of childhood, when one had no need to do anything in particular, because it was enough to be.  It seemed so futile to go on consuming stolidly and grimly the porridge of life, when one might take one’s choice of its dainties!  I had no temptation to waste my substance in riotous living.  I had no relish for the passionate and feverish delights of combat and chase.  It did not seem to be worth while to pretend that I had, merely for the sake of being considered robust and full-blooded.  To speak the truth, I did not particularly care what other people thought of my experiment.  It seemed to me that I had deferred to all that too long; and though I had no wish to break violently with the world or to set it at defiance, I thought I might venture to find a little corner and a little book, and see the current spin by.  It seemed to me, too, that most of the people who waxed eloquent about the normal duties and responsibilities of life chose them not reluctantly and philosophically, but because, on the whole they preferred them, and felt dull without them; and I imagined that I had my right to a preference too, particularly if it was not pursued at the expense of other people.

Whether or not the choice was wise or foolish will be seen, or may be inferred.  But I do not abjure the theory.  I think and believe that there are a good many people in the world who pursue lives for which they are not fitted, and lose all contentment in the process, simply because they respect conventions too much, and have not the courage to break away from them.  Some of the most useful people I know are people who not only think least about being useful, but are ready to condemn themselves for their desultoriness.  The people who have time to listen and to talk, to welcome friends and to sympathise with them, to enjoy and to help others to enjoy, seem to me often to do more for the world than the people who hurry from committee to committee, address meetings, and do what is called some of the drudgery of the world, which might in a hundred cases be just as well undone.  It is most of it merely a childish game either way; and the child who looks on and applauds is often better employed than the child who makes a long score, and thinks of nothing else for the rest of the afternoon.

And anyhow, this is what I saw and thought and did; not a very magnificent performance, but a little piece of life observed and experienced and written down.

THE SILENT ISLE

I

The Silent Isle, I name it; and yet in no land in which I have ever lived is there so little sight and sound of water as here.  It oozes from field to drain, it trickles from drain to ditch, it falls from ditch to dyke, and then moves silently to the great seaward sluice; it is not a living thing in the landscape, bright and vivacious, but rather something secret and still, drawn almost reluctantly away, rather than