CHAPTER V. THE WEISSEN ROSS'L.



The moth will singe her wings, and singed return,
Her love of light quenching her fear of pain.

There are quite a number of people who get through life without
realizing their own insignificance. Ninety-nine out of a hundred
persons signify nothing, and the hundredth is usually so absorbed in
the message which he has been sent into the world to deliver that he
loses sight of the messenger altogether.

By a merciful dispensation of Providence we are permitted to bustle
about in our immediate little circle like the ant, running hither
and thither with all the sublime conceit of that insect. We pick
up, as he does, a burden which on close inspection will be found to
be absolutely valueless, something that somebody else has thrown
away. We hoist it over obstructions while there is usually a short
way round; we fret and sweat and fume. Then we drop the burden and
rush off at a tangent to pick up another. We write letters to our
friends explaining to them what we are about. We even indite
diaries to be read by goodness knows whom, explaining to ourselves
what we have been doing. Sometimes we find something that really
looks valuable, and rush to our particular ant-heap with it while
our neighbours pause and watch us. But they really do not care; and
if the rumour of our discovery reach so far as the next ant-heap,