They pushed each other
into ditches, they tripped up a friend who passed on a bicycle, and
all roared in concert at the rueful way in which he surveyed a
muddy coat and torn trousers. There seemed to be not the slightest
idea among them of contributing to each other's pleasure. The point
was to be amused at the expense of another, and to be securely
obstreperous.
But among these there were lovers walking, faint and pale with
mutual admiration; a young couple led along a hideous over-dressed
child, and had no eyes for anything except its clumsy movements and
fatuous questions. Or an elderly couple strolled along, pleased and
contented, with a married son and daughter. The cure of the vile
mirth of youth seemed after all to be love and the anxious care of
other lives.
And thus indeed a gentle optimism did emerge, after all, from the
tangle. I felt that it was strange that there should be so much to
breed dissatisfaction. I struck out of the town, and soon was
passing a mill in broad water-meadows, overhung by great elms; the
grass was golden with buttercups, the foliage was rich upon the
trees.
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