My ideas had been taking a socialistic shape for many years; but they were lacking in definite outline.

We lived within two hundred yards of the sea, and its voice was in our ears night and day.

The other thing that happened in 1883 was my reading of Thoreau's Walden.

IN April 1882 my father died; and I was at once whirled out of my land of dreams into a very different sphere.

What is the good of life if its chief element, and that which must always be its chief element, is odious? No, the only true economy is to arrange so that your daily labor shall be itself a joy.

When he was twenty-three or twenty-four my father began to learn German and read philosophy in his spare hours, which did not look as though he were destined to remain long on board ship!

I was in the Square at the time. The crowd was a most good-humoured, easy going, smiling crowd; but presently it was transformed. A regiment of mounted police came cantering up.