The
Water Was Dappled With Slanting Sunshine, And Dusted All Over With
A Little Mist Of Flying Insects.
There were some amorous ducks,
also, whose lovemaking reminded me of what I had seen a little
farther down.
But the road grew sad, and I grew weary; and as I
was perpetually haunted with the terror of a return of the tie that
had been playing such ruin in my head a week ago, I turned and went
back to the inn, and supper, and my bed.
The next morning, at breakfast, I communicated to the smart
waitress my intention of continuing down the coast and through
Whitehaven to Furness, and, as I might have expected, I was
instantly confronted by that last and most worrying form of
interference, that chooses to introduce tradition and authority
into the choice of a man's own pleasures. I can excuse a person
combating my religious or philosophical heresies, because them I
have deliberately accepted, and am ready to justify by present
argument. But I do not seek to justify my pleasures. If I prefer
tame scenery to grand, a little hot sunshine over lowland parks and
woodlands to the war of the elements round the summit of Mont
Blanc; or if I prefer a pipe of mild tobacco, and the company of
one or two chosen companions, to a ball where I feel myself very
hot, awkward, and weary, I merely state these preferences as facts,
and do not seek to establish them as principles.
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