the least doubt; who could imagine a
community of intelligent persons without Homer and Dante and
Shakespeare and Wordsworth! How the volumes would be housed we did not
try to divine; but that we should find them there we did not think of
doubting. Our chief thought was of the principle of selection, long
sought after by lovers of books but never yet found, which we were
certain would be easily discovered when we came to look along the
shelves of the libraries in Arden. With what delight we anticipated
the long days when we should read together again, and amid such novel
surroundings, the books we loved! For, although our home contained few
luxuries, it had fed the mind; there was not a great soul in literature
whose name was not on the shelves of our library, and the
companionships of that room made our quiet home more rich in gracious
and noble influences than many a palace.

And yet we had been in the Forest several months before we even thought
of books; so absorbed were we in the noble life of the place, in the
inspiring society about us. There came a morning, however, when, as I
looked out into the shadows of the deep woods, I recalled a wonderful
line of Dante's that must have come to the poet as he passed through
some silent and sombre woodland path. Suddenly I remembered that
months had passed since we had opened a book; we whose most inspiring
hours had once been those in which we read together from some familiar
page. For an instant I felt something akin to remorse; it seemed as if
I had been disloyal to friends who had never failed me in any time of
need. But as I meditated on this strange forgetfulness of mine, I saw
that in Arden books have no place and serve no purpose. Why should one
read a translation when the original work lies open and legible before
him? Why should one watch the reflections in the shadowy surface of
the lake when the heavens shine above him? Why should one linger
before the picturesque landscape which art has imperfectly transferred
to canvas when the scene, with all its elusive play of light and shade,
lies outspread before him? I became conscious that in Arden one lives
habitually in the world which books are always striving to portray and
interpret; that one sees with his own eyes all that the eyes of the
keenest observer have ever seen; that one feels in his own soul all the
greatest soul has ever felt. That which in the outer world most men
know only by report, in A