“I know you do,” said Miss Ross, and her face was lovely when she smiled. “I know exactly what you feel like. When you get up in the morning you feel the whole day is not long enough for all you mean to do in it, the whole world is your playground. And when you glow after the cold bath there is nothing you don’t feel ready for, from wittling a stick, to building an empire. And you’re downstairs and out early, and ‘away to the meadows, the meadows again,’ with your rod and your line, and your bait at your belt, and your family see no more of you till dinner-time.” The children gave a deep breath, for this made them think of water-meadows and minnow-fishing, marsh-marigolds in golden clumps, and deep, clear runlets. “This is the fun of being young,” said Miss Ross, “prize it.” “And what is the fun of being old?” asked Bimbo. “Many people have asked that before you, but all those who see the right aspects of youth may be trusted, I think, to grow old properly. Good taste is the highest degree of sensibility. And nowhere so clearly as in growing old, is good taste more subtly evidenced. “The great thing is to feel. Let every bit of you be alive, even though you may suffer. The only sin is indifference.” “Is it people’s fault when they are indifferent, or can’t they help it?” asked Clare. “Oh, there are folk who will close their eyes and sit in the very market-place of the universe, with their fingers in their ears.” “Then a bullock runs into them, I suppose,” said Bim; “and they pick themselves up from the dust, saying, ‘What have I done to deserve it?’” “Yes,” added Clare, “or they will say, ‘See, we were promised music to dance to, and where are the sweet strains?’” All the older children would have shrunk from an allusion to the great grief of which the beautiful face before them bore so deep an impress, but one of the younger ones said: “I’m so surprised that you, who are so sad to look at, should have such nice laughing eyes all the same when you speak, and seem so ready to be amused.” Miss Ross did not answer immediately, her lips framed some words. Only Clare who was nearest to her heard them, for she was speaking to herself: “And even yet I dare not let it languish, Dare not indulge in memory’s rapturous pain, Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish, How could I seek the empty world again?” But aloud, she said to the little child who had spoken: “Sorrow and gladness are close together, the more you have it in your nature to suffer, the more thoroughly you can enjoy. And these two things, suffering and gladness, mean a full comprehension of life. The psalmist says, ‘_Grant me understanding, and I shall live_’ and understanding means the spirit that makes us accept our joys, our duties, and our sorrows; deliberately adjusting ourselves to them, giving them their place.