Summer holiday

“ For a small sum he can get far away from the close and smoky town, to the seaside perhaps, but certainly to the fields and country air; he can make of every fine Sunday in the summer a holiday indeed. ”

“ There is no pleasure that I have ever experienced like a child's midsummer holiday. The time, I mean, when two or three of us used to go away up the brook, and take our dinners with us, and come home at night tired, dirty, happy, scratched beyond recognition, with a great nosegay, three little trout, and one shoe, the other one having been used for a boat till it had gone down with all hands out of soundings. ”

“ James Muir Howie, on the "Nerve Rest-Cure," which says—"For those who cannot get a sufficient holiday, the best substitute is an occasional day in bed." Why not several days in bed? In fact one's whole summer holiday? "Better than climbing toilsome mountains," he remarks. Quite so—and much better than toilsome trip to Ramsgate with one's whole family in tow. (Think of the Old Woman who lived in a Shoe. She had all her family in toe. Laugh feebly at my own joke. Really my nerves must be very bad.) Best feature of new holiday plan, however, is its cheapness. ”

“ Thus one by one the sweet smiling lakes pass by, the bright summer days fade away, and the pleasant holiday season comes to an end. The long shadows lengthen lovingly over Lakeland; the giant hills, like sleepy Titans, nod a last adieu; the darkling copsewood grows shadowy and indistinct; the sweet sunny mere in the hollow glimmers in the distance; the purple haze creeps up the well-known glens, golden with happy memories; and the lofty mountains we have or have not climbed, gloom with deeper shadows. ”

“ In holiday time, in the summer, at Christmas and at Easter, they were allowed to run quite wild, in old clothes at some out-of-the-way seaside place, in country farmhouses, where they scrambled about on ponies and amongst ducks and chickens, or in the country houses of their friends and relations, where there were other children of their age for them to play with. ”

“ For the children there is the day in the country. Every summer day long caravans of wagons filled with children, singing and shouting as they go, drive along the roads to the nearest country place, or excursion trains crammed with children are carried off to the nearest seaside places. They run about on the seashore, they bathe, they sit down to a tea of cake and buns, and they are taken home at night tired out but singing and shouting to the end. This summer “day out” is the one great holiday for the children ”

“ There are Sundays and fête-days to be thought of."
"Yes; and how should we pass those?"
"Why, you would put on your holiday dress, with [Pg 113] one of those pretty little caps à la paysanne, which all admit you look so very nicely in, and accompany your aunt in her large old-fashioned chaise, driven by James the farm servant, to hear mass in the village church; after which, during summer, your kind relative would take you to the different fêtes given in the adjoining parishes. ”

“ Yet how can there be a vacation without mountains, or seashore, or the fields, or the forests—days out of doors? My ideal vacation would have to be spent in the open; and this book, the larger part of it, is the record of one of my summer vacations—the vacation of the summer of 1912. That was an ideal vacation, and along with my account of it I wish to give you some hints on how to make the most of your summer chance to tramp the fields and woods.
For the real lover of nature is a tramp ”

“ There is a generally accepted notion that a brief summer vacation, if at all obtainable in this busy life of ours, must be spent in a flight as far afield as time will allow; that the popular resorts in the mountains, by the seaside, or on the margins of the upper lakes must be sought for rest and enjoyment; that neighborhood surroundings should, in the mad rush for change of air and scene, be left behind. ”

“ Fair-browed girls robed in spotless white muslin, garlanded with flowers and bright with rosy badges in honor of the occasion, were seen here and there, while their eyes sparkled and their lips drank from the cup of happiness, enjoying life and the blessing of being young.
The constantly increasing throng of summer visitors and tourists from all parts of the globe, speaking different languages and wearing outlandish clothes, made up a bewildering picture, while the July sun beamed down upon them, and over lake and green-decked mountain-tops. ”

“ The young man to-day comes fresh from the pure air and clear lavish sunshine of his country home, where summer's flower-decked green is a continuous feast, and winter's glories a delight no less. Whether upon the snow in sleigh, or hillside coasting, or the swift skate on the frozen river, or at evening's cozy fireside before the blazing logs, all rejoice in simple pleasures, and prayer closes the day. ”

“ I know not what the winter may be, but I am enchanted with the beauty of this country in summer; bold, picturesque, romantic, nature reigns here in all her wanton luxuriance, adorned by a thousand wild graces which mock the cultivated beauties of Europe. ”

“ Warm but fresh—how could it help being fresh in that pure mountain air, which turned Sunny’s cheeks the colour of opening rosebuds, and made even papa and mamma feel almost as young as she? Big people like holidays as well as little people, and it was long since they had had a holiday. ”

“ It's going, the time of year when you can stay out of doors most of the time, when you can go in swimming, and the Sunday-school picnic, and the circus, and play base-ball and camp out, and there's no school, and everything nice, and watermelons, and all like that. Good-by, good-by, and you begin to sniff a little. The departure of summer is dignified and even splendid, but the earth looks so sordid and draggle-trailed when winter goes, that onions could not bring a tear. Old winter likes to tease. ”

“ COTTAGE LIFE. The summer is here!—here with its fragrant mornings and its noonday heats, its mellow twilights and its moonlight evenings, its days of glory and its nights of starry beauty. It is summer. Let us go out into the country, away from the stifling air and dull brick walls of the town, into the far, pure, breezy, unsurpassable country. There we shall breathe the fresh air of Heaven. ”

“ I shall not write out the rest of the section till evening, partly in order not to think away my appetite for dinner, partly by way of hobbling after a little addition to it in the open air, where, besides, I can hear two or three yellow-hammers and the church-people sing. On the whole the after-summer, which, to-day, with its finest sky-blue dress and the sun upon it as order-badge, stands out there upon the fields, is a still Good Friday of Nature; and if we human beings were polite people, we should go out oftener into the open air and politely escort the departing summer to the very door. ”

“ For most Americans, this Labor Day weekend is our last chance to catch our breath before the hustle and bustle of the fall. I'm on vacation with my family, and many of you may be driving to the beach or the lake for the last long weekend of summer. ”

“ Once upon a time there was a quiet respectable little spell-of-hot-weather, with no idea of being a nuisance or doing more than warm people up a bit, and make the summer really feel like summer, and add attraction to seaside resorts. ”

“ Before you spoke, I was thinking about those children and the flowers, and it made me feel quite melancholy that we were going back to the seashore where it is so green and beautiful, and so cool compared with the city. Another summer, perhaps we can plan to do more for the poor little things who have so little to enjoy. ”

“ And, so far as concerns the exceptions, it will here suffice to remind ourselves of mountain climbing on snowshoes in winter, of ski-running and skating, and of the winter carnivals of sport held in the Adirondacks, in the Alps, and in the Rocky Mountains. In our southern states, however, no disadvantage attaches to winter; to the contrary, over a great part of that region, winter is the pleasanter season for the pedestrian. But summer is the season of vacations, and is, generally speaking, the time of good roads, fair skies, and gentle air. Then one can walk with greatest ease and freedom. ”

“ I don’t believe the country ever gives one just such a feel of summer as there is now. Hot air, balcony-flowers, rustling brown trees, they’re drier and more papery than country ones; sunny dust, dusty sun, and people, pavements, and omnibuses, and undergrounds—and smart fashionable clothes. ”

“ Across the little stream the stray logs that have grounded, the rocks, the cottages on the hill, the rustling trees, the soaring height of the near-hills, the bright green of the small point, the darker green of the great cape beyond, the dim outline of the far-away mountain range and the broad stretch of cool waters dotted with gracefully floating vessels; all these make ideal summer surroundings. It is a pleasant spot. A great charm for many will be the simplicity of all, unspoiled by crowds—fashion left out. Children may here realize all the joys of early youth ”

“ We had thought the summer too long and too hot, we welcomed the crispness and vigor{111} of autumn, but to-day we walked abroad with joy in the warmth that again thrills us as with a fine touch of youth come back, and as little crinkles of heat shimmer upward from the brown fields we push forward, eager to bathe in it all once more.
All the out-door world seems dreamy with the same delight. ”

“ It is necessary to the full enjoyment of these journeys that they should be made in summer-time, for then the retired spots that I love to haunt, are at their idlest and dullest. A gentle fall of rain is not objectionable, and a warm mist sets off my favourite retreats to decided advantage. ”

“ In the summer, it is true, a small contingent of visitors, adventurous in spirit, though mostly of sedate and solitary habits, make their appearance to swell its meagre population, and impart to the wide stretches of smooth sand that fringe its shores a fleeting air of life and sober gaiety ”

“ If it is an exhibition you go to gape at, we never picture you dragging your weary legs from one department to another, and wondering why your back is so sore. Should it be the seaside, we talk heartlessly to you about the "briny," though we must know, if we would stop to think, that if there is one holiday more miserable than all the others, it is that spent at the seaside, when you wander the weary beach and fling pebbles at the sea, and wonder how long it will be till dinner time. ”

“ In the dreamy summer stillness, we sit with, content, looking at those distant hills, listening to the lapping of the waves, watching the sun sink lower toward the sea. The afternoon sunlight makes a glade across the waters,—seeming to one from a western sea-board like some strange disarrangement in the day. ”

“ And now, reader, in this fine soft summer, when the heather is blooming, and the sky laughing and crying like a hysterical bride, full of love, where will ye go—through your own land or a stranger's? If you stay at home you can choose your own scenery, and have something to see in the summer, and talk of in the winter, that will make your friends from the Alps and Apennines respectful to you. ”

“ Commonplace people, especially town-dwellers, who flit into the country for a few months, have a silly and absurd idea of Summer, which all the atmospherical phenomena fail to drive out of their foolish fancies. They insist on its remaining with us for half a year at least, and on its being dressed in its Sunday's best every day in the week as long as they continue in country quarters. The Sun must rise, like a labourer, at the very earliest hour, shine all day, and go to bed late, else they treat him contumeliously, and declare that he is not worth his meat. ”

“ We are now in the beginning of June, the fresh outburst of summer, when every day in the country is a delight to eye and ear, and we say, 'The season for hot rooms is beginning.' We alone of civilized races spend our summer in a capital, and cling to the country when the trees are leafless and the brooks frozen. ”

“ A summer resort is one of the thousand windows whence to watch the thousand aspects of life in the Atlantic States. Remember that between June and September it is the desire of all who can to get away from the big cities—not on account of wantonness, as people leave London—but because of actual heat. ”

“ A summer resort, however, is a summer resort the world over, and we found the historic city, which has gracefully fitted itself to the curve of its beautiful bay, crowded with idle people, elaborately dressed, who sat long at the noonday breakfast, and longer yet at the evening dinner, and then longest of all on the benches in the park, where bands clashed and fireworks flared, until the very stars began to blink for sleepiness. ”

“ Neither rain nor hail, nothing makes any difference, nothing will prevent them from going out, from closing behind them the door of the deserted workshop, of the stuffy little lodging. But when the springtime is come, when the May sunshine glitters on it as this morning, and it can deck itself out in gay colours, then indeed Sunday is the holiday of holidays. ”

“ This accomplished author has done nothing better than this absorbing story of a summer vacation and the marvelous transformation of a grouchy father into a genial friend. The summer boarders are every one eccentric characters and the opportunities are immense. ”

“ Winter is over with its long, delightfully cosey evenings. Spring is nearly done, with its shorter evenings, and now we are fairly launched into the flower months—when all life seems an holiday, and every moment that is possible is to be passed out of doors.
To get ready for my little proposed festival, everybody must go a-Maying. With baskets, and fern cases, let the children, papa and mamma, nursey, aunt Grace, uncle Fred, and indeed every one who will drop books and work, and go off to the woods for the wild treasures that are playing hide-and-seek there. ”

“ I resolved that I would give my summer discourse only if external nature, in her soft luxuriant beauty, looked summer-like: a sweet pervading accompaniment to my poor words, giving them a force and meaning far beyond their own. What talk concerning summer skies is like the sapphire radiance, so distant and pure, looking in through the church windows? You do not remember how blue and beautiful the sky is, unless when you are looking at it: nature is better than our remembrance of her. ”