which was somewhat marred by being complicated in an inexplicable
fashion with the story of Jonah.

"Talking of Jonah," he said solemnly, with a happy disregard of the fact
that he had declined to answer several eager questions put to him on the
subject, "look at the strange tales sailors tell us."

"I wouldn't advise you to believe all those," said a bluff, clean-shaven
man, who had been listening without speaking much. "You see when a
sailor gets ashore he's expected to have something to tell, and his
friends would be rather disappointed if he had not."

"It's a well-known fact," interrupted the first speaker firmly, "that
sailors are very prone to see visions."

"They are," said the other dryly, "they generally see them in pairs, and
the shock to the nervous system frequently causes headache next morning."

"You never saw anything yourself?" suggested an unbeliever.

"Man and boy," said the other, "I've been at sea thirty years, and the
only unpleasant incident of that kind occurred in a quiet English
countryside."

"And that?" said another man.

"I was a young man at the time," said the narrator, drawing at his pipe
and glancing good-humouredly at the company. "I, had just come back from
China, and my own people being away I went down into the country to
invite myself to stay with an uncle. When I got down to the place I
found it closed and the family in the South of France; but as they were
due back in a couple of days I decided to put up at the Royal George,
a very decent inn, and await their return.

"The first day I passed well enough; but in the evening the dulness of
the rambling old place, in which I was the only visitor, began to weigh
upon my spirits, and the next morning after a late breakfast I set out
with the intention of having a brisk day's walk.

"I started off in excellent spirits, for the day was bright and frosty,
with a powdering of snow on the iron-bound roads and nipped hedges, and
the country had to me all the charm of novelty. It was certainly flat,
but there was plenty of timber, and the villages through which I passed
were old and picturesque.

"I lunched luxuriously on bread and cheese and beer in the bar of a small
inn, and resolved to go a little further before turning back. When at
length I found I had gone far enough, I turned up a lane at right angles
to the road I was passing, and resolved to find my way back by another
route. It is a long lane that has no turning