And so in my trouble, as I walked up and down the oak-panelled
vestibule of my house there in Yorkshire, I longed once more
to throw myself into the arms of Nature. Not the Nature which
you know, the Nature that waves in well-kept woods and smiles
out in corn-fields, but Nature as she was in the age when creation
was complete, undefiled as yet by any human sinks of sweltering
humanity. I would go again where the wild game was, back to
the land whereof none know the history, back to the savages,
whom I love, although some of them are almost as merciless as
Political Economy. There, perhaps, I should be able to learn
to think of poor Harry lying in the churchyard, without feeling
as though my heart would break in two.
And now there is an end of this egotistical talk, and there shall
be no more of it. But if you whose eyes may perchance one day
fall upon my written thoughts have got so far as this, I ask
you to persevere, since what I have to tell you is not without
its interest, and it has never been told before, nor will again.
CHAPTER I
THE CONSUL'S YARN
A week had passed since the funeral of my poor boy Harry, and
one evening I was in my room walking up and down and thinking,
when there was a ring at the outer door.
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