ely collecting sticks, I made my way to the far point of the island
where the moonlight on plain and river could be seen to better advantage.
The desire to be alone had come suddenly upon me; my former dread returned
in force; there was a vague feeling in me I wished to face and probe to the
bottom.

When I reached the point of sand jutting out among the waves, the spell of
the place descended upon me with a positive shock. No mere "scenery" could
have produced such an effect. There was something more here, something to
alarm.

I gazed across the waste of wild waters; I watched the whispering willows;
I heard the ceaseless beating of the tireless wind; and, one and all, each
in its own way, stirred in me this sensation of a strange distress. But the
willows especially; for ever they went on chattering and talking among
themselves, laughing a little, shrilly crying out, sometimes sighing--but
what it was they made so much to-do about belonged to the secret life of
the great plain they inhabited. And it was utterly alien to the world I
knew, or to that of the wild yet kindly elements. They made me think of a
host of beings from another plane of life, another evolution altogether,
perhaps, all discussing a mystery known only to themselves. I watched them
moving busily together, oddly shaking their big bushy heads, twirling their
myriad leaves even when there was no wind. They moved of their own will as
though alive, and they touched, by some incalculable method, my own keen
sense of the horrible.

There they stood in the moonlight, like a vast army surrounding our camp,
shaking their innumerable silver spears defiantly, formed all ready for an
attack.

The psychology of places, for some imaginations at least, is very vivid;
for the wanderer, especially, camps have their "note" either of welcome or
rejection. At first it may not always be apparent, because the busy
preparations of tent and cooking prevent, but with the first pause--after
supper usually--it comes and announces itself. And the note of this
willow-camp now became unmistakably plain to me; we were interlopers,
trespassers; we were not welcomed. The sense of unfamiliarity grew upon me
as I stood there watching. We touched the frontier of a region where our
presence was resented. For a night's lodging we might perhaps be tolerated;
but for a prolonged and inquisitive stay--No! by all the gods of the trees
and wilderness, no! We were the first human influences