BOOKS AND GARDENS

Most men seek solitude from wounded vanity, from disappointed ambition, from a miscarriage in the passions; but some others from native instinct, as a duckling seeks water.  I have taken to my solitude, such as it is, from an indolent turn of mind, and this solitude I sweeten by an imaginative sympathy which re-creates the past for me,—­the past of the world, as well as the past which belongs to me as an individual,—­and which makes me independent of the passing moment.  I see every one struggling after the unattainable, but I struggle not, and so spare myself the pangs of disappointment and disgust.  I have no ventures at sea, and, consequently, do not fear the arrival of evil tidings.  I have no desire to act any prominent part in the world, but I am devoured by an unappeasable curiosity as to the men who do act.  I am not an actor, I am a spectator only.  My sole occupation is sight-seeing.  In a certain imperial idleness, I amuse myself with the world.  Ambition!  What do I care for ambition?  The oyster with much pain produces its pearl.  I take the pearl.  Why should I produce one after this miserable, painful fashion?  It would be but a flawed one, at best.  These pearls I can pick up by the dozen.  The production of them is going on all around me, and there will be a nice crop for the solitary man of the next century.  Look at a certain silent emperor, for instance:  a hundred years hence his pearl will be handed about from hand to hand; will be curiously scrutinised and valued; will be set in its place in the world’s cabinet.  I confess I should like to see the completion of that filmy orb.  Will it be pure in colour?  Will its purity be marred by an ominous bloody streak?  Of this I am certain, that in the cabinet in which the world keeps these peculiar treasures, no one will be looked at more frequently, or will provoke a greater variety of opinions as to its intrinsic worth.  Why should I be ambitious?  Shall I write verses?  I am not likely to surpass Mr. Tennyson or Mr. Browning in that walk.  Shall I be a musician?  The blackbird singing this moment somewhere in my garden shrubbery puts me to instant shame.  Shall I paint?  The intensest scarlet on an artist’s palette is but ochre to that I saw this morning at sunrise.  No, no, let me enjoy Mr. Tennyson’s verse, and the blackbird’s song, and the colours of sunrise, but do not let me emulate them.  I am happier as it is.  I do not need to make history,—­there are plenty of people willing to save me trouble on that score.  The cook makes the dinner, the guest eats it; and the last, not without reason, is considered the happier man.