s and rills,
The silence that is in the starry sky,
The sleep that is among the lonely hills._

--WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

[Illustration: A NIGHT AMONG THE PINES

(_See following page_)]

A NIGHT AMONG THE PINES

BY ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

This is an account of one night's camping-out
experience in the mountains of southeastern France.
Stevenson's only companion was Modestine, a donkey
"not much bigger than a dog, the color of a mouse,
with a kindly eye and a determined jaw." The
selection is especially fine in its interpretation
of night out of doors. Read it to gather the
impressions that the sights and sounds made upon
the author. Then read it to discover what you would
have listened for (and probably heard) had you been
in the same position.

From Bleymard after dinner, although it was already
late, I set out to scale a portion of the Lozere. An
ill-marked stony droveroad guided me forward; and I met
nearly half a dozen bullock carts descending from the woods,
each laden with a whole pine tree for the winter's firing. 5
At the top of the woods, which do not climb very high upon
this cold ridge, I struck leftward by a path among the
pines, until I hit on a dell of green turf, where a streamlet
made a little spout over some stones to serve me for a water
tap. "In a more sacred or sequestered bower . . . nor 10
nymph, nor faunus, haunted." The trees were not old,
but they grew thickly round the glade; there was no outlook,
except northeastward upon distant hilltops or straight
upward to the sky; and the encampment felt secure and
private like a room. By the time I had made my arrangements 15
and fed Modestine, the day was already beginning
to decline. I buckled myself to the knees into my sack and
made a hearty meal; and as soon as the sun went down, I
pulled my cap over my eyes and fell asleep.

Night is a dead monotonous period under a roof; but
in the open world it passes lightly, with its stars and dews
and perfumes, and the hours are marked by changes in the
face of Nature. What seems a kind of temporal death to
people choked between walls and curtains, is only a light 5
and living slumber to the man who sleeps afield. All night
long he can hear Nature brea