Part 8 (1/2)

When winter twilight falls on my street with the rain, a sense of the horrible sadness of life descends upon me. I think of drunken old women who drown themselves because n.o.body loves them; I think of Napoleon at St. Helena, and of Byron growing morose and fat in the enervating climate of Italy.

_Inconstancy_

The rose that one wears and throws away, the friend one forgets, the music that pa.s.ses--out of the well-known transitoriness of mortal things I have made myself a maxim or precept to the effect that it is foolish to look for one face, or to listen long for one voice, in a world that is after all, as I know, full of enchanting voices.

But all the same, I can never quite forget the enthusiasm with which, as a boy, I read the praises of Constancy and True Love, and the unchanged Northern Star.

_The Poplar_

There is a great tree in Suss.e.x, whose cloud of thin foliage floats high in the summer air. The thrush sings in it, and blackbirds, who fill the late, decorative suns.h.i.+ne with a s.h.i.+mmer of golden sound. There the nightingale finds her green cloister; and on those branches sometimes, like a great fruit, hangs the lemon-coloured Moon. In the glare of August, when all the world is faint with heat, there is always a breeze in those cool recesses, always a noise, like the noise of water, among its lightly hung leaves.

But the owner of this Tree lives in London, reading books.

_On the Doorstep_

I rang the bell as of old; as of old I gazed at the great s.h.i.+ning Door and waited. But, alas! that flutter and beat of the wild heart, that delicious doorstep Terror--it was gone; and with it dear, fantastic, panic-stricken Youth had rung the bell, flitted round the corner and vanished for ever.

_Old Clothes_

Shabby old waistcoat, what made the heart beat that you used to cover? Funny-shaped hat, where are the thoughts that once nested beneath you? Old shoes, hurrying along what dim paths of the Past did I wear out your sole-leather?

_Youth_

Oh dear, this living and eating and growing old; these doubts and aches in the back, and want of interest in the Moon and Roses...

Am I the person who used to wake in the middle of the night and laugh with the joy of living? Who worried about the existence of G.o.d, and danced with young ladies till long after daybreak? Who sang ”Auld Lang Syne” and howled with sentiment, and more than once gazed at the summer stars through a blur of great, romantic tears?

_Consolation_

The other day, depressed on the Underground, I tried to cheer myself by thinking over the joys of our human lot. But there wasn't one of them for which I seemed to care a hang--not Wine, nor Friends.h.i.+p, nor Eating, nor Making Love, nor the Consciousness of Virtue. Was it worth while then going up in a lift into a world that had nothing less trite to offer?

Then I thought of reading--the nice and subtle happiness of reading. This was enough, this joy not dulled by Age, this polite and unpunished vice, this selfish, serene, life-long intoxication.

_Sir Eustace Carr_