gan to puff and sigh. When they
came to a cross-road he sniffed at it, but never could be sure. The
scent seemed to lie one time in one way, another time in another. Not
being able to make sure of the way home, the pony made it up to himself
in a different direction. He sauntered along, and cooled down. He took a
pull at the grass, nearly snatching the loose reins out of Geoff's small
hands. Then, after having thus secured the proper length, he had a
tolerable meal, a sort of picnic refreshment, not unpleasant; and the
grass was very crisp and fresh. He began to think that it was for this
purpose, to give him a little beneficial change of diet, that he had
been brought out. It was very considerate. Corn is good, and so even is
nice dry, sweet-smelling hay. But of all things in the world, there is
nothing so delightful as the fresh salad with all its juices, the nice
sweet grass with the dew upon it, especially when it is past the season
for grass, and you have been ridden in the sun.

Geoff's mind was pleasurably moved in a different way. The freedom, the
silence, the fresh air, entered into his little being like wine. He had
not much experienced the delights of solitude. A sickly child, who has
to be watched continually, and who is alone in the sense of having no
playmates, no one of his own age near him, has less experience than the
robust of true aloneness. He had been always with his mother, always,
in his mother's brief absences,--so brief that they scarcely told in
the little story of his life,--under the charge of the nurse, who was
entirely devoted to him. He knew all the stories she had to tell by
heart, and yet would have them repeated, with a certain pleasure in the
sound of the words. But his mother,--he never could be sure what she was
going to say. To question her was the chief occupation of his life, and
she never was weary of replying. His days were full of this perpetual
intercourse. So it happened that to get out alone into the absolute
stillness, broken only by the rustle of the leaves, the sound of the
wind as it brought them down, the twitter of the birds, the tinkle of
the little stream, was a new delight to Geoff, unlike anything that had
gone before. And to see miles and miles before him, to see all round,
roads stretching into the unknown, houses and churches and woods, all
nameless and new; was he riding out to seek his fortune, was he going
to conquer the world, was he the prince riding to the