for potatoes, and
probably won't get any, though the earth doubtless is still abundant, if
we had but the sense and opportunity to try it, I cannot help wondering
whether it would not have been better for us to have refused the gift of
reason from which could be devised the edifying wonders of civilization,
and have remained in the treetops instead, so ignorant that we were
unaware we were lucky.

Another grave statement by a great statesman, and, when we are fortunate,
a field postcard, are to-day our full literary deserts. Is it surprising
that catalogues of old books do not come our way? We do not deserve them.
Hope faintly revives, when the postman cheers us with an overdue field
postcard, of a morning to dawn when the abstraction we name the "average
intelligence" and the "great heart of the public" and the "herd mind,"
will not only regret that it made a ruinous fool of itself the night
before, but solemnly resolve to end all disruptive and dirty habits. This
wild hope was born in me of such a postcard (all right so far!)
coinciding with the arrival of the list of old books. It seemed at that
moment that things could be different and better. Then, when closing the
front door that morning--very gently--not slamming it on the run--I saw
something else. The door noiselessly closed, an easy launch into a
tranquil day, as though I had come down through the night with the
natural process of the hours, and so had commenced the day at the right
moment, I noticed the twig of a lilac bush had intruded into the porch.
It directly indicated me with a black finger. What did it want? I looked
intently, sure that an omen was here. Aha! So that was it! The twig was
showing me that it had a green nail.

Four young officers of the Flying Corps passed me, going ahead briskly,
and I thought that an elm under which they walked had kindling in it a
suggestion of coloured light. But it was too delicate to be more than a
hope. It must be confessed that the men who fight in the air were more
distinct than that light. Then the four officers parted, two to either
side, when marching past another figure. They went beyond it swiftly,
taking no notice of it, turned into the future, and vanished. I drew near
the bowed and leisurely being, which had a spade over its shoulder.

It stopped to light a pipe, and I caught up to it. The edge of the spade
was like silver with use, and the big hand which grasped it was brown
with dry earth. The lean n