Examining him at my leisure I saw him to be a tall, lean man, with rather exaggerated features. He had a big, thin head, a long, pointed nose, a mobile and smiling mouth, large dark eyes, and full side-whiskers. I took him at once for a professional man of some kind, solicitor, schoolmaster, or even a clergyman, though his attire was not clerical. “Here,” he said, “just take the end of this map and let us consult together.” I did as I was desired, and he pointed out the way he meant to take. “Now,” he said, “there is a train there in an hour, and I want to arrive there easily—mind you, not hot; that is so uncomfortable.” I told him that if he knew the road, which was a complicated one, he could probably just do it in the time; but I added that I was myself going to pass a station on the line, where he might catch the same train nearer town. He looked at me with a certain slyness. “Are you certain of that?” he cried; “I have all the trains at my fingers’ ends.” I assured him it was so, while he consulted a time-table. “Right!” he said, “you are right, but all the trains do not stop there; it is not a deduction that you can draw from the fact of one stopping at the other station.” We walked up to the top of the hill together, and I proposed that we should ride in company. He accepted with alacrity. “Nothing I should like better!” As we got on to our bicycles his foot slipped. “You will notice,” he said, “that these are new boots—of a good pattern—but somewhat smooth on the sole; in fact they slip.” I replied that it was a good thing to scratch new boots on the sole, so as to roughen them before riding. “A capital idea!” he said delightedly; “I shall do it the moment I return, with a pair of nail-scissors, closed, mind you, to prevent my straining either blade.” We then rode off, and after a few yards he said, “Now, this is not my usual pace—rather faster than I can go with comfort.” I begged him to take his own pace, and he then began to talk of the country. “Pent up in my chambers,” he said—“I am a conveyancer, you must know—I long for a green lane and a row of elms. I have lived for years in town, in a most convenient street, I must tell you, but I sicken for the country; and now that I am in easier circumstances—I have lived a hard life, mind you—I am going to make the great change, and live in the country. Now, what is your opinion of the relative merits of town and country as a place of residence?” I told him that the only disadvantage of the country to my mind was the difficulty of servants. “Right again!” he said, as if I had answered a riddle. “But I have overcome that; I have been educating a pair of good maids for years—they are paragons, and they will go anywhere with me; indeed, they prefer the country themselves.”
In such light talk we beguiled the way; too soon we came to where our roads divided; I pointed out to him the turn he was to take. “Well,” he said cheerily, “all pleasant things come to an end. I confess that I have enjoyed your company, and am grateful for your kind communications; perhaps we may have another encounter, and if not, we will be glad to have met, and think sometimes of this pleasant hour!” He put his foot upon the step of his bicycle cautiously, then mounted gleefully, and saying “Good-bye, good-bye!” he waved his hand, and in a moment was out of sight.
The thought of this brave and merry spirit planning schemes of life, making the most of simple pleasures, has always dwelt with me. The gods, as we know from Homer, assumed the forms of men, and were at the pains to relate long and wholly unreliable stories to account for their presence at particular times and places; and I have sometimes wondered whether in the lean conveyancer, with his childlike zest for experience, his brisk enjoyment of the smallest details of daily life, I did not entertain some genial, masquerading angel unawares.
26
June 8, 1893.
Is it not the experience of every one that at rare intervals, by some happy accident, life presents one with a sudden and delicious thrill of beauty? I have often tried to analyse the constituent elements of these moments, but the essence is subtle and defies detection. They cannot be calculated upon, or produced by any amount of volition or previous preparation. One thing about these tiny ecstasies I have noticed—they do not come as a rule when one is tranquil, healthy, serene—they rather come as a compensation for weariness and discontent; and yet they are the purest gold of life, and a good deal of sand is well worth washing for a pellet or two of the real metal.
To-day I was more than usually impatient; over me all the week had hung the shadow of some trying, difficult business—the sort of business which, whatever you do, will be done to nobody’s satisfaction. After a vain attempt to wrestle with it, I gave it up, and went out on a bicycle; the wind blew gently and steadily this soft June day; all the blue sky was filled with large white clouds, blackening to rain. I made for the one piece of flat ground in our neighbourhood. It is tranquillising, I have often found, to the dweller in a hilly land, to cool and sober the eye occasionally with the pure breadths of a level plain. The grass was thick and heavy-headed in the fields, but of mere wantonness I turned down a lane which I know has no ending,—a mere relief-road for carts to have access to a farm,—and soon came to the end of it in a small grassy circle, with a cottage or two, where a footpath strikes off across the fields.
Heretofore Unvisited