_June_ 1891.
From the bank to which the boat is tied a kind of scent rises out of the
grass, and the heat of the ground, given off in gasps, actually touches my
body. I feel that the warm, living Earth is breathing upon me, and that
she, also, must feel my breath.
The young shoots of rice are waving in the breeze, and the ducks are in
turn thrusting their heads beneath the water and preening their feathers.
There is no sound save the faint, mournful creaking of the gangway against
the boat, as she imperceptibly swings to and fro in the current.
Not far off there is a ferry. A motley crowd has assembled under the
banyan tree awaiting the boat's return; and as soon as it arrives, they
eagerly scramble in. I enjoy watching this for hours together. It is
market-day in the village on the other bank; that is why the ferry is so
busy. Some carry bundles of hay, some baskets, some sacks; some are going
to the market, others coming from it. Thus, in this silent noonday, the
stream of human activity slowly flows across the river between two
villages.
I sat wondering: Why is there always this deep shade of melancholy over
the fields arid river banks, the sky and the sunshine of our country? And
I came to the conclusion that it is because with us Nature is obviously
the more important thing. The sky is free, the fields limitless; and the
sun merges them into one blazing whole. In the midst of this, man seems so
trivial. He comes and goes, like the ferry-boat, from this shore to the
other; the babbling hum of his talk, the fitful echo of his song, is
heard; the slight movement of his pursuit of his own petty desires is seen
in the world's market-places: but how feeble, how temporary, how
tragically meaningless it all seems amidst the immense aloofness of the
Universe!
The contrast between the beautiful, broad, unalloyed peace of
Nature--calm, passive, silent, unfathomable,--and our own everyday
worries--paltry, sorrow-laden, strife-tormented, puts me beside myself as
I keep staring at the hazy, distant, blue line of trees which fringe the
fields across the river.
Where Nature is ever hidden, and cowers under mist and cloud, snow and
darkness, there man feels himself master; he regards his desires, his
works, as permanent; he wants to perpetuate them, he looks towards
posterity, he raises monuments, he writes biographies; he even goes the
length of erecting tombstones over the dead. So busy is he that he has not
time to consider how many monuments crumble, how often names are
forgotten!