bees hum round by day; by night the nighthawk passes,
coming up from the fields and even skirting the sheds and houses below.
The rains beat on them, and the storm drives the dead leaves over their
low green domes; the waves boom on the shore far down.

How many times has the morning star shone yonder in the East? All the
mystery of the sun and of the stars centres around these lowly mounds.

But the glory of these glorious Downs is the breeze. The air in the
valleys immediately beneath them is pure and pleasant; but the least
climb, even a hundred feet, puts you on a plane with the atmosphere
itself, uninterrupted by so much as the tree-tops. It is air without
admixture. If it comes from the south, the waves refine it; if inland,
the wheat and flowers and grass distil it. The great headland and the
whole rib of the promontory is wind-swept and washed with air; the
billows of the atmosphere roll over it.

The sun searches out every crevice amongst the grass, nor is there the
smallest fragment of surface which is not sweetened by air and light.
Underneath, the chalk itself is pure, and the turf thus washed by wind
and rain, sun-dried and dew-scented, is a couch prepared with thyme to
rest on. Discover some excuse to be up there always, to search for stray
mushrooms--they will be stray, for the crop is gathered extremely early
in the morning--or to make a list of flowers and grasses; to do
anything, and, if not, go always without any pretext. Lands of gold have
been found, and lands of spices and precious merchandise; but this is
the land of health.

There is the sea below to bathe in, the air of the sky up hither to
breathe, the sun to infuse the invisible magnetism of his beams. These
are the three potent medicines of nature, and they are medicines that by
degrees strengthen not only the body but the unquiet mind. It is not
necessary to always look out over the sea. By strolling along the slopes
of the ridge a little way inland there is another scene where hills roll
on after hills till the last and largest hides those that succeed behind
it.

Vast cloud-shadows darken one, and lift their veil from another; like
the sea, their tint varies with the hue of the sky over them. Deep
narrow valleys--lanes in the hills--draw the footsteps downwards into
their solitude, but there is always the delicious air, turn whither you
will, and there is always the grass, the touch of which refreshes.
Though not in sight, it is plea