of the divine huntress. It is no use for a man to take to the woods; we know him; Anthony tried the same thing long ago, and had a pitiful time of it by all accounts. But there is this about some women, which overtops the best gymnosophist among men, that they suffice to themselves, and can walk in a high and cold zone without the countenance of any trousered being. I declare, although the reverse of a professed ascetic, I am more obliged to women for this ideal than I should be to the majority of them, or indeed to any but one, for a spontaneous kiss. There is nothing so encouraging as the spectacle of self-sufficiency. And when I think of the slim and lovely maidens, running the woods all night to the note of Diana's horn; moving among the old oaks, as fancy-free as they; things of the forest and the starlight, not touched by the commotion of man's hot and turbid life—although there are plenty other
Page:Stevenson - An Inland Voyage (1878).djvu/30
8
An Inland Voyage.
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fd/Stevenson_-_An_Inland_Voyage_%281878%29.djvu/page30-1024px-Stevenson_-_An_Inland_Voyage_%281878%29.djvu.jpg)