When all the world was young and we were young with it there was no occupation more pleasing to our infant minds than the digging of great holes in that placid and maternal earth that endured the trampling of our childish feet with patience, and betrayed no realisation of the extraordinary miracle of life that had set us dancing in the fields and valleys of the world.  As repentant children trace with curious finger on their mother’s foreheads the lines that they themselves have set there, so we followed the furrows on the forehead of our mother Earth with our little spades, smoothing here and deepening there, and not the less contented that our labours had but a vague and illusory aim.  Sometimes, perhaps, we had a half-formed ambition to dig to those dim and incredible Antipodes where children walk p. 106head downwards, clinging to the earth with their feet, like the flies on the playroom’ ceiling.  Sometimes, perhaps, we dug for treasure, immense masses of golden coin, like those memorable hoards described in “Treasure Island” and the “Gold Bug.”  Or, again, it might be that we planned vast caves and galleries wherein tawny pirates and swart smugglers might carouse, shocking the echoes with blood-curdling oaths, and drinking boiling rum like Quilp.  We dug, in fine.

There seems to be some element in the human mind that is definitely attracted by the digging of holes, for it is not only children who are interested by the spectacle.  The genial excavators whose duty it is to make havoc of the London streets never fail to draw an attentive and apparently appreciative audience, whether of loafers or philosophers the critic may not lightly determine.  They gaze into the pit with countenances of abysmal profundity, that appear to see all, to understand all, and to express nothing in particular.  It is possible that they are placidly enjoying the reflection that beneath p. 107the complex contrivances of our civilisation, beneath London itself, the virgin earth lies unturned and unaffected.  Perhaps, as each spadeful of earth reaches the surface, they perceive, like a child watching the sawdust trickle from the broken head of a doll, that here is the raw material of which worlds are made.  Perhaps they do not think at all, but merely derive a mild satisfaction from watching other people work.  Yet it is at least agreeable to believe that they are watchers for the unexpected, that they have discovered the great truth that if you dig long enough you will probably dig something up.

We children knew this very well, and we never dug without feeling the thrill proper to treasure-seekers.  Even half a brick becomes eventful when found in these circumstances, and the earth had a hundred pleasant secrets in the shape of fragments of pottery, mysterious lumps of metal and excited insects for those who approached her reverently, trowel in hand.  It was this variety of treasure that made us prefer inland digging p. 108to those more fashionable excavations that are carried on at the seaside.  Sand is a friendly substance in which to dig, and it is very convenient to have a supply of water like the sea close at hand when it is necessary to fill a pond or add a touch of realism to a moat.  But the ease with which sand obeys the spade soon becomes monotonous, and the seaside in general suffers from an air of having been elaborately prepared for children to play there.  Our delving operations in the garden had the charm of nominal illegality, and the brown earth had a hundred moods to thwart and help and enchant us continually.  Sometimes we dug with scie............