the fresh and lovely lyrics of their
matin-prime.

I turn, I confess, more eagerly to scenes like these than to scenes of
historical and political tradition, because there hangs for me a glory
about the scene of the conception and genesis of beautiful imaginative
work that is unlike any glory that the earth holds. The natural joy of
the youthful spirit receiving the impact of mighty thoughts, of poignant
impressions, has for me a liberty and a grace which no historical or
political associations could ever possess. I could not glow to see
the room in which a statesman worked out the details of a Bill for the
extension of the franchise, or a modification of the duties upon imports
and exports, though I respect the growing powers of democracy and the
extinction of privilege and monopoly; but these measures are dimmed and
tainted with intrigue and manoeuvre and statecraft. I do not deny their
importance, their worth, their nobleness. But not by committees and
legislation does humanity triumph. In the vanguard go the blessed
adventurous spirits that quicken the moral temperature, and uplift the
banner of simplicity and sincerity. The host marches heavily behind, and
the commissariat rolls grumbling in the rear of all; and though my place
may be with the work-a-day herd, I will send my fancy afar among the
leafy valleys and the far-off hills of hope.

But I would not here quarrel with the taste of any man. If a mortal
chooses to travel in search of comfortable rooms, new cookery and wines,
the livelier gossip of unknown people, in heaven's name let him do so.
If another wishes to study economic conditions, standards of life,
rates of wages, he has my gracious leave for his pilgrimage. If another
desires to amass historical and archaeological facts, measurements
of hypaethral temples, modes of burial, folk-lore, fortification,
God forbid that I should throw cold water on the quest. But the only
traveller whom I recognise as a kindred spirit is the man who goes in
search of impressions and effects, of tone and atmosphere, of rare and
curious beauty, of uplifting association. Nothing that has ever moved
the interest, or the anxiety, or the care, or the wonder, of human
beings can ever wholly lose its charm. I have felt my skin prickle and
creep at the sight of that amazing thing in the Dublin museum, a section
dug bodily out of a claypit, and showing the rough-hewn stones of a
cist, deep in the earth, the gravel over it and ar