life. It must, moreover, detract somewhat from the sensitiveness of taste
and of smell.

Those who live in cities may almost lay it down as a rule that no time
spent out of doors is ever wasted. Fresh air is a cordial of incredible
virtue; old families are in all senses county families, not town families;
and those who prefer Homer and Plato and Shakespeare to hares and
partridges and foxes must beware that they are not tempted to neglect this
great requisite of our nature.

Most Englishmen, however, love open air, and it is probably true that most
of us enjoy a game at cricket or golf more than looking at any of the old
masters. The love of sport is engraven in the English character. As was
said of William Rufus, "he loves the tall deer as he had been their
father."

An Oriental traveler is said to have watched a game of cricket and been
much astonished at hearing that many of those playing were rich men. He
asked why they did not pay some poor people to do it for them.

Wordsworth made it a rule to go out every day, and he used to say that as
he never consulted the weather, he never had to consult the physicians.

It always seems to be raining harder than it really is when you look at
the weather through the window. Even in winter, though the landscape often
seems cheerless and bare enough when you look at it from the fireside,
still it is far better to go out, even if you have to brave the storm:
when you are once out of doors the touch of earth and the breath of the
fresh air gives you fresh life and energy. Men, like trees, live in great
part on air.