His
enthusiasms, his purposes, never defined as education would have
defined them, were dissipated into utter vagueness. He lost his
guiding interests, and found himself returning to those of boyhood.
The country once more attracted him; he took out his old
sketch-books, bought a new one, revived the regret that he could not
be a painter of landscape. A visit to one or two picture-galleries,
and then again profound discouragement, recognition of the fact that
he was a mechanic and never could be anything else.
It was the end of his illusions. For him not even passionate love
was to preserve the power of idealising its object. He loved Clara
with all the desire of his being, but could no longer deceive
himself in judging her character. The same sad clearness of vision
affected his judgment of the world about him, of the activities in
which he had once been zealous, of the conditions which enveloped
his life and the lives of those dear to him. The spirit of revolt
often enough stirred within him, but no longer found utterance in
the speech which brings relief; he did his best to dispel the mood,
mocking at it as folly. Consciously he set himself the task of
becoming a practical man, of learning to make the best of life as he
found it, of shunning as the fatal error that habit of mind which
kept John Hewett on the rack.
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