Page:Letters from England.djvu/70

 together, that for the most part it rotates, hisses, grinds with oiled pistons, chatters with steel jaws, fatly sweats and glistens brassily: it is the mythic emblem of the metal age. The sole perfection which modern civilization attains is a mechanical one; machines are splendid and flawless, but the life which serves them or is served by them, is neither superb nor brilliant, nor more perfect nor more graceful; nor is the work of the machines perfect; only they, the machines, are like gods. And I may tell you that I discovered an actual idol in the Palace of Industry. It is a revolving invulnerable safe, a glossy armoured ball, which quietly revolves and revolves on a black altar. It is wonderful and a little uncanny.

Bear me homeward, Flying Scotsman, splendid hundred-and-fifty-ton locomotive; carry me across the seas. O white and glittering ship; there will I sit down on the rough field-edge where the wild thyme grows, and I will close my eyes, for I am of peasant blood and have been somewhat disturbed by