Up, to save yonder sluice; that will save yonder lode; that again yonder farm; that again some other lode, some other farm, far back inland, but guessed at instantly by men who have studied from their youth, as the necessity of their existence, the labyrinthine drainage of lands which are all below the water level, and where the inner lands, in many cases, are lower still than those outside. So they hurry away to the nearest farms; the teams are harnessed, the waggons filled, and drawn down and emptied; the beer-cans go round cheerily, and the men work with a sort of savage joy at being able to do something, if not all, and stop the sluice on which so much depends. As for the outer land, it is gone past hope; through the breach pours a roaring salt cataract, digging out a hole on the inside of the bank, which remains as a deep sullen pond for years to come. Hundreds, thousands of pounds are lost already, past all hope. Be it so, then. At the next neap, perhaps, they will be able to mend the dyke, and pump the water out; and begin again, beaten but not conquered, the same everlasting fight with wind and wave which their forefathers have waged for now 800 years. He who sees—as I have seen—a sight like that, will repine no more that the primæval forest is cut down, the fair mere drained. For instead of mammoth and urus, stag and goat, that fen feeds cattle many times more numerous than all the wild venison of the primæval jungle; and produces crops capable of nourishing a hundred times as many human beings; and more—it produces men a hundred times as numerous as ever it produced before; more healthy and long-lived—and if they will, more virtuous and more happy—than ever was Girvian in his log-canoe, or holy hermit in his cell. So we, who knew the deep fen, will breathe one sigh over the last scrap of wilderness, and say no more; content to know that— ‘The old order changeth, yielding place to new, And God fulfils himself in many ways, Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.’ IV. MY WINTER GARDEN. {135} SO, my friend: you ask me to tell you how I contrive to support this monotonous country life; how, fond as I am of excitement, adventure, society, scenery, art, literature, I go cheerfully through the daily routine of a commonplace country profession, never requiring a six-weeks’ holiday; not caring to see the Continent, hardly even to spend a day in London; having never yet actually got to Paris. You wonder why I do not grow dull as those round me, whose talk is of bullocks—as indeed mine is, often enough; why I am not by this time ‘all over blue mould;’ why I have not been tempted to bury myself in my study, and live a life of dreams among old books.