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Therefore it surprised him to find himself in Paradise after a life spent perfecting trifles. Now the guide had taken him by mistake to the wrong Paradise one meant only for good, busy souls. In this Paradise, our man saunters along the road only to obstruct the rush of business. He stands aside from the path and is warned that he tramples on sown seed. Pushed, he starts up: hustled, he moves on.
Of those gleesome saunters over the hills in spring, or those sallies of the body in winter, those excursions into space when the foot strikes fire at every step, when the air tastes like a new and finer mixture, when we accumulate force and gladness as we go along, when the sight of objects by the roadside and of the fields and woods pleases more than pictures or than all the art in the world, those ten or twelve mile dashes that are but the wit and effluence of the corporeal powers, of such diversion and open road entertainment, I say, most of us know very little.
By Jove, how tempting they are in their light, thin dresses, which occasionally give one a glimpse of the delicate pink flesh beneath! "One saunters along, head up, mind alert, and eyes open. I tell you it's great! You see her in the distance, while still a block away; you already know that she is going to please you at closer quarters.
It was a charming waltz, Dithy, but charming things must end. Your lawful proprietor approaches; to your lawful proprietor I resign you." He was perfectly unflushed, perfectly unexcited. He bows, smiles, yields her to Sir Victor, and saunters away. Five seconds later he is bending over Lady Gwendoline's chair, whispering in the pink, patrician ear resting against the glistening, golden chignon.
As soon as he has lit a cigar he saunters down the street and disappears. The gentleman's face is small and round, like a girl's; he is young and promising; it is Ojen, leader and model for all youthful poets. He has been in the mountains to regain his health, and since his return he has had many glorious nights; his friends have acclaimed him without ceasing.
But certainly it is a most entertaining place to the stranger, whether he explores the crowded Jews' quarter, with its swarms of dirty people, its narrow streets, and high houses hung with clothes, as if every day were washing-day; or strolls through the equally narrow streets of rich shops; or lounges upon the bridges, and looks at the queer boats with clumsy rounded bows, great helms' painted in gay colors, with flowers in the cabin windows, boats where families live; or walks down the Plantage, with the zoological gardens on the one hand and rows of beer-gardens on the other; or round the great docks; or saunters at sunset by the banks of the Y, and looks upon flat North Holland and the Zuyder Zee.
All summer she sails, floats, glides, sits, perches, sprawls, walks, meanders, talks, climbs, rides, saunters, or dances madly as her mood or circumstances suggest. There is her life, varying a little according to clime and disposition, according to whether she is daughter of a duke or of a successful grocer.
By long years of patient industry and reading of the newspapers, for what are the libraries of science but files of newspapers? a man accumulates a myriad facts, lays them up in his memory, and then when in some spring of his life he saunters abroad into the Great Fields of thought, he, as it were, goes to grass like a horse, and leaves all his harness behind in the stable.
No sound is in the air save the echo of a footfall in some one of the dark streets behind or the yawn of a weary fruit-seller. In the little caffè under the arcades the idlers seem to have fallen into an enchanted sleep. Now and then a student saunters by, gazing dreamily up at the graceful galleries. Tired mothers hasten across the piazza, dragging their tired but happy children after them.
Such is the calm grandeur of the scene, that one could imagine some Thalia investing it with a poetic charm the gods might muse over. "It is not quite time yet," says the man, starting suddenly to his feet. He again approaches a gas-light, looks attentively at his watch, then saunters to the corner of Fourth and Thompson streets.
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