When they get it, often, it is true, they pant for the ardours of the fray whereof the dim and distant sounds are echoing through the spaces of their heart, in the same way that the countries without a history are sometimes anxious to write one in their own blood.

But that is a principle of Nature, who will allow of no standing still among her subjects, and who has ordained that strife of one sort or another shall be the absolute condition of existence.
On the whole, John found that the life of a South African farmer came well up to his expectations.

He had ample occupation; indeed, what between ostriches, horses, cattle, sheep, and crops, he was rather over than under occupied.

Nor was he much troubled by the lack of civilised society, for he was a man who read a great deal, and books could be ordered from Durban and Cape Town, while the weekly mail brought with it a sufficient supply of papers.

On Sundays he always read the political articles in the "Saturday Review" aloud to Silas Croft, who, as he grew older, found that the print tried his eyes, an attention which the old man greatly appreciated.