a name; it is famous; if I were the young
painter I would leave it alone in its glory.

VII

These are the words of an old stager; and though time is a good
conservative in forest places, much may be untrue to-day. Many of us
have passed Arcadian days there and moved on, but yet left a portion of
our souls behind us buried in the woods. I would not dig for these
reliquiae; they are incommunicable treasures that will not enrich the
finder; and yet there may lie, interred below great oaks or scattered
along forest paths, stores of youth's dynamite and dear remembrances.
And as one generation passes on and renovates the field of tillage for
the next, I entertain a fancy that when the young men of to-day go forth
into the forest they shall find the air still vitalised by the spirits
of their predecessors, and, like those "unheard melodies" that are the
sweetest of all, the memory of our laughter shall still haunt the field
of trees. Those merry voices that in woods call the wanderer farther,
those thrilling silences and whispers of the groves, surely in
Fontainebleau they must be vocal of me and my companions? We are not
content to pass away entirely from the scenes of our delight; we would
leave, if but in gratitude, a pillar and a legend.

One generation after another fall like honey-bees upon this memorable
forest, rifle its sweets, pack themselves with vital memories, and when
the theft is consummated depart again into life richer, but poorer also.
The forest, indeed, they have possessed, from that day forward it is
theirs indissolubly, and they will return to walk in it at night in the
fondest of their dreams, and use it for ever in their books and
pictures. Yet when they made their packets, and put up their notes and
sketches, something, it should seem, had been forgotten. A projection of
themselves shall appear to haunt unfriended these scenes of happiness, a
natural child of fancy, begotten and forgotten unawares. Over the whole
field of our wanderings such fetches are still travelling like
indefatigable bagmen; but the imps of Fontainebleau, as of all beloved
spots, are very long of life, and memory is piously unwilling to forget
their orphanage. If anywhere about that wood you meet my airy bantling,
greet him with tenderness. He was a pleasant lad, though now abandoned.
And when it comes to your own turn to quit the forest, may you leave
behind you such another; no Antony or Werther, let us hope, no tearful