So that
these forms are suitable rather for those who wish to make
verses, than for those who wish to express opinions.
Sometimes, on the other hand, difficulties arise: rival
verses come into a man's head, and fugitive words elude his
memory. Then it is that he enjoys at the same time the
deliberate pleasures of a connoisseur comparing wines, and
the ardour of the chase. He may have been sitting all day
long in prison with folded hands; but when he goes to bed,
the retrospect will seem animated and eventful.
Besides confirming himself as an habitual maker of verses,
Charles acquired some new opinions during his captivity. He
was perpetually reminded of the change that had befallen him.
He found the climate of England cold and "prejudicial to the
human frame;" he had a great contempt for English fruit and
English beer; even the coal fires were unpleasing in his
eyes. (1) He was rooted up from among his friends and
customs and the places that had known him. And so in this
strange land he began to learn the love of his own. Sad
people all the world over are like to be moved when the wind
is in some particular quarter. So Burns preferred when it
was in the west, and blew to him from his mistress; so the
girl in the ballade, looking south to Yarrow, thought it
might carry a kiss betwixt her and her gallant; and so we
find Charles singing of the "pleasant wind that comes from
France.
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