should easily procure a guide home. So, with tottering knees and
throbbing heart--for I was by this time nearly breathless--I continued
to advance by the side of the standing corn, at such a pace as I could
manage, uttering from time to time a lusty halloo, in hopes of making
myself heard by some belated reaper or returning woodman. But my calls
had no other effect than to awake the mocking echoes of the wood, or
the mysterious and almost human shout of the screech-owl, and to leave
me to a still more intense feeling of solitude, when these had died
away. I found myself at length in a deep, hollow field-road, like
those which abound in South Devon, and high overhead, on the lofty
bank, stood a two-branched, weather-beaten finger-post, and a great
rustic crucifix near it, looming large in the moonlight. Scrambling up
the bank, with anxious peering eyes, I made out, by the dubious light
of the moon, that one of the outstretched wooden arms bore, in
rudely-cut letters, the name of the village beside which I was
resident; and as its distance was stated, I found that, after all my
windings and wanderings, I had still only got half a German mile, or
about one league, astray! This was a very pleasant discovery; and
accordingly I quickly wheeled about, and set off with renewed vigour
at right angles to my previous line of march, having still good hopes
of being at home before eleven o'clock at night, time enough to
prevent any alarm on account of my absence.

The road soon, however, degenerated into a mere field-track, which, as
the moon had disappeared behind clouds, just before her final setting,
could only with difficulty be recognised by an occasional deep rut,
felt by my stick in the soft ground; even this track at length forked
out into two others--one penetrating into a wood on my right; the
other opener, and with only scattered trees by its side, to the left.
The latter seemed the most promising, and was accordingly selected,
and followed for about ten minutes, when it, too, came upon the skirts
of another wood in the opposite direction. It seemed, besides, as well
as I could judge from some faint glimpses I now got of the surrounding
country in a momentary gleam of moonlight, to be leading me wide of my
goal: and I accordingly retraced my steps once more to where the road
had divided, and taking the recently slighted right-hand path, dived
in desperation in between the trees, amidst 'darkness that might be
felt.' Walki