ENFANTILLAGE
April 23
Have you never longed to wander there, in that wonderful cloudland beyond the sea, where, like droves of monstrous cattle, close-huddled and drowsy, they lie the day through—the comely, milk-white summer clouds, slow and sleek and swelling; the quick-scudding darkling clouds, tattered with travelling across the sky; the mighty thunder-clouds, violet and lowering; the flocks of fluffy-white baby clouds; and all the sun’s great gaudy guard, from the daintily gilded sunset spars to the blood-red bands that frequent the South?
Sometimes, at even-fall, when the sea lies calm in her opal tints, you may discern the distant lines of their strange, fantastic home, vague, phantasmagoric, like a mirage beyond the horizon.
Perhaps, after death, we may linger there, and watch them silently sail away towards the lands we have loved long ago!...