going without
consciousness or effort--without a question or a thought, without a
glance to either side--on and on.

He reached the top of a rise from which the road sloped down to the
valley. And here he stopped, as if set to go no farther.

Before him spread the landscape of the valley; green woods encircled
it on every hand, like a protecting fence about a pleasure-garden.
Within the area enclosed were mounds and hilly fields, stretches of
meadow, farmsteads, rows of corn-sheaves and haystacks, patches of
stubble, a tiny stream with a bridge and a fall, and mills on either
bank.

A thrill of emotion seized the wanderer at sight of it all; one
glance let loose a flood of memories and thoughts of things long since
forgotten.

All seemed as before. He looked at the stream, and followed the line
of its course with his eye. The mills stared at one another from bank
to bank, as they had always done since the beginning of time. But the
mills themselves had changed. The old wooden structures were gone, and
in place of them stood modern stone-walled buildings.

A lightning thought came into his mind: was there _anything_ that was
unchanged, though the setting seemed as it had been? What might not
have happened in the little place during those years?

The wanderer felt uneasy at the thought. Here he was--but who could
say what he would find here, now he had come?

Slowly, with heavy steps, he took his way down towards the village.
And ever as he neared it, his uneasiness increased.

* * * * *

He came to a turn in the way. From just beyond came the tinkle of a
bell, and, as he rounded the bend, he saw a flock of sheep grazing,
and a fair-haired lad watching the flock.

The sight gladdened his heart--the sheep and the shepherd lad at least
were as he had hoped to find them.

"Good-day!" he said heartily. "And whose lad are you, little man?"

"Just Stina's boy," answered the young herdsman easily, from his seat
by the wayside.

"Ho, are you? ... yes." The wanderer stepped across the ditch, sat
down by the wayside, and lit his pipe.

"And what's the news in the place? I've been here before, d'ye see,
and used to know it well. But 'tis long since I heard anything from
these parts."

"News?... H'm." The lad felt a pleasant sense of importance at being
thus asked, and stepped down from his seat. "Well, you've heard,
maybe, 'twas Mattila's Tytto won the first prize at the cattle sho