He now found, that it would be very difficult to effect that which it was very easy to suppose effected.  When he looked round about him, he saw himself confined by the bars of nature, which had never yet been broken, and by the gate, through which none, that once had passed it, were ever able to return.  He was now impatient as an eagle in a grate.  He passed week after week in clambering the mountains, to see if there was any aperture which the bushes might conceal, but found all the summits inaccessible by their prominence.  The iron gate he despaired to open; for it was not only secured with all the power of art, but was always watched by successive sentinels, and was, by its position, exposed to the perpetual observation of all the inhabitants.

He then examined the cavern through which the waters of the lake were discharged; and, looking down, at a time when the sun shone strongly upon its mouth, he discovered it to be full of broken rocks, which, though they permitted the stream to flow through many narrow passages, would stop any body of solid bulk.  He returned discouraged and dejected; but, having now known the blessing of hope, resolved never to despair.

In these fruitless searches he spent ten months.  The time, however, passed cheerfully away:  in the morning he rose with new hope, in the evening applauded his own diligence, and in the night slept sound after his fatigue.  He met a thousand amusements, which beguiled his labour, and diversified his thoughts.  He discerned the various instincts of animals, and properties of plants, and found the place replete with wonders, of which he purposed to solace himself with the contemplation, if he should never be able to accomplish his flight; rejoicing that his endeavours, though yet unsuccessful, had supplied him with a source of inexhaustible inquiry.

But his original curiosity was not yet abated; he resolved to obtain some knowledge of the ways of men.  His wish still continued, but his hope grew less.  He ceased to survey any longer the walls of his prison, and spared to search, by new toils, for interstices which he knew could not be found; yet determined to keep his design always in view, and lay hold on any expedient that time should offer.

CHAP.  VI.

A DISSERTATION ON THE ART OF FLYING.

Among the artists that had been allured into the happy valley, to labour for the accommodation and pleasure of its inhabitants, was a man eminent for his knowledge of the mechanick powers, who had contrived many engines, both of use and recreation.  By a wheel, which the stream turned, he forced the water into a tower, whence it was distributed to all the apartments of the palace.  He erected a pavilion in the garden, around which he kept the air always cool by artificial showers.  One of the groves, appropriated to the ladies, was ventilated by fans, to which the rivulet, that ran through it, gave a constant motion; and instruments of soft musick were placed at proper distances, of which some played by the impulse of the wind, and some by the power of the stream.