TER V.--THE NEW COUNTRY.

_All places that the eye of Heaven visits_,
_Are to a wise man ports and happy havens_.

RICHARD II.

The primitive man, after he has satisfied the claims of appetite,
stitched his skin-mantle, and thatched a hut, may begin to spare time for
reflection on the quality and flavour of the prey he has eaten, or the
picturesqueness of his cabin. Till then his estimate of things is
quantitative. He asks not of what sort his food is, but whether there is
enough of it, and regards less the cut of his coat than its thickness.

The analogy of our circumstances must be our excuse for postponing so
long a description of our new settlement, its physical surroundings, and
the complexion of our domestic and social life. Not in truth that we had
returned to barbarism: but who could dilate on the beauty of mountain
scenery, in sight of which he was perhaps to starve; who would criticise
the pattern of his dinner-service, or be fastidious in carpets and wall-
paper, before he could reckon upon dinner, or call shelter his own?

But a week is over, and we have all settled into our berths. The boys
have found that there will be dinner every day; the masters that no one
will have to pitch his tent on a sand-dune, or spread a straw litter in a
bathing-machine. The level of comfort was, of course, not uniform. How
should it be? Probably there is a choice of corners in a workhouse or
casual-ward. Some of our party tasted the painful pleasures of the poor
in the scant accommodation and naked simplicity of cottage lodgings. It
was long after our arrival that we discovered a valued friend still
sitting on the corner of his packing-case, and brewing his coffee on a
washhand-stand. The fire smoked all day; but this vice in the apartment
was neutralised by a broken window. Yet he should be quite happy, he
said, if he could get a glazier _and_ a sweep (like smoke and draught,
one would not do without the other), a bolster, an occasional clean
towel, and a little warm water in the morning.

Those who had brought a family with them into camp were more seriously
troubled with the cares of providing quarters, and pondered regretfully
on the peace and roominess of home. Still as we are leaving no one
houseless or dinnerless, we may turn aside to describe at more leisure
the place we lived in and the manner of our life.

The stage on which our little history was enacted is a maritime plain of
irregular