Such A Phenomenon, Indeed, Our Reason Might Perhaps
Resolve With A Little Trouble.
We might reflect that the present
road had been developed out of a tract spontaneously followed by
generations of
Primitive wayfarers; and might see in its expression
a testimony that those generations had been affected at the same
ground, one after another, in the same manner as we are affected
to-day. Or we might carry the reflection further, and remind
ourselves that where the air is invigorating and the ground firm
under the traveller's foot, his eye is quick to take advantage of
small undulations, and he will turn carelessly aside from the
direct way wherever there is anything beautiful to examine or some
promise of a wider view; so that even a bush of wild roses may
permanently bias and deform the straight path over the meadow;
whereas, where the soil is heavy, one is preoccupied with the
labour of mere progression, and goes with a bowed head heavily and
unobservantly forward. Reason, however, will not carry us the
whole way; for the sentiment often recurs in situations where it is
very hard to imagine any possible explanation; and indeed, if we
drive briskly along a good, well-made road in an open vehicle, we
shall experience this sympathy almost at its fullest. We feel the
sharp settle of the springs at some curiously twisted corner; after
a steep ascent, the fresh air dances in our faces as we rattle
precipitately down the other side, and we find it difficult to
avoid attributing something headlong, a sort of ABANDON, to the
road itself.
The mere winding of the path is enough to enliven a long day's walk
in even a commonplace or dreary country-side. Something that we
have seen from miles back, upon an eminence, is so long hid from
us, as we wander through folded valleys or among woods, that our
expectation of seeing it again is sharpened into a violent
appetite, and as we draw nearer we impatiently quicken our steps
and turn every corner with a beating heart. It is through these
prolongations of expectancy, this succession of one hope to
another, that we live out long seasons of pleasure in a few hours'
walk. It is in following these capricious sinuosities that we
learn, only bit by bit and through one coquettish reticence after
another, much as we learn the heart of a friend, the whole
loveliness of the country. This disposition always preserves
something new to be seen, and takes us, like a careful cicerone, to
many different points of distant view before it allows us finally
to approach the hoped-for destination.
In its connection with the traffic, and whole friendly intercourse
with the country, there is something very pleasant in that
succession of saunterers and brisk and business-like passers-by,
that peoples our ways and helps to build up what Walt Whitman calls
'the cheerful voice of the public road, the gay, fresh sentiment of
the road.' But out of the great network of ways that binds all
life together from the hill-farm to the city, there is something
individual to most, and, on the whole, nearly as much choice on the
score of company as on the score of beauty or easy travel.
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