I am contented as
though I had been born and brought up here, and were now
returning from a Greenland or whaling voyage. Even the dust of
my Fatherland, which is often whirled about the wagon, and which
for so long a time I had not seen, is greeted. The
clock-and-bell jingling of the crickets is altogether lovely,
penetrating, and agreeable. It sounds bravely when roguish boys
whistle in emulation of a field of such songstresses. One
fancies that they really enhance one another. Also the evening
is perfectly mild as the day."
"If one who dwelt in the south, and came hither from the south,
should hear of my rapture hereupon, he would deem me very
childish. Alas! what I here express I have long known while I
suffered under an unpropitious heaven, and now may I joyful feel
this joy as an exception, which we should enjoy everforth as an
eternal necessity of our nature."
Thus we "sayled by thought and pleasaunce," as Chaucer says, and
all things seemed with us to flow; the shore itself, and the
distant cliffs, were dissolved by the undiluted air.
Pages:
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492
493
494
495
496
497
498
499