y day," he said to himself. "I always knew that love would
come down on me like a storm." Then, aloud, he said to her: "I wish I
knew what you know; but I can't, because my mind is different, my life
has been different. When you go into the world and see a great deal, and
loosen a little the strings of your principles, and watch how sins and
virtues contradict themselves, you see things after a while in a kind of
mist. But you, Guida, you see them clearly because your heart is clear.
You never make a mistake, you are always right because your mind is
right."

She interrupted him, a little troubled and a good deal amazed: "Oh, you
mustn't, mustn't speak like that. It's not so. How can one see and learn
unless one sees and knows the world? Surely one can't think wisely if
one doesn't see widely?"

He changed his tactics instantly. The world--that was the thing? Well,
then, she should see the world, through him, with him.

"Yes, yes, you're right," he answered. "You can't know things unless you
see widely. You must see the world. This island, what is it? I was born
here, don't I know! It's a foothold in the world, but it's no more; it's
not afield to walk in, why, it's not even a garden. No, it's the little
patch of green we play in in front of a house, behind the railings,
before we go out into the world and learn how to live."

They had now reached the highest point on the island, where a flagstaff
stood. Guida was looking far beyond Jersey to the horizon line. There
was little haze, the sky was inviolably blue. Far off against the
horizon lay the low black rocks of the Minquiers. They seemed to her,
on the instant, like stepping-stones. Beyond would be other
stepping-stones, and others and others still again, and they would all
mark the way and lead to what Philip called the world. The world! She
felt a sudden little twist of regret at her heart. Here she was like a
cow grazing within the circle of its tether--like a lax caterpillar on
its blade of grass. Yet it had all seemed so good to her in the past;
broken only by little bursts of wonder and wish concerning that outside
world.

"Do we ever learn how to live?" she asked. "Don't we just go on from one
thing to another, picking our way, but never knowing quite what to do,
because we don't know what's ahead? I believe we never do learn how to
live," she added, half-smiling, yet a little pensive too; "but I am so
very ignorant, and--"

She stopped, for suddenly i