iousness, but an island
in a river sounds like the beginning of the greatest adventure story on
earth. "Robinson Crusoe" is really a great tale, but think of Robinson
Crusoe's feelings if he could have actually seen England and Spain from
his inaccessible isle! "Treasure Island" is a spirit of genius: but
what treasure could an island contain to compare with Alfred? And then
consider the further elements of juvenile romance in an island that was
more of an island than it looked. Athelney was masked with marshes; many
a heavy harnessed Viking may have started bounding across a meadow only
to find himself submerged in a sea. I feel the full fictitious splendour
spreading round me; I see glimpses of a great romance that will never be
written. I see a sudden shaft quivering in one of the short trees. I see
a red-haired man wading madly among the tall gold flowers of the marsh,
leaping onward and lurching lower. I see another shaft stand quivering
in his throat. I cannot see any more, because, as I have delicately
suggested, I am a heavy man. This mysterious marshland does not sustain
me, and I sink into its depths with a bubbling groan.

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