Was not this really life, the life of nature, of the woods and fields? Would not one grow better, purer, to stay always in this lovely wilderness, where every leaf had a voice, every stone showed forth its steadfast lesson, every morning and evening was full of joy and peace? Why should one ever go back to places where people talked and gossiped and made formal calls?
Such new worlds, too, were opening before her! Not only this great one of nature, but the sister world of science, which till now had been only a name. She had always thought of "scientific people" much as she would of the inhabitants of Mars, never having been thrown with any in this short life, which seemed to her so long, so full. As she said to her friend here, she had had many lives already, all beautiful, joyful beyond measure; but this strange world, where they spoke a language of their own, where all the men wore spectacles and long beards, and all the women short hair and spectacles,—this world she had never thought even to peep into. And now—behold! the magic door had been opened by friendly hands; opened only a little way, it was true, but wide enough for her to see at least beyond the threshold,—and it was fairy-land! As for the long beards and the spectacles,—Hildegarde laughed to herself, a little soft, happy laugh.
Gerald, who was lying at her feet, looked up, and laughed too, for pure good-will.
"Good joke!" he said; "excellent joke! See here, Miss Hilda—"
"Do leave off that tiresome 'Miss,' Jerry! You know I told you to, ages ago."
"I know! but my manners are so superlative. Well, Hilda, then, just listen to this! I have been improving a little on one of your old ballads—"
"Improving? sacrilegious wretch!"
"Oh, but listen! Why should a ballad be too old to be improved?
This goes beautifully.
"Our lads are to the fishing gane,
A-fishing with a line and float,
And they hae grippet Hilda the Grahame,
For stealing o' the Codger's boat."
"I didn't steal it!" cried Hilda, aiming a neatly folded stocking-ball at the boy's head; but Gerald avoided it, and went on.