When idle, one
can love, one can be good, feel kindly to all, devote oneself to
others, be thankful for existence, educate one's mind, one's heart,
one's body. When busy, as I am busy now or have been busy to-day,
one feels just as you sometimes felt when you were too busy, owing
to want of servants.
'DEC. 5. - On Sunday I was at Isleworth, chiefly engaged in playing
with Odden. We had the most enchanting walk together through the
brickfields. It was very muddy, and, as he remarked, not fit for
Nanna, but fit for us MEN. The dreary waste of bared earth,
thatched sheds and standing water, was a paradise to him; and when
we walked up planks to deserted mixing and crushing mills, and
actually saw where the clay was stirred with long iron prongs, and
chalk or lime ground with "a tind of a mill," his expression of
contentment and triumphant heroism knew no limit to its beauty. Of
course on returning I found Mrs. Austin looking out at the door in
an anxious manner, and thinking we had been out quite long enough.
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