an and footman, and grooms to lead back the horses,
all kicking their heels at the bridge of the Anio: worthy persons, no
doubt, and conscientiously subserving our higher existence; but the
bare fact of whom, their well-appointed silhouettes, seem somehow
incongruous as we get further and more solitary among the pale grass
billows, deeper into that immense space, that unlimited horizon of ages.

These are some of the prestigious merits of the bicycle, though many
more might be added. This grotesque iron courser, not without some of
the grasshopper's absurd weirdness, is a creature of infinite capacities
for the best kind of romance--the romance of the fancy. It may turn out
to be (I always suspect it) the very mysterious steed which carried
adventurous knights and damsels through forests of delightful
enchantments, sprouting wings, proving a hippogriff and flying up,
whenever fairies were lacking or whenever envious wizards were fussing
about. And, as reward--or perhaps crown--for its many good services,
reposed occasionally by Britomart's or Amadis' side, far from the
world's din, even as my bicycle rested on the pale wintry grass
hillocks, under the rolling cloud bales and the song of invisible larks,
of the Campagna.

PUZZLES OF THE PAST

I am full of curiosity about the Past. This does not mean that I read
the memoirs of Napoleon's marshals, or that I write queries to
antiquarian papers, or that I enjoy being taken to see invisible Pictish
barrows and Roman encampments; in fact, nothing could be further from my
character and habits. But the Past puzzles me; and I like being puzzled
by the Past.

Not in its details, but in all manner of general questions, and such,
moreover, as very rarely admit of an answer. What are the relations of
the Past and Present? Where does the Past begin? And, to go further
still, what _is_ the Past?

All this sounds abstract, and even metaphysical; but it is really quite
the reverse. These speculations are always connected with some concrete
place or person, and they arise in my mind (and in the mind of the
twenty thousand persons whom I don't know, but whom I resemble),
together with some perspective of street or outline of face, and always
with a faint puff of emotion. I will give you a typical instance of one
of these puzzles. It formulated itself in my mind a few weeks ago at
Verona, while going to see a certain little church on the slopes above
the Adige. You go through