It is beautiful when it rains far away in the distance, the bright sun shining on the mound on which you stand, and only a few guerilla drops heralding the approach of the shower towards you. It is beautiful among leafless trees, in early Spring or late Autumn, under an avenue, or in a copse, when every long bough and black branch is glittering, strung with trembling diamonds; when, the force of the wind and rain being kept from you by the trees and underwood, the gentle sadness and quiet melancholy of the scene can be gathered into your heart. It is beautiful in a town, when you stand at the window, and watch the emptying streets; the gutters pour by in a yellow, twisted flood; the street becomes a river, and, as the sudden gust drives them before it, “Skirmishing drops Rush with bright bayonets across the road.” The window is lined with rows of brilliants, that gradually grow bigger and bigger, and waver and fall, ever supplied by a constant succession of new comers, like the Scotch at Flodden, “Each stepping where his comrade stood The instant that he fell.” And, since I have mostly spoken of the beauty of rain in the country, I will quote a description of its beauty in London:-- “A slight, quick, fervid shower--tears more of happiness brimming over than anger breaking its bounds--had just fallen, and pricked the dry grey pavement into a dark lace pattern of spots, out of which you could select the newest by their being sharper in outline and darker than the rest. The aristocracy of five minutes ago, and the parvenues of the last moment, alike, as the soft warm rain fell now quicker and more petulantly passionate, melting one into the other, losing shape, place, and purpose, as the stone washed luminous brown, and transparent as slabs of Cairngorm agate.” Londoners caught in a shower will surely thank me for this extract, and recall the description while they admire the process. * * * * * But if some people, notwithstanding my special pleading, still agree with Coleridge’s address to the rain,-- “Oh, rain, that I lie listening to You’re but a doleful sound at best,” and echo his decision,-- “And, by the by, ’tis understood, You’re not so pleasant as you’re good” for these I have yet a word. If we cannot _enjoy_, let us _accept_ rain at any rate without grumbling; ay, even though it last day after day; ay, though it spoil our pleasure-plans, or our crops--remembering at Whose ordering it comes. People who grumble at the weather always remind me of the Israelites grumbling at Moses and Aaron, the mere instruments used by the Supreme. “_What are we? Your murmurings are not against us, but against the Lord._”