The Aristocrats by Gertrude Atherton — Read

_Boulder Lake_, July 10th

Do not imagine, Polly, that I have given up my solitary ramblings in the forest. I enjoy them more than ever; and their _soundlessness_ after the eternal babble which pervades the lake -- I am afraid I am not grateful for all the kind attentions I receive -- is simply delicious. Leaves, green leaves everywhere, rioting to my knees and hanging in the air. You never notice the slender branches, only the delicate fairy curtain they hang between the dark stems of the trees. And the ferns, and the ground pine, and the green stars of that moss that covers ground and rock, and the rich velvet moss, shading from a dark green to one that is almost white, that covers the fallen trees, and the incomparable solitude. Best of all I have discovered a gorge, sloping gently on one side, the other a huge boulder covered with moss; in the bottom of the gorge a brook pushing its tortuous way over rocks; and alders and ferns close to the banks. Overhead there is a rift of sky, and the sunlight flickers about generously, and the woods I have come through look so dark and impenetrable. There is a fine dry rock with the alders meeting like an arbour above it, and I sit there by the hour and wonder why the forest ever made me feel over-civilised. Beside these people I feel a pure child of Nature. They have reached a pitch of correctness I never can hope to attain. They never use slang, they punctuate their sentences so beautifully, they would not drop a final g in our careless fashion for worlds; they pronounce all their syllables so distinctly! Oh, this is "culture," Polly mine. If poor dear Matthew Arnold could only come back and live among them! Perhaps he does in spirit and that is his idea of Heaven. (It would be mine of Hell).