in the gloom I
frequently tripped and plunged into prickly gorse near the ground, so
that from shin to knee was soon a-tingle with sharp pain. Odd puffs and
spits of rain stung my face, and the periods of utter stillness were
always followed by little shouting gusts of wind, each time from a new
direction. Troubled is perhaps too strong a word, but flustered I
certainly was; and though I recognised that it was due to my being in
an environment so remote from the town life I was accustomed to, I
found it impossible to stifle altogether the feeling of malaise that
had crept into my heart, and I looked about with increasing eagerness
for the lighted windows of Bassett's cottage.

More and more, little pin-pricks of distress and confusion accumulated,
adding to my realisation of being away from streets and shop-windows,
and things I could classify and deal with. The mist, too, distorted as
well as concealed, played tricks with sounds as well as with sights.
And, once or twice, when I stumbled upon some crouching sheep, they got
up without the customary alarm and hurry of sheep, and moved off slowly
into the darkness, but in such a singular way that I could almost have
sworn they were not sheep at all, but human beings crawling on
all-fours, looking back and grimacing at me over their shoulders as
they went. On these occasions--for there were more than one--I never
could get close enough to feel their woolly wet backs, as I should have
liked to do; and the sound of their tinkling bells came faintly through
the mist, sometimes from one direction, sometimes from another,
sometimes all round me as though a whole flock surrounded me; and I
found it impossible to analyse or explain the idea I received that they
were _not_ sheep-bells at all, but something quite different.

But mist and darkness, and a certain confusion of the senses caused by
the excitement of an utterly strange environment, can account for a
great deal. I pushed on quickly. The conviction that I had strayed from
the route grew, nevertheless, for occasionally there was a great
commotion of seagulls about me, as though I had disturbed them in their
sleeping-places. The air filled with their plaintive cries, and I heard
the rushing of multitudinous wings, sometimes very close to my head,
but always invisible owing to the mist. And once, above the swishing of
the wet wind through the gorse-bushes, I was sure I caught the faint
thunder of the sea and the distant cra