y unwound the hair, lifted the circlet, and, scarcely knowing what
I did, put it in my shoulder-bag.

After that I went more cheerfully into the outside sunshine, and
setting my clothes to dry on a stone, took stock of the situation. The
place was, perhaps, not quite so romantic by day as by night, and the
scattered trees, matted by creepers, with which the whole were
overgrown, prevented anything like an extensive view of the ruined city
being obtained. But what gave me great satisfaction was to note over
these trees to the eastward a two-humped mountain, not more than six or
seven miles distant--the very one I had mislaid the day before. Here
was reality and a chance of getting back to civilisation. I was as
glad as if home were in sight, and not, perhaps, the less so because
the hill meant villages and food; and you who have doubtless lunched
well and lately will please bear in mind I had had nothing since
breakfast the day before; and though this may look picturesque on
paper, in practice it is a painful item in one's programme.

Well, I gave my damp clothes but a turn or two more in the sun, and
then, arguing that from the bare ground where the forest ended half-way
up the hill, a wide view would be obtained, hurried into my garments
and set off thither right gleefully. A turn or two down the blank
streets, now prosaic enough, an easy scramble through a gap in the
crumbling battlements, and there was the open forest again, with a
friendly path well marked by the passage of those wild animals who made
the city their lair trending towards my landmark.

A light breakfast of soft green nuts, plucked on the way, and then the
ground began to bend upwards and the woods to thin a little. With
infinite ardour, just before midday, I scrambled on to a bare knoll on
the very hillside, and fell exhausted before the top could be reached.

But what were hunger or fatigue to the satisfaction of that moment?
There was the sea before me, the clear, strong, gracious sea, blue
leagues of it, furrowed by the white ridges of some distant storm. I
could smell the scent of it even here, and my sailor heart rose in
pride at the companionship of that alien ocean. Lovely and blessed
thing! how often have I turned from the shallow trivialities of the
land and found consolation in the strength of your stately solitudes!
How often have I turned from the tinselled presence of the shore, the
infinite pretensions of dry land that make life