Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/233

 as heartless, godless, loveless. For him the solitude of the woods, the companionship of the wild men, the song of the forest bird, sufficed. He wondered that men of heart and intellect could endure the stifling atmosphere of cities, and claimed that only through that intimacy with Nature which the solitudes of the wilderness afford can the soul rise to the height of communion with the Divine. Yet toward that world which he had quitted, and of which he spoke such hard things, his thoughts ever turned, if it was but to compare it with the paradise he claimed to have found in the deserted places.

The evening passed quickly and pleasantly. Robert's melancholy was soon dispelled by the cheerful influences of the happy home circle. Shortly after dinner he disappeared in company with the children, the two younger ones seated on his broad shoulders and clinging about his neck with the remorseless grip of a pair of young grislies.

"Do not stifle your kind friend," cautioned Madame Bienveillance. But the youngsters only screamed louder than before, and the smaller boy on the left shoulder buried his hands in Robert's hair, crying,— "When one rides without bridle, one must hold on by the mane."

"When one rides without spurs, one must