But in such a life as I now lived, it was not a finger-tip that worked but the whole man.  The cabbage I cut for dinner was fashioned from my own substance, for my sweat had nourished it.  The butter I ate was part of my own energy, spent over the churn, come back to me in the freshness and firmness of edible gold.  My bread was baked in a flame kindled at my own heart [Transcriber’s note:  hearth?], and it was the sweeter for it.  When I lay down at night I was quits with Nature.  I had paid so much energy into her bank, and had a right to the dividend of rest she gave me.

Apart from all other things, the economy of this mode of life will be at once perceived.  My expenses sank steadily month by month.  I made a good many mistakes, of course, for there is more than meets the eye in remunerative gardening, chicken farming, and bee-keeping, as there is in most human occupations which appear delusively simple.  It took me some time to rectify these mistakes, but before a year had passed I found myself raising all my own garden produce, well supplied with eggs and poultry for my own table, and able to earn a little by the sale of my superfluous stock.  Some articles, such as coal, were excessively dear; but then, as a set-off, I could have all the wood I required for next to nothing, and we burned more wood than coal.  Groceries I purchased in wholesale quantities from a Manchester store, so that in spite of carriage I paid less for them than I had paid in London, and secured the best quality.  My trout rod served my breakfast table, and my gun brought me many a dinner.  In short, I found that small as was the sum of money which I had earned, yet it was more than enough for my needs.

Winter is, of course, the trying time for a resident in the country.  About the beginning of December the weather broke, and there was a week of driving rain.  A fortnight of grey weather followed, and then came three days of heavy snow.  From the moment that the snow ceased winter became delightful.  No words of mine can describe the glory of these winter days.  It is only of late years that people have discovered that Switzerland is infinitely more beautiful in winter than in summer; some day they will discover the same truth about the Lake District.  It happened one day in midwinter that business took me as far as Keswick, and I shall never forget the astonishment and delight of that visit.  Skiddaw was a pure snow mountain, a miniature Mont Blanc; Derwentwater was blue as polished steel, covered with ice so clear that it was everywhere transparent; the woods were plumed with snow, and over all shone the sun of June, and the keen air tingled in the veins like wine.  Beside the road the drifts ran high, hollowed by the wind into a hundred curves and cavities, and in each the reflected light made a tapestry of delicate violet and rose.  Those who imagine that snow is only white—­dead, cold white—­have never seen the pure new-fallen snow, when the stricture