some turning of the way the mystical Golden Girl,—without, in short, finding a wife? 

 "Then," suggested the idea, with a blush for its own absurdity, "why not go on pilgrimage and seek her? I don't believe you'll find her. She isn't usually found after thirty. But you'll no doubt have good fun by the way, and fall in with many pleasant adventures." 

 "A brave idea, indeed!" I cried.  "By Heaven, I will take stick and knapsack and walk right away from my own front door, right away where the road leads, and see what happens."  And now, if the reader please, we will make a start. 

 

 

 CHAPTER III 

 AN INDICTMENT OF SPRING 

 "Marry! an odd adventure!" I said to myself, as I stepped along in the spring morning air; for, being a pilgrim, I was involuntarily in a mediaeval frame of mind, and "Marry! an odd adventure!" came to my lips as though I had been one of that famous company that once started from the Tabard on a day in spring. 

 It had been the spring, it will be remembered, that had prompted them to go on pilgrimage; and me, too, the spring was filling with strange, undefinable longings, and though I flattered myself that I had set out in pursuance of a definitely taken resolve, I had really no more freedom in the matter than the children who followed at the heels of the mad piper. 

 A mad piper, indeed, this spring, with his wonderful lying music,—ever lying, yet ever convincing, for when was Spring known to keep his word? Yet year after year we give eager belief to his promises. He may have consistently broken them for fifty years, yet this year he will keep them.  This year the dream will come true, the ship come home. This year the very dead we have loved shall come back to us again: for Spring can even lie like that. There is nothing he will not promise the poor hungry human heart, with his innocent-looking daisies and those practised liars the birds. Why, one branch of hawthorn against the sky promises more than all the summers of time can pay, and a pond ablaze with yellow lilies awakens such answering splendours and enchantments in mortal bosoms,—blazons, it would seem, so august a message from the hidden heart of the world,—that ever afterwards, for one who has looked upon it, the most fortunate human existence must seem a disappointment. 

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