ct
violently with a sword.

And others again say that there hath been no town of Allathurion,
and that Leothric never lived.

Peace to them. The gardener hath gathered up this autumn's leaves.
Who shall see them again, or who wot of them? And who shall say what
hath befallen in the days of long ago?

The Lord of Cities

I came one day upon a road that wandered so aimlessly that it was
suited to my mood, so I followed it, and it led me presently among
deep woods. Somewhere in the midst of them Autumn held his court,
sitting wreathed with gorgeous garlands; and it was the day before
his annual festival of the Dance of Leaves, the courtly festival
upon which hungry Winter rushes mob-like, and there arise the
furious cries of the North Wind triumphing, and all the splendour
and grace of the woods is gone, and Autumn flees away, discrowned
and forgotten, and never again returns. Other Autumns arise, other
Autumns, and fall before other Winters. A road led away to the left,
but my road went straight on. The road to the left had a trodden
appearance; there were wheel tracks on it, and it seemed the correct
way to take. It looked as if no one could have any business with the
road that led straight on and up the hill. Therefore I went straight
on and up the hill; and here and there on the road grew blades of
grass undisturbed in the repose and hush that the road had earned
from going up and down the world; for you can go by this road, as
you can go by all roads, to London, to Lincoln, to the North of
Scotland, to the West of Wales, and to Wrellisford where roads end.
Presently the woods ended, and I came to the open fields and at the
same moment to the top of the hill, and saw the high places of
Somerset and the downs of Wilts spread out along the horizon.
Suddenly I saw underneath me the village of Wrellisford, with no
sound in its street but the voice of the Wrellis roaring as he
tumbled over a weir above the village. So I followed my road down
over the crest of the hill, and the road became more languid as I
descended, and less and less concerned with the cares of a highway.
Here a spring broke out in the middle of it, and here another. The
road never heeded. A stream ran right across it, still it straggled
on. Suddenly it gave up the minimum property that a road should
possess, and, renouncing its connection with High Streets, its
lineage of Piccadilly, shrank to one side and became an
unpretentious fo