He always felt
this, on approaching London.
His dislike of mankind, of the mass of mankind, amounted almost to an
illness.
'"Where the quiet coloured end of evening smiles Miles and miles--"' he
was murmuring to himself, like a man condemned to death. Gerald, who
was very subtly alert, wary in all his senses, leaned forward and asked
smilingly:
'What were you saying?' Birkin glanced at him, laughed, and repeated:
'"Where the quiet coloured end of evening smiles, Miles and miles,
Over pastures where the something something sheep Half asleep--"'
Gerald also looked now at the country. And Birkin, who, for some reason
was now tired and dispirited, said to him:
'I always feel doomed when the train is running into London. I feel
such a despair, so hopeless, as if it were the end of the world.'
'Really!' said Gerald. 'And does the end of the world frighten you?'
Birkin lifted his shoulders in a slow shrug.
'I don't know,' he said. 'It does while it hangs imminent and doesn't
fall.
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