he was carried away by his subject into an
indiscriminate optimism, for he turned upon it sadly and with equal
firmness in later life. But the writing is beyond that of the
letters to the _Times_, and in the sentences--

'The plough is drawn by dull, patient oxen, plodding onwards now
just as they were depicted upon the tombs and temples, the
graves and worshipping-places, of races who had their being
three thousand years ago. Think of the suns that have shone
since then; of the summers and the bronzed grain waving in the
wind; of the human teeth that have ground that grain, and are
now hidden in the abyss of earth; yet still the oxen plod on,
like slow Time itself, here this day in our land of steam and
telegraph'

--in these sentences, though they are commonplace enough, there is
proof that the writer already had that curious consciousness of the
past which was to give so deep a tone to many of his pages later on.
But in these papers, again, what is most noticeable is the practical
knowledge and the power of handling practical things. Though he
himself, brought up on his father's farm, had no taste for farming,
and seldom did any practical work except splitting timber, he yet
confines himself severely to things as they are, or as they may
quickly be made to become by a patching-up. These are 'practical
politics for practical men.' Consequently the clear and forcible
writing is only better in degree than other writing of the moment
with an element of controversy, and represents not the whole truth,
but an aspect of selected portions of the truth. When it is turned
to other purposes it shows a poor grace, as in 'a widespread ocean
of wheat, an English gold-field, a veritable Yellow Sea, bowing in
waves before the southern breeze--a sight full of peaceful poetry;'
and the sluggish, customary euphemism of phrases like 'a few calves
find their way to the butcher' is tedious enough.

'The Idle Earth' (_Longman's_, December, 1894), 'After the County
Franchise' (_Longman's_, February, 1884), and 'The Wiltshire
Labourer' (_Longman's_, 1887), belong to Jefferies' later years.
'The Idle Earth' was published only after his death, but, like the
other two, was written, probably, between 1884 and 1887. He was no
longer writing as a practical man, but as a critical outsider with
an inside knowledge. 'The Idle Earth' is an astonishing
curiosity--an extreme example of Jefferies' discontent with things
as they ar