Yonder below him was home -- the old house that had sheltered him , the graves of his kin , the wide fields where his boyhood dreams had been dreamed . Should he go down to it ? This was the question he asked himself . He had come back to it , heartsick of his idols of the marketplace . For years they had satisfied him , the buying and selling and getting gain , the pitting of strength and craft against strength and craft , the tireless struggle , the exultation of victory . Then , suddenly , they had failed their worshipper ; they ceased to satisfy ; the sacrifices he had heaped on their altars availed him nothing in this new need and hunger of his being . His gods mocked him and he wearied of their service . Were there not better things than these , things he had once known and loved and forgotten ? Where were the ideals of his youth , the lofty aspirations that had upborne him then ? Where was the eagerness and zest of new dawns , the earnestness of well-filled , purposeful hours of labour , the satisfaction of a good day worthily lived , at eventide the unbroken rest of long , starry nights ? Where might he find them again ? Were they yet to be had for the seeking in the old valley ? With the thought came a great yearning for home . He had had many habitations , but he realized now that he had never thought of any of these places as home . That name had all unconsciously been kept sacred to the long , green , seaward-looking glen where he had been born . So he had come back to it , drawn by a longing not to be resisted . But at the last he felt afraid . There had been many changes , of that he felt sure . Would it still be home ? And if not , would not the loss be most irreparable and bitter ?
Would it not be better to go away , having looked at it from the hill and having heard the saga of the firs , keeping his memory of it unblurred , than risk the probable disillusion of a return to the places that had forgotten him and friends whom the varying XXXXX must certainly have changed as he had changed himself ?
altars eventide habitations heartsick labour nights rest thought worshipper years