On, as the sun slopes, and his beams fall slant over solemn mounds of
cool gray hue and woody fields all pranked in gold. Look to the north,
and you see the far-away hills in their sunset livery of white and
purple and rose. On the clear summits the snow sometimes lies; and, as
the royal orb sinks, you will see the snow blush for a minute with
throbbing carnation tints that shift and faint off slowly into cold
pallid green. The heart is too full of ecstasy to allow even of thought.
You live--that is all! You may continue your wanderings among all the
mystic sounds and sights of the night, but it is better to rest long and
well when you can. Let the village innkeeper put down for you the
coarsest fare that can be conceived, and you will be content; for, as a
matter of fact, any food and drink appeal gratefully to the palate of a
man who has been inhaling the raciest air at every pore for eight or ten
hours. If the fare does not happen to be coarse--if, for example, the
landlord has a dish of trout--so much the better; you do not envy any
crowned personage in Christendom or elsewhere. And how much does your
day of Paradise cost you? At the utmost, half-a-crown. Had you been away
on the Rhine or in Switzerland or in some German home of brigands, you
would have been bleeding at the purse all day, while in our own
matchless land you have had merriment, wild nature, air that is like the
essence of life--and all for thirty pence.
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