It is the clouds you don't dread that swamp you. Cowper knew, for he too
was an apprehensive mortal, and it is only the apprehensive mortal who
really knows the full folly of his apprehensiveness.

Now, save once, I have never lost a train in my life. The exception was at
Calais when the Brussels express did, in defiance of the time-table, really
give me and others the slip, carrying with it my bag containing my clothes
and the notes of a most illuminating lecture. I chased that bag all through
Northern France and Belgium, inquiring at wayside stations, wiring to
junctions, hunting among the mountains of luggage at Lille.

It was at Lille that---But the train is slowing down. There is the slope of
the hillside, black against the night sky, and among the trees I see the
glimmer of a light beckoning me as the lonely lamp in Greenhead Ghyll used
to beckon Wordsworth's Michael. The night is full of stars, the landscape
glistens with a late frost: it will be a jolly two miles' tramp to that
beacon on the hill.




IN PRAISE OF CHESS


I sometimes think that growing old must be like the end of a tiring day.
You have worked hard, or played hard, toiled over the mountain under the
burning sun, and now the evening has come and you sit at ease at the inn
and ask for nothing but a pipe, a quiet talk, and so to bed. "And the
morrow's uprising to deeds shall be sweet." You have had your fill of