Observe the commonplace man's attitude on a grey cheerless day, when
the sky hangs low and the rollers are leaden. "A beast of a day!" he
remarks in his elegant fashion; and he goes and grumbles in the vile
parlour of his lodging-house, where the stuffy odour of aged chairs
and the acrid smell of clumsy cookery contend for mastery. Yet outside
on the moaning levels of the dim sea there are mysterious and ghostly
sights that might move the heart of the veriest stockbroker if he
would but force his mind to consider them. Look at that dark tremulous
stream that seems to flow over the sullen sea. It is but a cat's-paw
of wind, and yet it looks like a river flowing in silence from some
fairy region. The boats start out of the haze and glide away into
dimness after having shown their phantom shadows for a few seconds;
the cry of the gull rings weirdly; the simulated agony of the staunch
bird's scream makes one somehow think of tortured souls; you think of
dim strange years, you feel the dim strange weather, you remember the
still strange land unvexed of sun or stars, "where Lancelot rides
clanking through the haze." Ah, who dares talk of a commonplace or
disagreeable sea? I used the phrase once, but I well know that the
"commonplace" day offers sights of sober grandeur to the eyes of the
wise man.
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