Areopagus Volume LXXXVII
Seven short lessons every someday.
Welcome one and all to the eighty seventh volume of the Areopagus — and we embark once more on a journey through time and space...
I - Classical Music
Summer Night on the River
Frederick Delius (1911)
Performed by the Hallé Orchestra
Moonlit Night on the Crimea, Gurzuf by Ivan Aivazovsky (1889)
Summer Night on the River, together with the more famous On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring, formed Frederick Delius' Two Pieces for Small Orchestra. They are both symphonic poems: one-movement compositions intended to evoke a particular place or feeling. What I love about Summer Night on the River is how it conjures an atmosphere rather different to the one usually created by summer-inspired music. This is not purely peaceful, not wholly languid or heat-dazed. There is an edge of mystery to Delius' little meditation, even a hint of darkness. Such impressions are surely the result of Delius' use of chromaticism; notice the slight strangeness here, the sporadic atonality, the sense of unresolved notes. With it he leads us along a seven minute musical journey that is elusive, almost unsettled, and gorgeously expressive — and gives us a different sort of summer.
II - Historical Figure
William Harrison
Voice of the Past
William Harrison was a priest and scholar who lived in 16th century England. To give his biography as nothing more than that sentence would not be an error, and it would not understate his role in history. No, William Harrison is not a man who will be found in lists of "the most influential people you've never heard of" or any such thing. He was, by all accounts, a relatively ordinary man of his time — and that is what makes him special.
See, in the 1560s he became involved in a fascinating project. It had started in 1548 with a printer called Reginald Wolfe, who would later become Master of the Worshipful Company of Stationers under Queen Elizabeth. He had set himself the lofty goal of creating:
a universall Cosmographie of the whole world, and therewith also certaine particular histories of every knowne nation.
Wolfe could not complete this monumental task alone, so he ended up hiring Raphael Holinshed and William Harrison, among others, to help him. When Wolfe died his fellow publishers scaled down the scope of this project to the British Isles alone — that is, rather than the whole world. By 1577 the first edition was finished: a sort of encyclopaedia both of British history and of life in modern Britain. Holinshed had taken charge of the historical part and so the work has come to be known as Holinshed's Chronicles. This was a major source for Shakespeare's history plays, and for other Elizabethan writers like Edmund Spenser and Kit Marlowe.
What about William Harrison? He was tasked with compiling the review of modern life. And yet, as he says in the preface:
I must needs confess that until now of late... I never travelled forty miles forthright and at one journey in all my life.
Despite having not much travelled Harrison was a passionate historian who collected old maps, letters, coins, and all manner of curiosities. He consulted these for much of his work, rifling through libraries and especially through the notes of an earlier Tudor historian called John Leland. And, in the end, he did travel — up and down the country, speaking to anybody who would lend him a penny's worth of thoughts. Thus Harrison created his Description of England. It is a vivid and all-encompassing portrait of the Elizabethan Era, one for which Harrison found no detail or tangent unworthy.
What can we learn from Harrison? It sounds silly, but pretty much everything. The various chapters of his Description range from the total number of parishes in England to its various species of birds and beasts, from criminal justice to local nicknames for alcohol. What time of day did people used to eat? Harrison tells us:
With us the nobility, gentry, and students do ordinarily go to dinner at eleven before noon, and to supper at five, or between five and six at afternoon. The merchants dine and sup seldom before twelve at noon, and six at night, especially in London. The husbandmen dine also at high noon as they call it, and sup at seven or eight; but out of the term in our universities the scholars dine at ten.
Much of the Description was drawn from first-hand investigation, some of it rigorous and but some of it purely anecdotal — like this excerpt from a passage where Harrison is discussing the snakes of England:
I did see an adder once myself that lay (as I thought) sleeping on a molehill, out of whose mouth came eleven young adders of twelve or thirteen inches in length apiece, which played to and fro in the grass one with another, till some of them espied me. So soon therefore as they saw my face they ran again into the mouth of their dam, whom I killed, and then found each of them shrouded in a distinct cell or pannicle in her belly, much like unto a soft white jelly, which maketh me to be of the opinion that our adder is the viper indeed.
Whereas so many books from history concern nothing but the actions of leaders and princes, and focus on the arts of war and politics and religion alone, Harrison gives us a uniquely broad portrait of the mundanities of life. As when talking of a certain type of dog:
Some men call them warners, because they are good for nothing else but to bark and give warning when anybody doth stir or lie in wait about the house in the night season.
He even describes, in scrupulous detail, the various methods of brewing beer. How does he know about this?
Since I have taken occasion to speak of brewing, I will exemplify in such a proportion as I am best skilled in, because it is the usual rate for mine own family, and once in a month practised by my wife and her maid-servants, who proceed withal after this manner, as she hath oft informed me.
His joyous prose occasionally slips into invective, as when he criticises people for having become obsessed with fashion — a startlingly familiar sentiment, no?
And as these fashions are diverse, so likewise it is a world to see the costliness and the curiosity, the excess and the vanity, the pomp and the bravery, the change and the variety, and finally the fickleness and the folly, that is in all degrees, insomuch that nothing is more constant in England than inconstancy of attire. Oh, how much cost is bestowed nowadays upon our bodies, and how little upon our souls!
And here Harrison remarks with praise on the education of English ladies:
And to say how many gentlewomen and ladies there are that besides sound knowledge of the Greek and Latin tongues are thereto no less skilful in the Spanish, Italian, and French, or in some one of them, it resteth not in me.
What makes Harrison's Description so wonderful is his manner of writing. No doubt the things he is talking about are interesting in and of themselves, but they are elevated by his incredibly colourful, often conversational style. To give but one example, in the preface to the Description Harrison refers to it as "a foul and frazzled treatise". Or take this passage:
For mine own part, good reader, let me boast a little of my garden, which is but small, and the whole area thereof little above 300 foot of ground, and yet, such hath been my good luck in purchase of the variety of simples, that, notwithstanding my small ability, there are very near three hundred of one sort and other contained therein, no one of them being common or usually to be had.
We feel we know William Harrison — he becomes a friend, guiding us through Elizabethan England and answering all our questions with patience and good humour.
He is shrewd and affable, garrulous and inquisitive, even laying out the various kinds of vagabonds at large in England. As stated, no detail was deemed either too obvious or too uninteresting, and for this we may thank him.
The several disorders and degrees amongst our idle vagabonds: 1.Rufflers. 2.Uprightmen 3. Hookers or anglers 4. Rogues 5. Wild rogues 6. Priggers or pransers 7. Palliards 8. Fraters 9. Abrams 10. Freshwater mariners or whipiacks 11. Drummerers 12. Drunken tinkers 13. Swadders or pedlers 14. Jarkeman or patricoes
William Harrison is one those people with whom we can almost talk, face to face, not as an earth-shattering titan of history but as a fellow human being, recording his observations and thoughts about the world as he knew it. And, when we do, the world he knew and lived in does not feel quite so different to ours. For there is also a heavy dose of nostalgia in Harrison's work. Though he praises much of life in modern England, he can't help but look back on the good old days as somehow better:
When our houses were built of willow, then had we oaken men; but, now that our houses are come to be made of oak, our men are... become willow.
Some things never change. How often do we hear people in 2024 wondering whether the past was a time of greater moral fibre, of hardier and more decent folk? Still, Harrison clearly loved England and was fond of claiming for it all manner of accolades, as when he said:
There is no country that may (as I take it) compare with ours in number, excellency, and diversity of dogs.
If you want to learn about the past, and what life was like, I can think of few better people to help you than William Harrison. Rarely is reading history so much fun — and so wonderfully revealing. Of course, Harrison's Description is specific to Elizabethan England, so for anybody who wants to learn about that particular age his work is a must-read. But, even if the 16th century doesn't interest you, the sheer detail and generosity of Harrison's investigations give it universal appeal.
I let William Harrison close this section out — with one of his lasting hopes for England, and a humble and rather beautiful one at that:
That everie man, in whatsoever part of the champaine soile enjoieth fortie acres of land and upwards, after that rote, either by free deed, copie hold, or fee farme, might plant one acre of wood, or sow the same with oke mast, hasell, beech and sufficient provision be made that it may be cherished and kept.
III - Painting
The Hungry Lion Throws Itself on the Antelope
Henri Rousseau (1905)
Pablo Picasso once said, and very famously, “it took me five years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child”. Whether this is a statement of genius or of hubris I am unsure. But, I think, there is something there. Everything we are — how we think about the world and about ourselves, what we do and what we say — has been shaped by an avalanche of ideas and systems created by other people. This is most obviously true of artists, who inevitably paint in the way they were taught to paint. Hence those artists (of all kinds) who have managed to break free of such influence and create something authentically theirs are the ones we praise most highly. Consider this, the first line from a review of Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, published in 1927:
A writer named Hemingway has arisen, who writes as if he had never read anybody’s writing, as if he had fashioned the art of writing himself.
This line of thinking explains, in part, the success and charm of Henri Rousseau. He was a French painter, born in 1844, who became something like a poster boy for those avant-garde artists who gathered in Paris in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Why? Because he painted like he had fashioned the art of painting himself. See, Rousseau served in the army and then worked as a tax collector; he didn't start painting properly until his forties. Thus, given his lack of formal training, Rousseau simply painted as he saw fit. The result was an almost totally novel style, thoroughly idiosyncratic and unlike either the art of the Parisian artistic establishment or even that of the Impressionist and Post-Impressionist rebels.
To me Rousseau's art seems almost like an old-fashioned animation or pop-up picture book, made up of different plates superimposed atop one another. A sense of three-dimensional depth is created by the layering of two-dimensional images.
Although Rousseau is most famous now for his jungle scenes, he painted plenty of other subjects. His cityscapes are especially delightful. They, like all Rousseau's work, have a wonderfully child-like, illustrative quality. If Rousseau's art looks original even in 2024, imagine how it must have seemed when it was first exhibited in 1886! He caused a stir because he seemed to have achieved, without really trying, what a generation of avant-garde artists could not — he reinvented painting for himself.
View of the Ile de Cité Paris / The Seine at Suresnes
We return to Picasso. So the story goes, he came across a painting of Rousseau's for sale on the street — not to purchase as art, but as a canvas to be pasted over and reused. He immediately recognised Rousseau's natural talent and made contact with him. They became friends and, in 1908, Picasso organised a dinner in Rousseau's honour at Bateau-Lavoir, his studio in Montmartre. The guest-list included, among others, Gertrude Stein, Guillaume Apollinaire, Jean Metzinger, Juan Gris, and Daniel-Henri Kahnweiler. It was a veritable who's-who of the avant-garde Parisian art scene — all to recognise the achievements of this tax-collector-turned-painter.
IV - Architecture
The National Gallery
Forgotten Failure?
Two hundred years (and a couple of months) ago, London's National Gallery was founded. Its first paintings were donated to them by a man called John Julius Angerstein, and the Gallery was actually based at his old house on Pall Mall. Soon enough, as the National Gallery's collection grew, it became clear that purpose-built and more extensive premises would be necessary. After briefly moving to an alternative and again inadequate site, a competition to design the new National Gallery building was held in 1831. The winning design was submitted by an architect called William Wilkins. The location? Trafalgar Square, at the heart of the London.
Construction began in 1832 and was finished by 1838. The intention had been to create a building which, like the Parthenon in Athens, dominated the surrounding area and served as a sort of cultural fulcrum for the city. This did not happen. The project was riddled with inconveniences, including adjacent buildings that could not be demolished and an awkward right of way. Columns were recycled from a recently demolished building called Carlton House, but these were too small and so only the bases and capitals were used. In the end, after bickering and compromise and lambasting from the press, what should have been a towering and noble edifice ended up looking rather squat and paltry. A contemporary picture (of a proposed monument) shows the problem — it fails to command the square and simply fades into the background.
Picked out for particular criticism (by the press and the public both) was its inexplicably small dome and the two equally puny turrets on either side. Compare Wilkins' original plan with what ended up being built, and you can see how far the domes and flanking porticoes were scaled back:
This may not be something that you have noticed, but compare the National Gallery to other domed neoclassical buildings and you will never be able to "unsee it", as they say. In fact, the building was nearly demolished and rebuilt in the 1860s, and a plan was even drawn up by E.M. Barry. You can see, in Barry's design, the sort of grand building that the National Gallery was always supposed to be. Would this not have been more impressive?
Alas, it was not demolished, and the real problems with the building were more or less solved. See, much of the contemporary complaining had been aimed at its strangely small and narrow interior. This was fixed over subsequent decades as the Gallery was expanded and remodelled. The landscaping of Trafalgar Square also helped; it gave the National Gallery a greater sense of height and scale.
So, William Wilkins' allegedly catastrophic façade remains. A century and a half ago it was considered a national embarrassment, but the millions of tourists who visit the National Gallery each year, or those milling in and around Trafalgar Square, will probably have no such vehement reaction. Perhaps you have been there, and found it to be a charming building — and you are well within your rights to do so! This is an interesting story, I think, because it illustrates perfectly how perceptions can change. What was once detested has become, if not quite iconic, at least inconspicuously pleasant. Shall some of those lamented works of modern architecture undergo a similar transformation? I wouldn't be surprised.
V - Rhetoric
Idiolects
Perhaps you have a friend who talks in a very specific way: there are certain words or turns of phrase they always go to, a particular cadence, a habit of constructing their sentences in an unusual order, or a proclivity for talking in idioms. None of these things alone make their speech unusual; but, taken together, they mean your friend talks in a way wholly unlike anybody else. This is called an idiolect — a dialect of one. Of course, no two people ever speak exactly the same — we all have idiosyncrasies and habits, conscious or otherwise. In this sense everybody has an idiolect, I suppose. But it is clearly the case that some people talk in a way more unusual, more striking, more individualistic, than others.
So that is the word itself: an interesting one that describes a phenomenon you have likely noticed before. It is also incredibly useful, I think. Because we can, should we so choose, cultivate an idiolect of our own. Why settle for the words and ways of speaking that have appeared in our heads, as implanted there by people we have heard or books we have read? Why not consciously choose to speak in a way that we genuinely like? It takes effort, of course, but it can be done. Some might call this artificial — the opposite is true, I daresay! To cultivate an idiolect of one's own is to find a way of talking most authentic to oneself.
And, in addition, to do so can only be a boon for our ability to communicate. Think of it: an idiolect is often what makes a fictional character memorable. Yoda is the most obvious example, but there are dozens more. Why not Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, as played by Tom Hardy? With that strange accent and penchant for gnomic statements he is as idiolectical as it gets. And what is true of fiction is also, necessarily, true of real life. A wonderful thought can be stymied by generic language; why not make our thoughts both wonderful and memorable? That is, in so many words, the effect of an idiolect.
VI - Writing
The Power of Word
Microsoft claims to have something like 95% of the world's word processing market; over one billion people use Microsoft Word. Does this matter? More than we realise. Because Word is not neutral — it is not the same as a blank sheet of paper onto which we can write whatever we want. That is how it feels, but the strange and perhaps uncomfortable truth is that Word contains an almost invisible set of guardrails that restrict and guide how we write. Our willingness to experiment, to break the rules even in the smallest ways, to write freely and individually without fear of being "correct" — all of that is naturally reeled in by a system like Microsoft Word.
There are only so many fonts and only so many templates, for example. This seems trivial, but the smallest of details really do matter — how we write is how we think, after all, and anything that informs the former necessarily influences the latter. Our individuality is surely sapped, even inhibited, by using such a carefully calibrated system where everything from margins to document size has been chosen for us. When you write by hand it is your handwriting, line spacing, letter sizing, and suchlike; when you use Word all of that has been created for you by somebody else, and when changed can only be changed according to rules set by them. All of this may be a necessary sacrifice to word processing, which has surely been a blessing for humankind, but it is a sacrifice we must be aware of.
And it goes further. Not so long ago I ran a little experiment and copied a few lines of the 16th century poet Edmund Spenser into Microsoft Word. His verse was suddenly riddled with jagged lines: errors of spelling, syntax, and punctuation. Even more surprising was that Word suggested "improvements" to Spenser's poetry and gave me several ways to make his clarity, concision, formality, and choice of vocabulary better. Ditto for Shakespeare, Milton, Ruskin, and anybody else you can think of. There is something at least bizarre, if not actually troubling, about the fact that Microsoft Word and its algorithms want to both correct and improve these writers. I do not say they are without fault, of course, but you see my point. Does Word know how to write better than William Shakespeare? Just something to think about next time you use a word processor.
VII - The Seventh Plinth
A Beautiful Game?
Last week I asked you:
Why is sport so popular?
I cannot help but include, by way of introduction, those words from a letter written by Pliny the Younger in 98 AD:
The Races were on, a type of spectacle which has never had the slightest attraction for me. I can find nothing new or different in them: once seen is enough, so it surprises me all the more that so many thousands of adult men should have such a childish passion for it.
And here are some of your answers...
Paris C
Much like art, and how it liberates us from being tied down to our earthly, monotonous ways, sport frees us from being… civil, in a sense. The physical, mental, and emotional trials and tribulations that sports of all kinds entail make us human. They bring out the worst, the best, and all the in-between that is harbored within us.
Plus, it just feels nice. It’s very cathartic to be extremely obsessed about doing one thing, and one thing only, for any given time. In sports, it’s imperative to maintain that focus.
Cindy K
We are a society in decline. Bread. And circuses. Or in this case example, circuses and bread.
Cerise
I think it’s because it’s real. We have lots of movies and TV shows and fake news all the time. But sports is real people doing things most of us can’t. And it’s happening in real time. With real people doing amazing things.
Dalton L
Sport cannot be spoiled. A classic novel can be spoiled by a friend that has read it. A brand new blockbuster movie can be spoiled by internet leaks, or other avid fans the day it releases if you have not yet had the chance to make it to the theaters. Sport is one of the only truly unscripted past times. We do not know who will win, lose, or tie. An underdog or nobody can have their bright moment and briefly become a hero. Our favorite players may become legends or failures depending on the outcome. We have no certainty in the outcome, and people will always LOVE to see that uncertain story unfold live in front of them.
Nathan B
I think there are a few reasons. First, I understand that sports (at least in ancient Athens) originated as a way to train for war. Boys would learn combat-specific skills like spear throwing, how to harness aggression, competition, and teamwork. While today’s sports programs may not be overly tied to combat training, I think many still believe sports to be a valuable training ground for life. In my Western context, aggression, competition, and individual success are highly valued.
Second, participating as a spectator taps into the primitive, ego-driven, dualistic, tribalistic mind. We love to divide everything into black and white, us and them, light and dark, good and evil. The world, of course, is much more complex, full of nuance, subtlety, shades of gray, admixtures of dark and light. But with sports, we can escape into a world in which “us” and “them” is neatly defined, action is governed by clear rules, and everything culminates in winners and losers.
Third, sports are fun! But if a culture (like the West) never mature beyond non-dualistic thinking, sports simply reinforce the way we see the world: a zero sum game, winner takes all, may the best man win, only the strong survive.
Jane L
Reading this question after a nine mile walk, all I can say is that I shall be looking forward to the answers, because, although I can understand the desire get physically active, I find it impossible to understand the pleasure from confining that activity to the degraded grass of a football pitch or hockey field. As for watching it, I am totally mystified. There are so many matters to get passionate about, but who kicks a ball through a goal more times than the others seems to me to be the epitome of boredom.
Patricia M
From an armchair athlete. In answer to your question, here are some points:
1. Everyone usually has the requisite number of arms, legs, torso, head , brain, etc. So we are equal in composition.
2. We admire people who use these properties in ways that exceed expectations: speed, accuracy, endurance and skill.
3. There’s an ancient view of perfection of the human body which is still embedded in our own culture to this day.
4. Tribes are partisan: we support people from our own background.
5. Finally, our endocrine systems probably override our reason.
VR
Once again, your question invites an entire book – complete with qualitative and quantitative studies – to be written in an attempt to answer it.
I shall instead pass on my thoughts as a huge fan of FC Bayern Munich and formula 1, as well as a casual but regular watcher of MMA, NBA, NFL and tennis, and also as a former manager at a sports media unicorn.
Firstly, sports is a powerful form of entertainment: a series that never ends. The drama surrounding sports, the relationships and interactions between athletes, managers, boards, sponsors, institutions, celebrities, media and fans – it's all incredibly multifaceted and dynamic. Add to that a complex and ever-changing context of rules, new formats, new characters, new side narratives, and you get a continuous tale that you can rely on to draw you away from the mundane life, yet is still embedded in the real world around you, providing ample conversation material across social classes and borders. The number of "legendary" heroes and "epic" battles far surpasses that of any Tolkienesque world.
Secondly, as humans, we always admire "the best", and sports supplies no shortage of that. Evolutionary biology programs us to be keenly aware of status, with physical prowess being a strong arbiter of setting it. Where before this prowess might have predominantly been displayed through fighting or hunting, we evolved countless new ways for showcasing it. Elite athletes are the epitome of that prowess: only a few out of millions ever reach that level. Sports are also more relatable to most people. Many people can play football or swim or throw some hoops. Not many people can even imagine drafting some groundbreaking scientific theory or leading a country. Therefore, the best in these activities that the masses indulge in themselves occasionally, receive more appreciation from the proletariat.
Thirdly, when you combine the entertainment value along with our natural inclination to appreciate success, commercialisation can enter the picture to amplify both aspects. There's all the broadcasting fluff, witty pundits, all the high production ads tapping directly into our emotions, all the eight-figure contracts being signed (which only raised the status of those involved). The industry built around sports is just massive. It actively keeps sports popular by pouring money into it to get more money out of it.
Lastly, as humans we're hardwired towards tribalism. Look at the Chimp Empire series on Netflix and you'll find we weren't much different for most of our time on Earth: it's us versus them. Our tribe versus theirs. Thankfully, civilization has propelled us away from having to raid the village next door to expand access to resources. Yet, even a non-enthusiast of sports, still tends to root for their nation's representative at the Olympics. The current football Euros emphasize this – absolute strangers all sing together and feel a strong sense of "us" playing against "them". It's a modern pseudo-tribalism. We've even gotten to the point where the majority of Mancherster United fans are neither from Manchester nor from the UK, so it's even exceeded the confines of Nationalism.
To conclude, sports became popular because of our innate inclinations being absorbed into modern Capitalism. I personally love sports. Yet, I feel humanity could benefit from making science, altruism and intellectual art as popular. I believe if we would shower incredible minds, as opposed to incredible bodies, with money and recognition, more of these minds would emerge to make the world a better place. Of course, entrepreneurs or stellar corporate people or incredible artists do indeed get accolades. I just feel that the days where an Einstein or Planck or Leo Tolstoy gain superstardom are diminished.
Ionna H
A beautiful and perfectly trained body, talent optimized with endless discipline and intelligence , to become the best , and to ascend to the Olymp of the unforgotten .
Isn’t it our one dream ?
Matthew L
As someone who was never really good at sport or enjoyed playing many sports as a child, yet absolutely and utterly loves supporting a football team, I think to answer this question one must ask why spectator sports specifically are so popular, and the following words by the late Sir Bobby Robson can provide the answer to that:
“What is a club in any case? Not the buildings or the directors or the people who are paid to represent it. It’s not the television contracts, get-out clauses, marketing departments or executive boxes. It’s the noise, the passion, the feeling of belonging, the pride in your city. It’s a small boy clambering up stadium steps for the very first time, gripping his father’s hand, gawping at that hallowed stretch of turf beneath him and, without being able to do a thing about it, falling in love.”
Sarah S
Sport is popular because it provides a field of play for our heroic instincts: bravery, courage, camaraderie, perseverance, daring, skill—these are all on display in a sports competition. Through sports we are given a chance to train, to fight, to band together and see a match through to the end, and then to shake hands with our opponent and get back to the perspiring perseverance in practice that makes us better, more skilled players and people, ready for the next competition.
Spectators, too, have a chance to be part of something bigger than themselves, a club exclusive to those who cheer for the same team or competitor. Spectators are given the opportunity to vicariously experience the trials and triumphs of their beloved players, weeping when they weep and rejoicing when they rejoice, and hopefully becoming more human for the experience
Rhys W
Sports are popular because they allow humans to channel their inherently idolatrous and tribal tendencies. In time past, those desires were channeled through war towards knights and generals, for example. In times new, those desires are channeled through club allegiances and sports icons. This is not altogether a bad thing, because it results in much less death.
Question of the Week
And for this week's question, inspired by William Harrison...
Tell me about an underappreciated writer — from any era or place, living or dead.
Email me your answers and I'll share them in next week's newsletter.
And that's all
The heat! The heat! Some words of Tennyson seemed to stir in my mind as I lay in the sun — I rifled through In Memoriam, Tennyson's long and gorgeously life-affirming poem written in memory of a friend who had died, and found them:
When summer’s hourly-mellowing change
May breathe with many roses sweet
Upon the thousand waves of wheat,
That ripple round the lonely grange;Come: not in watches of the night,
But where the sunbeam broodeth warm,
Come, beauteous in thine after form,
And like a finer light in light.
With these words — these thoughts in verse — I bid you farewell. Adieu!
Yours,
The Cultural Tutor