Commonplace Book

'As I crossed St James' Park in the early hours of the morning to Downing Street, on the smut-smirched grass under the umber sky lay rows of wretched figures. One morning I saw a butterfly, with outspread, primrose-coloured wings, flutter above them, almost touching their grimy faces and their hair tangled and matted with sweat. As a benison, it ought to have brought the memory of the clover fields and honeysuckle-lined hedges, amid which, most likely, their boyhood had been passed. Backwards and forwards it fluttered, until, at last, one of the men seeing it, beat it down under his hat with a curse, as he had beaten down, long ago, every pure thought that had ever been his.'

from Diogenes' Sandals by Mrs Arthur Kennard (Chapter XII)