Isn't this a nice thought from Stevenson?
The world is so full of a number of things,
I am sure we should all be as happy as kings.
It's true, you know. The world is full of happiness, and plenty to go
round, if you are only willing to take the kind that comes your way.
The whole secret is in being PLIABLE. In the country, especially,
there are such a lot of entertaining things. I can walk over
everybody's land, and look at everybody's view, and dabble in
everybody's brook; and enjoy it just as much as though I owned the
land--and with no taxes to pay!
It's Sunday night now, about eleven o'clock, and I am supposed to be
getting some beauty sleep, but I had black coffee for dinner, so--no
beauty sleep for me!
This morning, said Mrs. Semple to Mr. Pendleton, with a very determined
accent:
'We have to leave here at a quarter past ten in order to get to church
by eleven.'
'Very well, Lizzie,' said Master Jervie, 'you have the buggy ready, and
if I'm not dressed, just go on without waiting.' 'We'll wait,' said
she.
'As you please,' said he, 'only don't keep the horses standing too
long.'
Then while she was dressing, he told Carrie to pack up a lunch, and he
told me to scramble into my walking clothes; and we slipped out the
back way and went fishing.
It discommoded the household dreadfully, because Lock Willow of a
Sunday dines at two. But he ordered dinner at seven--he orders meals
whenever he chooses; you would think the place were a restaurant--and
that kept Carrie and Amasai from going driving. But he said it was all
the better because it wasn't proper for them to go driving without a
chaperon; and anyway, he wanted the horses himself to take me driving.
Did you ever hear anything so funny?
And poor Mrs. Semple believes that people who go fishing on Sundays go
afterwards to a sizzling hot hell! She is awfully troubled to think
that she didn't train him better when he was small and helpless and she
had the chance. Besides--she wished to show him off in church.
Anyway, we had our fishing (he caught four little ones) and we cooked
them on a camp-fire for lunch. They kept falling off our spiked sticks
into the fire, so they tasted a little ashy, but we ate them. We got
home at four and went driving at five and had dinner at seven, and at
ten I was sent to bed and here I am, writing to you.