“I measure every Grief I meetWith narrow, probing, Eyes;I wonder if It weighs like Mine,Or has an Easier size. I wonder if They bore it long,Or did it just begin?I could not tell the Date of Mine, It feels so old a pain. I wonder if it hurts to live,And if They have to try,And whether, could They choose between, It would not be, to die. I note that Some -- gone patient long --At length, renew their smile.An imitation of a LightThat has so little Oil. I wonder if when Years have piled,Some Thousands -- on the Harm Of early hurt -- if such a lapseCould give them any Balm; Or would they go on aching stillThrough Centuries above,Enlightened to a larger PainBy Contrast with the Love. The Grieved are many, I am told;The reason deeper lies, --Death is but oneand comes but once,And only nails the eyes. There's Grief of Want and Grief of Cold, --A sort they call "Despair";There's Banishment from native Eyes,In sight of Native Air. And though I may not guess the kindCorrectly, yet to meA piercing Comfort it affordsIn passing Calvary, To note the fashions of the Cross,And how they're mostly worn,Still fascinated to presumeThat Some are like My Own.”

“I wonder if it hurts to live,And if they have to try,And whether, could they choose between,They would not rather die.”

“So often I wonder whether it is my right to capitalize, as I feel, so often, on the grief of others. But then I justify, in my own particular thoughts, by feeling that I can contribute a little to the understanding of what others are going through; then there is reason for doing it.”

“Nowhere can I think so happily as in a train. I am not inspired; nothing so uncomfortable as that. I am never seized with a sudden idea for a masterpiece, nor form a sudden plan for some new enterprise. My thoughts are just pleasantly reflective. I think of all the good deeds I have done, and (when these give out) of all the good deeds I am going to do. I look out of the window and say lazily to myself, “How jolly to live there”; and a little farther on, “How jolly not to live there.” I see a cow, and I wonder what it is like to be a cow, and I wonder whether the cow wonders what it is to be like me; and perhaps, by this time, we have passed on to a sheep, and I wonder if it is more fun being a sheep. My mind wanders on in a way which would annoy Pelman a good deal, but it wanders on quite happily, and the “clankety-clank” of the train adds a very soothing accompaniment. So soothing, indeed, that at any moment I can close my eyes and pass into a pleasant state of sleep.”

“It is a curious thing that at my age — fifty-five last birthday — I should find myself taking up a pen to try to write a history. I wonder what sort of a history it will be when I have finished it, if ever I come to the end of the trip! I have done a good many things in my life, which seems a long one to me, owing to my having begun work so young, perhaps. At an age when other boys are at school I was earning my living as a trader in the old Colony. I have been trading, hunting, fighting, or mining ever since. And yet it is only eight months ago that I made my pile. It is a big pile now that I have got it — I don't yet know how big — but I do not think I would go through the last fifteen or sixteen months again for it; no, not if I knew that I should come out safe at the end, pile and all. But then I am a timid man, and dislike violence; moreover, I am almost sick of adventure. I wonder why I am going to write this book: it is not in my line. I am not a literary man, though very devoted to the Old Testament and also to the "Ingoldsby Legends." Let me try to set down my reasons, just to see if I have any.”

“Now there's something else I know. You might not think you're grieving, but grief comes in all sorts of ways. There's the kind of grief that leaves you numb, and the kind of grief that rips your world in half. And then there's another kind of grief that doesn't feel like grief at all. Its like a tiny splinter you don't even know you have until it festers so deep it has nowhere left to go but into your soul. I think that's the hardest kind of grief there is because you know you're hurting but you don't know why.”