Then when rainy days came we crouched together in the cave like
night-birds sheltered from the day, and we whispered and recounted
and planned. I scribbled in my diary in pencil, and he re-wrote my
scribbling in bright-coloured chalks, and drew side pictures and wrote
poems. Many are the pages we thus wrote together; some he wrote, some
I wrote, and there are many from both of us in this volume. When
I thought to make a book he laughed and said, "You are making to
yourself a graven image." He held it idolatry to imagine that
beautiful visions could be represented in words.
"I shall not worship the book," I urged.
"Other people may, or they may revile it," he answered, laughing.
"It's the same sin."
"Lest they worship or revile idolatrously, I shall write a notice,"
said I. "For though I praise Nature ill, and express her ill, she, the
wonderful spirit, is beyond all praise or blame." And I wrote these
words: "_Lest any one should think that in these pages life itself is
accounted for, any beauty set down in words, any yearning defined, or
sadness utterly plumbed, it is hereby notified that such appreciation
is false--that in these pages lies only the symbol of life, the
guide-post to the hearts of those who wrote the words. Follow, gentle
reader, the directions we have given; tread the roads that we have
trod, and see again what we have seen.
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