about half past four had enabled me to do another hour s work but a little after six sentences refused to form themselves a little began in the brain and the question not only where shall i dine but where shall i pass the hour before dinner presented itself the first thing to do was to dress and while dressing i remembered that i had not wandered in st james s park for some time and that that park since boyhood had fascinated me st james s park and the green park have never been divided in my admiration of their beauty the trees that grow along the are more beautiful in st james s park or seem so for the are well designed the art of sunday evening in london landscape is more akin to the art of a than to that of a painter it is a sort of architecture with colour added the formal landscape of reminds one of a tragedy by but the romantic of the green hills along the are as as there was a time when a boy used to walk from to to see not the but the women going home from the rooms and the but after a slight hesitation he often crossed from the frequented to the silent side to stand in admiration of the white rays of moonlight stealing between the trunks of the trees allowing him to perceive the shapes of the hollows through the darkness the trees grow so about these and upon the that it is easy to fill the with figures from s pictures ladies in and powdered hair elegant gentlemen wearing shoes tail coats and the swords which made them gentlemen did not make his gentlemen plead � that was his fault but s ladies put their to their lips so asking the pleading lover if he believes all he says knowing well that his vows are only part of the gracious but why did not the great of st james s park build little greek temples � those and temples which give such grace to english perhaps the great artist who laid out the green park was a and a and the stream of ladies that come up from to he thought � well of my dead life his thoughts were his own and now the earth is over him as would say five and twenty years ago the white rays between the tree trunks and the lengthened out disappearing in lights and shades and ascending the hill the boy used to look over the empty plain wondering at the lights of the horse guards shining far away like a village perhaps to night about midnight i may myself in again for we change very little what interested us in our youth interests us almost to the end st james s park is perhaps more beautiful in the sunset � there is the lake and led by remembrance of some i had seen on it i turned out of victoria street last sunday taking the eastern gate my thoughts occupied with beautiful nature seeing in imagination the shapes of the trees themselves against the sky and the little life of the � the ducks going hither and thither every duck intent upon its own business and its own desire i was extremely fortunate for the effect of light in the green park was more beautiful last sunday than anything i had ever seen the branches of the tall plane trees hung over the the foliage hardly stirring in the pale sunshine and my heart went out to the and cynical garden artificial as wild nature me and i thought how interesting it was to consider one s self to one s sympathies our are not quite so interesting to consider but they are interesting too in a way for they belong to one s self � sunday evening in london and self is man s main business all outside of self is uncertain all comes from self all returns to self the reason i desired st james s park last sunday was surely because it was part of me � not that part known to my friends our friends only those of themselves which they discover in us never did i meet one who discovered for himself or herself that i loved trees better than flowers or was deeply interested in the fact when attention was called to it � i watch the trees and never weary of their swaying � solemnly silent and strangely green they are in the long rainy days excited when a breeze is blowing in fine weather they gossip like frivolous girls in their tremulous decline they are more beautiful than ever far more beautiful than flowers now i am telling myself the very soul is speaking and with what extraordinary loveliness did the long branches hang out of the tall stately plane trees like in the hush of sound and decline of light the of the foliage spoke like a memory i seemed to have known the park for centuries yon i recognised as one that had painted but in what picture it is difficult to say so easily do his pictures flow one into the other always the same melancholy the melancholy of festival that pain in the heart that yearning for the beyond which all suffer whose business in life is to wear painted or embroidered dresses and to listen or to plead with this for sole that they who listen to day will plead to morrow divined the sorrow of those who sit under of my dead life some part great or in love s comedy listening to the murmur of the fountain watching a and lady advancing and bowing bowing and retiring dancing a on a richly coloured carpet the white animal the century of the of the plays a the pipe of pan has been exchanged for a as the twilight gathered under 