TWO TOWN MICE AT A COUNTRY INN.
When I reached the Wheel of Pleasure, I found Rosalind awaiting me in the coffee- room, looking fresh from a traveller's toilette, and with the welcome news that dinner was on the way.
By the time I had washed off the day's dust it was ready, and a merry meal it proved.Rosalind had none of Alastor's objections to the wine-list, so we drank an excellent champagne; and as there seemed to be no one in the hotel but ourselves, we made ourselves at home and talked and laughed, none daring to make us afraid.
At first, on sitting down to table, we had grown momentarily shy, with one of those sudden freaks of self-consciousness which occasionally surprise one, when, midway in some slightly unconventional situation to which the innocence of nature has led us, we realise it--"for an instant and no more."Positively, I think that in the embarrassment of that instant Ihad made some inspired remark to Rosalind about the lovely country which lay dreamy in the afterglow outside our window.
Oh, yes, I remember the very words.They were "What a heavenly landscape!" or something equally striking.
"Yes," Rosalind had answered, "it is almost as beautiful as the Strand!"If I'd known her better, I should have exclaimed, "You dear!"and I think it possible that I did say something to that effect,--perhaps "You dear woman!" At all events, the veil of self-consciousness was rent in twain at that remark, and our spirits rushed together at this touch of London nature thus unexpectedly revealed.
London! I hadn't realised till this moment how I had been missing it all these days of rustication, and my heart went out to it with a vast homesickness.
"Yes! the Strand," I repeated tenderly, "the Strand--at night!""Indeed, yes! what is more beautiful in the whole world?" she joined in ardently.
"The wild torrents of light, the passionate human music, the hansoms, the white shirts and shawled heads, the theatres--""Don't speak of them or you'll make me cry," said Rosalind.
"The little suppers after the theatre--"
"Please don't," she cried, "it is cruel;" and I saw that her eyes were indeed glistening with tears.
"But, of course," I continued, to give a slight turn aside in our talk, "it is very wrong of us to have such sophisticated tastes.We ought to love these lonely hills and meadows far more.
The natural man revels in solitude, and wants no wittier company than birds and flowers.Wordsworth made a constant companion of a pet daisy.He seldom went abroad without one or two trotting at his side, and a skylark would keep Shelley in society for a week.""But they were poets," retorted Rosalind; "you don't call poets natural.Why, they are the most unnatural of men.The natural person loves the society of his kind, whereas the poet runs away from it.""Well, of course, there are poets and poets, poets sociable and poets very unsociable.Wordsworth made the country, but Lamb made the town; and there is quite a band of poets nowadays who share his distaste for mountains, and take London for their muse.
If you'll promise not to cry again, I'll recall some lines by a friend of mine which were written for town-tastes like ours.But perhaps you know them?"It will gratify my friend to learn that Rosalind had the verses Irefer to by heart, and started off humming,--"Ah, London, London, our delight, Great flower that opens but at night, Great city of the midnight sun, Whose day begins when day is done...
