| I. | THE SCENE |
| II. | CONTENTMENT |
| III. | FRIENDSHIP |
| IV. | HUMOUR |
| V. | TRAVEL |
| VI. | SPECIALISM |
| VII. | OUR LACK OF GREAT MEN |
| VIII. | SHYNESS |
| IX. | EQUALITY |
| X. | THE DRAMATIC SENSE |
| XI. | KELMSCOTT AND WILLIAM MORRIS |
| XII. | A SPEECH-DAY |
| XIII. | LITERARY FINISH |
| XIV. | A MIDSUMMER DAY'S DREAM |
| XV. | SYMBOLS |
| XVI. | OPTIMISM |
| XVII. | JOY |
| XVIII. | THE LOVE OF GOD |
Yes, of course it is an experiment! But it is made in corpore vili.It is not irreparable, and there is no reason, more's the pity, why Ishould not please myself. I will ask—it is a rhetorical question whichneeds no answer—what is a hapless bachelor to do, who is professionallyoccupied and tied down in a certain place for just half the year? Whatis he to do with the other half? I cannot live on in my college rooms,and I am not compelled to do so for economy. I have near relations andmany friends, at whose houses I should be made welcome. But I cannot belike the wandering dove, who found no repose. I have a great love of myindependence and my liberty. I love my own fireside, my own chair, myown books, my own way. It is little short of torture to have to conformto the rules of other households, to fall in with other people'sarrangements, to throw my pen down when the gong sounds, to make myselfagreeable to fortuitous visitors, to be led whither I would not. I dothis, a very little, because I do not desire to lose touch with my kind;but then my work is of a sort which brings me into close touch day afterday with all sorts of people, till I crave for recollection and repose;the prospect of a round of visits is one that fairly unmans me. No doubtit implies a certain want of vitality, but one does not increase one'svitality by making overdrafts upon it; and then too I am a slave to mypen, and the practice of authorship is inconsistent with paying visits.Of course the obvious remedy is marriage; but one cannot