ve said, never had any wish to play with fire; but
most English children are strongly attracted, and are much less afraid
of fire than of the dark. Eternal darkness, with a biting east-wind,
were to the English fancy a far more fearful prospect than eternal
flames. The notion of these flames arose in Italy, where heat is no
luxury, and shadows are lurked in, and breezes prayed for. In England
the sun, even at its strongest, is a weak vessel. True, we grumble
whenever its radiance is a trifle less watery than usual. But that is
precisely because we are a people whose nature the sun has not
mellowed--a dour people, like all northerners, ever ready to make the
worst of things. Inwardly, we love the sun, and long for it to come
nearer to us, and to come more often. And it is partly because this
craving is unsatisfied that we cower so fondly over our open hearths.
Our fires are makeshifts for sunshine. Autumn after autumn, 'we see the
swallows gathering in the sky, and in the osier-isle we hear their
noise,' and our hearts sink. Happy, selfish little birds, gathering so
lightly to fly whither we cannot follow you, will you not, this once,
forgo the lands of your desire? 'Shall not the grief of the old time
follow?' Do winter with us, this once! We will strew all England, every
morning, with bread-crumbs for you, will you but stay and help us to
play at summer! But the delicate cruel rogues pay no heed to us,
skimming sharplier than ever in pursuit of gnats, as the hour draws
near for their long flight over gnatless seas.

Only one swallow have I ever known to relent. It had built its nest
under the eaves of a cottage that belonged to a friend of mine, a man
who loved birds. He had a power of making birds trust him. They would
come at his call, circling round him, perching on his shoulders, eating
from his hand. One of the swallows would come too, from his nest under
the eaves. As the summer wore on, he grew quite tame. And when summer
waned, and the other swallows flew away, this one lingered, day after
day, fluttering dubiously over the threshold of the cottage. Presently,
as the air grew chilly, he built a new nest for himself, under the
mantelpiece in my friend's study. And every morning, so soon as the
fire burned brightly, he would flutter down to perch on the fender and
bask in the light and warmth of the coals. But after a few weeks he
began to ail; possibly because the study was a small one, and he could
not get in i