Collected works > Edinburgh edition, 1894-98 - Works of Robert Louis Stevenson > Volume 11, 1895 - Miscellanies, Volume III

ORDERED SOUTH
changes upon the instant, and many a doleful
vignette of the grim wintry streets at home returns
to him, and begins to haunt his memory. The hope-
less, huddled attitude of tramps in doorways ; the
flinching gait of barefoot children on the icy pave-
ment ; the sheen of the rainy streets towards after-
noon ; the meagre anatomy of the poor defined by
the clinging of wet garments ; the high canorous
note of the North-easter on days when the very
houses seem to stiffen with cold : these, and such as
these, crowd back upon him, and mockingly sub-
stitute themselves for the fanciful winter scenes with
which he had pleased himself a while before. He
cannot be glad enough that he is where he is. If
only the others could be there also ; if only those
tramps could lie down for a little in the sunshine,
and those children warm their feet, this once, upon
a kindlier earth ; if only there were no cold any-
where, and no nakedness, and no hunger ; if only it
were as well with all men as it is with him !
For it is not altogether ill with the invaUd, after
all. If it is only rarely that anything penetrates
vividly into his numbed spirit, yet, when anything
does, it brings with it a joy that is all the more
poignant for its very rarity. There is something
pathetic in these occasional returns of a glad activity
of heart. In his lowest hours he will be stirred and
awakened by many such ; and they will spring
perhaps from very trivial sources ; as a friend once
said to me, the ' spirit of delight ' comes often on
small wings. For the pleasure that we take in
II — G 97