n blend of envy--of their good luck--and pity--for their inability
to make use of it. Indeed, it was one of the most hopeless features in
their character (when we troubled ourselves to waste a thought on them:
which wasn't often) that, having absolute licence to indulge in the
pleasures of life, they could get no good of it. They might dabble
in the pond all day, hunt the chickens, climb trees in the most
uncompromising Sunday clothes; they were free to issue forth and buy
gunpowder in the full eye of the sun--free to fire cannons and explode
mines on the lawn: yet they never did any one of these things. No
irresistible Energy haled them to church o' Sundays; yet they went there
regularly of their own accord, though they betrayed no greater delight
in the experience than ourselves.

On the whole, the existence of these Olympians seemed to be entirely
void of interests, even as their movements were confined and slow, and
their habits stereotyped and senseless. To anything but appearances
they were blind. For them the orchard (a place elf-haunted, wonderful!)
simply produced so many apples and cherries: or it didn't, when the
failures of Nature were not infrequently ascribed to us. They never
set foot within fir-wood or hazel-copse, nor dreamt of the marvels hid
therein. The mysterious sources--sources as of old Nile--that fed the
duck-pond had no magic for them. They were unaware of Indians, nor
recked they anything of bisons or of pirates (with pistols!), though the
whole place swarmed with such portents. They cared not about exploring
for robbers' caves, nor digging for hidden treasure. Perhaps, indeed,
it was one of their best qualities that they spent the greater part of
their time stuffily indoors.

To be sure, there was an exception in the curate, who would receive
unblenching the information that the meadow beyond the orchard was
a prairie studded with herds of buffalo, which it was our delight,
moccasined and tomahawked, to ride down with those whoops that announce
the scenting of blood. He neither laughed nor sneered, as the Olympians
would have done; but possessed of a serious idiosyncrasy, he would
contribute such lots of valuable suggestion as to the pursuit of this
particular sort of big game that, as it seemed to us, his mature age
and eminent position could scarce have been attained without a practical
knowledge of the creature in its native lair. Then, too, he was always
ready to constitute himself a hos