riverside dwelling. Every change, however small,
should be dictated by reason and not by caprice. This was the
essential difference between the stupid tenant and the wise landlord.
The tenant said, 'I will make a _fundamental_ change, and I will make
it _capriciously_--I will leave the house!' The landlord said, 'Why
not make an _incidental_ change, and make it _reasonably_? Try ducks!'
I have in my time seen great numbers of people, among all kinds and
conditions of men, throw up their riverside dwellings in high dudgeon
because their hens were drowned in the cellar. But among my saddest
letters I find some from those who tell me how they miss the swans and
the boat-house, the trout and the willows, and how sincerely they wish
now that they had tried ducks. But it is too late; the flashing stream
is the paradise of other tenants; and the children's most romantic
memory of childhood twines itself about the fun of getting the piano
and the dining-room table in and out of the different doors. We may
easily form a stupid habit of giving the landlord notice whenever the
river happens to rise; and we forget that it is from just such
movements--such goings and such stayings--that life as a whole takes
its tint and colour. Destiny is made of trifles. Our weal and our woe
are determined by comparatively insignificant issues. Somebody has
finely said that we make our decisions, and then our decisions turn
round and make us.

Now let nobody suppose that I am deprecating a change. On the
contrary, I am advocating a change. It will never do to let the fowls
drown, and to take no steps to prevent a recurrence of any such
disaster. I hold no brief for stagnation. I am merely insisting that
the change must commend itself to heart and conscience and reason. It
must be a forward move. Look at this, for example. It is from
Stanley's _Life of Arnold_: 'We are all in the midst of confusion,'
Arnold writes from Laleham, 'the books all packed and half the
furniture; and on Tuesday, if God will, we shall leave this dear place,
this nine-years' home of such exceeding happiness. But it boots not to
look backwards. Forward, forward, _forward_, should be one's motto.'
And thus Arnold moved to Rugby, and made history! There are times when
the landlord's gate is the high-road to glory.

The whole matter is capable of the widest application, and must be
scientifically treated. Man is always finding his fowls drowned in the
ce