The Oil And Wine Of Merry Meeting.

There Is Nothing In England That Exercises A More Delightful Spell Over My Imagination Than The Lingerings Of The Holiday Customs And Rural Games Of Former Times. They Recall The Pictures My Fancy Used To Draw In The May Morning Of Life, When As Yet I Only Knew The World Through Books, And Believed It To Be All That Poets Had Painted It; And They Bring With Them The Flavour Of Those Honest Days Of Yore, In Which, Perhaps With Equal Fallacy, I Am Apt To Think The World Was More Home-bred, Social, And Joyous Than At Present.

It Was, As I Have Said, A Fine Autumnal Day; The Sky Was Clear And Serene, And Nature Wore That Rich And Golden Livery Which We Always Associate With The Idea Of Abundance. The Forests Had Put On Their Sober Brown And Yellow, While Some Trees Of The Tendered Kind Had Been Nipped By The Frosts Into Brilliant Dyes Of Orange, Purple, And Scarlet.

Those Men Are Most Apt To Be Obsequious And Conciliating Abroad, Who Are Under The Discipline Of Shrews At Home.

Every Antique Farm-house And Moss-grown Cottage Is A Picture.

The Scholar Only Knows How Dear These Silent, Yet Eloquent, Companions Of Pure Thoughts And Innocent Hours Become In The Season Of Adversity. When All That Is Worldly Turns To Dross Around Us, These Only Retain Their Steady Value.