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158
Adventures in Contentment
·
David Grayson
98
It
is
curious
how,
in
spite
of
domestication
and
training,
Nature
in
her
great
moments
returns
to
the
primitive
and
instinctive!
My
brown
cow,
never
having
had
anything
but
the
kindest
treatment,
is
as
gentle
an
animal
as
could
be
imagined,
but
she
had
followed
the
nameless,
ages-old
law
of
her
breed:
she
had
escaped
in
her
great
moment
to
the
most
secret
place
she
knew.
It
did
not
matter
that
she
would
have
been
safer
in
my
yard--both
she
and
her
calf--that
she
would
have
been
surer
of
her
food;
she
could
only
obey
the
old
wild
law.
So
turkeys
will
hide
their
nests.
So
the
tame
duck,
tame
for
unnumbered
generations,
hearing
from
afar
the
shrill
cry
of
the
wild
drake,
will
desert
her
quiet
surroundings,
spread
her
little-used
wings
and
become
for
a
time
the
wildest
of
the
wild.
So
we
think--you
and
I--that
we
are
civilised!
But
how
often,
how
often,
have
we
felt
that
old
wildness
which
is
our
common
heritage,
scarce
shackled,
clamouring
in
our
blood!
I
stood
listening
among
the
alders,
in
the
deep
cool
shade.
Here
and
there
a
ray
of
sunshine
came
through
the
thick
foliage:
I
could
see
it
where
it
silvered
the
cobweb
ladders
of
those
moist
spaces.
Somewhere
in
the
thicket
I
heard
an
unalarmed
catbird
trilling
her
exquisite
song,
a
startled
frog
leaped
with
a
splash
into
the
water;
faint
odours
of
some
blossoming
growth,
not
distinguishable,
filled
the
still
air.
It
was
one
of
those
rare
moments
when
one
seems
to
have
caught
Nature
unaware.
I
lingered
a
full
minute,
listening,
looking;
but
my
brown
cow
had
not
gone
that
way.
So
I
turned
and
went
up
rapidly
to
the
road,
and
there
I
found
myself
almost
face
to
face
with
a
ruddy
little
man
whose
countenance
bore
a
look
of
round
astonishment.
We
were
both
surprised.
I
recovered
first.
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