sleep.
How serious he looked when he said all that!"

These thoughts in the coming gloom of the autumn evening made Tom feel
serious too. Then they passed away as he had that other try, and
another, and another, pretty well a dozen before he made a rush for what
he rightly assumed to be the north-east, and finally reached the road
pretty well tired out.

It was before the sun was far above the horizon the next morning that
Tom went out of the garden gate, and by the time he reached the spot
where he had turned into the wood, and gone many yards in amongst the
trees, he found the appearance of the place almost precisely the same as
he had seen it on the previous evening. There was the roof of the
natural temple all aglow, the dark bars across the tall boughs, and the
shadows stretching far away crossing each other in bewildering
confusion. But everything was reversed, and instead of the shadows
creeping upwards they stole down lower and lower, till the roof of
boughs grew dark and the carpet of soft fir-needles began to glow.

Then too, as he went south, the bright light came from his left instead
of his right.

"How beautiful!" he thought. "How stupid it is to lie in bed so long
when everything is so soft and fresh and bright in the morning. But
then bed is so jolly snug and comfortable just then, and it is so hard
to get one's eyes open. It's such a pity," he mused; "bed isn't much
when one gets in first, but grows more and more comfortable till it's
time to get up. I wish one could turn it right round."

These thoughts passed away, for there were squirrels about, and jays
noisily resenting his visit, and shouting to each other in jay--"Here's
a boy coming."

Then he caught sight of a magpie, after hearing its laughing call. A
hawk flew out of a very tall pine in an opening, and strewn beneath
there were feathers and bones suggestive of the hook-beaked creature's
last meal.

But as he followed the track of the pursuit once more, he had that to
take up his attention, till he felt sure that he must be close to the
place he sought, but grew more puzzled than ever as he gazed right round
him.

"It must be farther on," he muttered; and, starting once more, he
stopped at the end of another fifty yards or so, to have a fresh look
round down each vista of trees, which started from where he stood.

It was more open here, and in consequence a patch of bracken had run up
to a goodly height, spreading its frond