e me
start by muttering, as if he were an echo of the morning: 'Blind! Blind!
Blind!'

CHAPTER 36. ENTHUSIASM

I began the next day with another dive into the Roman bath, and then
started for Highgate. I was not dispirited now. I was not afraid of the
shabby coat, and had no yearnings after gallant greys. My whole manner
of thinking of our late misfortune was changed. What I had to do, was,
to show my aunt that her past goodness to me had not been thrown away
on an insensible, ungrateful object. What I had to do, was, to turn the
painful discipline of my younger days to account, by going to work with
a resolute and steady heart. What I had to do, was, to take my woodman's
axe in my hand, and clear my own way through the forest of difficulty,
by cutting down the trees until I came to Dora. And I went on at a
mighty rate, as if it could be done by walking.

When I found myself on the familiar Highgate road, pursuing such a
different errand from that old one of pleasure, with which it was
associated, it seemed as if a complete change had come on my whole life.
But that did not discourage me. With the new life, came new purpose,
new intention. Great was the labour; priceless the reward. Dora was the
reward, and Dora must be won.

I got into such a transport, that I felt quite sorry my coat was not
a little shabby already. I wanted to be cutting at those trees in the
forest of difficulty, under circumstances that should prove my strength.
I had a good mind to ask an old man, in wire spectacles, who was
breaking stones upon the road, to lend me his hammer for a little while,
and let me begin to beat a path to Dora out of granite. I stimulated
myself into such a heat, and got so out of breath, that I felt as if I
had been earning I don't know how much.

In this state, I went into a cottage that I saw was to let, and examined
it narrowly,--for I felt it necessary to be practical. It would do for
me and Dora admirably: with a little front garden for Jip to run about
in, and bark at the tradespeople through the railings, and a capital
room upstairs for my aunt. I came out again, hotter and faster than
ever, and dashed up to Highgate, at such a rate that I was there an
hour too early; and, though I had not been, should have been obliged to
stroll about to cool myself, before I was at all presentable.

My first care, after putting myself under this necessary course of
preparation, was to find the Doctor's house. It was n