erman female. I
might be as eloquently silent as I liked, and it did not impress him in
the least. The few remarks he made showed me that. This was grievous,
for Brosy was, in person, a very charming young man, and the good
opinion of charming young men is quite a nice thing to possess. Now I
began to regret, now that he was merely interjectional, those earnest
paragraphs in which he had talked the night before at supper and during
the sunset walk on the island of Vilm. Observing him sideways and
cautiously I saw that the pretty speeches his mother was making me
_apropos_ of everything and nothing were objectionable to him; and I
silently agreed with him that pretty speeches are unpleasant things,
especially when made by one woman to another. You can forgive a man
perhaps, because in your heart in spite of all experience lurks the
comfortable belief that he means what he says; but how shall you forgive
a woman for mistaking you for a fool?

They persuaded me to drive with them to the place in the woods they were
bound for called Kiekoewer, where the view over the bay was said to be
very beautiful; and when I got on to my feet I found I was so stiff that
driving seemed the only thing possible. Ambrose was very kind and
careful of my bodily comfort, but did not bother about me spiritually.
Whenever there was a hill, and there kept on being hills, he got out and
walked, leaving me wholly to his mother. But it did not matter any more,
for the forest was so exquisite that way, the afternoon so serene, so
mellow with lovely light, that I could not look round me without being
happy. Oh blessed state, when mere quiet weather, trees and grass, sea
and clouds, can make you forget that life has anything in it but
rapture, can make you drink in heaven with every breath! How long will
it last, this joy of living, this splendid ecstasy of the soul? I am
more afraid of losing this, of losing even a little of this, of having
so much as the edge of its radiance dimmed, than of parting with any
other earthly possession. And I think of Wordsworth, its divine singer,
who yet lost it so soon and could no longer see the splendour in the
grass, the glory in the flower, and I ask myself with a sinking heart if
it faded so quickly for him who saw it and sang it by God's grace to
such perfection, how long, oh how long does the common soul, half blind,
half dead, half dumb, keep its little, precious share?

My intention when I began this book wa