eclined by that infatuated editor,--when I reflect upon these things,
and a thousand others like unto them, I must say, I am lost in
admiration of my own virtues. You may not like me, but that is a mere
difference of taste. At any rate, I like myself very well, and find
myself very good company. Many a laugh, and "lots" or "heaps"
(according as you are a Northern or a Southern provincial) of
conversation we have all alone, and are usually on exceeding good
terms, which is a pleasure, even when other people like me, and an
immense consolation when they don't. But as I was saying, I do
sometimes fall out with myself, and with human nature in general (and,
in fact, I rather think the secret of self-complacence lurks somewhere
hereabouts,--in a mental assumption that our virtues are our own, but
our faults belong to the race). But to think that we were so puny and
puerile that we could not stand the beauty that breathed around us! I
do not mean that it killed us, but it drained us. It did not cease to
be beautiful, but we ceased to be overpowered. When the day began, eye
and soul were filled with the light that never was on sea or shore. We
spoke low and little, gazing with throbbing hearts, breathless,
receptive, solemn, and before twelve o'clock we flatted out and made
jests. This is humiliation,--that our dullard souls cannot keep up to
the pitch of sublimity for two hours; that we could sail through Glory
and Beauty, through Past and Present, and laugh. Low as I sank with
the rest, though, I do believe I held out the longest: but what can
one frail pebble do against a river? "How pretty cows look in a
landscape," I said; for you know, even if you must come down, it is
better to roll down an inclined plane than to drop over a precipice;
and I thought, since I saw that descent was inevitable, I would at
least engineer the party gently through aesthetics to puns. So I said,
"How pretty cows look in a landscape, so calm and reflective, and sheep
harmoniously happy in the summer-tide."

"Yes," said the Anakim, who is New Hampshire born; "but you ought to
see the New Hampshire sheep, if you want the real article."

"I don't," I responded. "I only want the picture."

"Ever notice the difference between Vermont and New Hampshire sheep?"
struck up Halicarnassus, who must always put in his oar.

"No," I said, "and I don't believe there is any."

"Pooh! Tell New Hampshire sheep as far off as you can see 'em," he