he told us, with that sluggish iteration 
characteristic of the countryman, that this was ‘ a fine healthy spot, . . . yes! a very 
healthy spot, ... a healthy spot.’ And he held down his head; alas! it was useless 
for him to hold it erect, fronting the lovely scene. Saddened by his presence, we soon 
moved on ; and, returning by the cliffs, we came upon another human being, with eyes 
closed to the beauty around, but closed in sleep, not blindness. A little girl, not more 
than eight years old, was stretched along the path, her rosy cheek resting on her little 
arm, which rested on the bare rock. How fast she was! but, as Shakespeare says, 
‘Weariness will snore upon a flint;’ and here was wearied innocence sleeping on a flint, 
the summer sun pouring down its rays upon her, and also on the milk, which stood in a 
can by her side. Whether the milk was as much benefited by this rest in the sun on 
its way to Ilfracombe, the customers thereof must say. All I know is, that the pic¬ 
ture was very touching, and I placed a penny in the child’s half-closed hand, that she 
might mind it on awaking. She would think some fairy placed it there.” 
—or this, which explains the passion of Englishmen for the sea:— 
“We are sea-dogs from our birth ; it is in our race, bred in the blood. Even the 
most inland and bucolic youth takes spontaneously to the water, as an element he is born 
to rule. The winds carry ocean murmurs far into the inland valleys, and awaken the 
old pirate instincts of the Norsemen. Boys hear them, and although they never saw a 
ship in their lives, these murmurs make their hearts unquiet; and to run away from 
home, ‘ to go to sea,’ is the inevitable result. Place a Londoner in a turnip-field, and 
the chances are, that he will not know it from a field of mangold wurzel. Place him, 
unfamiliar with pigskin, on a ‘ fresh horse,’ and he will not make a majestic figure. But 
take this same youth, and fling him into a boat: how readily he learns to feather an oar! 
Nay, even when he is sea-sick—as unhappily even the Briton will sometimes be—he 
goes through it with a certain careless grace, a manly haughtiness, or, at the lowest, a 
certain ‘official reserve,’ not observable in the foreigner. What can be a more abject 
picture than a Frenchman suffering from sickness, unless it be a German under the same 
hideous circumstances ? Before getting out of harbour he was radiant, arrogant, self- 
centered ; only half an hour has passed, and he is green, cadaverous, dank, prostrate, the 
manhood seemingly spunged out of him. N.B.—In this respect 1 am a Frenchman.” 
—we cannot fail to recognise a writer who can talk in a pleasant and 
sensible style about matters of eyery-day occurrence. 
In a far different manner does Mr. Lewes treat of subjects of a more 
purely scientific nature. In these he is evidently not at home. He is, 
in short, a man of literary habits, and some power as a writer, who has 
made vigorous attempts to “get up” Zoology by attacking its litera¬ 
ture on all sides simultaneously. In the German, especially, he seems 
to have surpassed himself. Numerous are the allusions to the works of 
Leydig, Leuckhart, Yon Baer, Yan Beneden, Muller, and others. But 
in many instances he seems to have had but a vague conception of the 
true meaning of these authors. The extent of his learning, however, 
sinks into insignificance when compared with that of his personal re- 
