And yon twelve-winded sky,
The stuff of life to knit me
Blew hither: here am I'

George and I both know this, but why does it distress him? We
know that we come from the winds, and that we shall return to
them; that all life is perhaps a knot, a tangle, a blemish in the
eternal smoothness. But why should this make us unhappy? Let us
rather love one another, and work and rejoice. I don't believe in
this world sorrow."

Miss Honeychurch assented.

"Then make my boy think like us. Make him realize that by the
side of the everlasting Why there is a Yes--a transitory Yes if
you like, but a Yes."

Suddenly she laughed; surely one ought to laugh. A young man
melancholy because the universe wouldn't fit, because life was a
tangle or a wind, or a Yes, or something!

"I'm very sorry," she cried. "You'll think me unfeeling, but--but
--" Then she became matronly. "Oh, but your son wants employment.
Has he no particular hobby? Why, I myself have worries, but I can
generally forget them at the piano; and collecting stamps did no
end of good for my brother. Perhaps Italy bores him; you ought to
try the Alps or the Lakes."

The old man's face saddened, and he touched her gently with his
hand. This did not alarm her; she thought that her advice had