"No," he answered kindly, "because you are not tired yet. But when you are tired, not with imaginary battlings, but with the real campaigns of life, then you will think about the dews falling softly on the hills." "Are you tired, then?" she asked. "I have been very tired," he answered simply. They walked on in silence for a few minutes, and then he added: "You wished for knowledge, and here you are surrounded by opportunities for attaining to it." "I have never found Auntie Lloyd a specially interesting subject for study," Joan said obstinately. Hieronymus smiled. "I was not thinking of Auntie Lloyd," he said. "I was thinking of all these beautiful hedges, these lanes with their countless treasures, and this stream with its bed of stones, and those hills yonder; all of them eloquent with the wonder of the earth’s history. You are literally surrounded with the means of making your minds beautiful, you country people. And why don’t you do it?" Joan listened. This was new language to her. Hieronymus continued: "The sciences are here for you. They offer themselves to you, without stint, without measure. Nature opens her book to you. Have you ever tried to read it? From the things which fret and worry our souls, from the people who worry and fret us, from ourselves who worry and fret ourselves, we can at least turn to Nature. There we find our right place, a resting place of intense repose. There we lose that troublesome part of ourselves, our own sense of importance. Then we rest, and not until then. "Why should you speak to me of rest?" the girl cried, her fund of patience and control coming suddenly to an end. "I don’t want to rest. I want to live a full, rich life, crammed with interests. I want to learn about life itself, not about things. It is so absurd to talk to me of rest. You’ve had your term of unrest--you said so. I don’t care about peace and repose! I don’t----" She left off as suddenly as she had begun, fearing to seem too ill-mannered. "Of course you don’t," he said gently, "and I’m a goose to think you should. No, you will have to go out into the world, and to learn for yourself that it is just the same there as everywhere: butter and cheese making, prize-winning and prize-losing, and very little satisfaction either over the winning or the losing; and a great many Auntie Lloyds, probably a good deal more trying than the Little Stretton Auntie Lloyd. Only, if I were you, I should not talk about it any more. I should just go. Saddle the white horse and go! Get your experiences, thick and quick. Then you will be glad to rest." "Are you making fun of me?" she asked half suspiciously, for he had previously joked about the slow pace of the white horse. "No," he answered, in his kind way; "why should I make fun of you? We cannot all be content to go on living a quiet life in a little village."