CHAPTER XXIX
EDWARD COSSEY MEETS WITH AN ACCIDENT
At the best of times this is not a gay world, though no doubt we ought
to pretend that humanity at large is as happy as it is represented to
be in, let us say, the Christmas number of an illustrated paper. How
well we can imagine the thoughtful inhabitant of this country Anno
Domini 7500 or thereabouts disinterring from the crumbling remains of
a fireproof safe a Christmas number of the /Illustrated London News/
or the /Graphic/. The archaic letters would perhaps be unintelligible
to him, but he would look at the pictures with much the same interest
that we regard bushmen's drawings or the primitive clay figures of
Peru, and though his whole artistic seventy-sixth century soul would
be revolted at the crudeness of the colouring, surely he would
moralise thus: "Oh, happy race of primitive men, how I, the child of
light and civilisation, envy you your long-forgotten days! Here in
these rude drawings, which in themselves reveal the extraordinary
capacity for pleasure possessed by the early races, who could look
upon them and gather gratification from the sight, may we trace your
joyous career from the cradle to the grave. Here you figure as a babe,
at whose appearance everybody seems delighted, even those of your race
whose inheritance will be thereby diminished--and here a merry lad you
revel in the school which the youth of our age finds so wearisome.
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