It is easy for the sentimentalist to say, "But if the object is, after all, the enjoyment of Nature, why not go and enjoy her, without any collateral aim?" Because it is the universal experience of man, that, if we have a collateral aim, we enjoy her far more. He knows not the beauty of the universe, who has not learned the subtile mystery, that Nature loves to work on us by _indirections_. Astronomers say, that, when observing with the naked eye, you see a star less clearly by looking at it, than by looking at the next one. Margaret Fuller's fine saying touches the same point,--"Nature will not be stared at." Go out merely to enjoy her, and it seems a little tame, and you begin to suspect yourself of affectation. We know persons who, after years of abstinence from athletic sports or the pursuits of the naturalist or artist, have resumed them, simply in order to restore to the woods and the sunsets the zest of the old fascination. Go out under pretence of shooting on the marshes or botanizing in the forests; study entomology, that most fascinating, most neglected of all the branches of natural history; go to paint a red maple-leaf in autumn, or watch a pickerel-line in winter; meet Nature on the cricket ground or at the regatta; swim with her, ride with her, run with her, and she gladly takes you back once more within the horizon of her magic, and your heart of manhood is born again into more than the fresh happiness of the boy. * * * * * BY THE DEAD. Pride that sat on the beautiful brow, Scorn that lay in the arching lips, Will of the oak-grain, where are ye now? I may dare to touch her finger-tips! Deep, flaming eyes, ye are shallow enough; The steadiest fire burns out at last. Throw back the shutters,--the sky is rough, And the winds are high,--but the night is past. Mother, I speak with the voice of a man; Death is between us,--I stoop no more; And yet so dim is each new-born plan, I am feebler than ever I was before,-- Feebler than when the western hill Faded away with its sunset gold. Mother, your voice seemed dark and chill, And your words made my young heart very cold. You talked of fame,--but my thoughts would stray To the brook that laughed across the lane; And of hopes for me,--but your hand's light play On my brow was ice to my shrinking brain; And you called me your son, your only son,-- But I felt your eye on my tortured heart To and fro, like a spider, run, On a quivering web;--'twas a cruel art! But crueller, crueller far, the art Of the low, quick laugh that Memory hears! Mother, I lay my head on your heart; Has it throbbed even once these fifty years? Throbbed even once, by some strange heat thawed? It would then have warmed to her, poor thing, Who echoed your laugh with a cry!--O God, When in my soul will it cease to ring?