Pages from a Journal with Other Papers

This is a fictional book. There is no hurry for achievement, although so much has to be done--such infinite intricacy to be unfolded and made perfect. The little stream winding down the bottom turns and doubles on itself; a dead leaf falls into it, is arrested by a twig, and lies there content. It is a quiet, warm day in June. The wind is westerly, but there is only just enough of it to waft now and then a sound from the far-off town, or the dull, subdued thunder of cannon-firing from ships or forts distant some forty miles or more. Massive, white-bordered clouds, grey underneath, sail overhead; there was heavy rain last night, and they are lifting and breaking a little. Softly and slowly they go, and one of them, darker than the rest, has descended in a mist of rain, blotting out the ships.