bed
earlier!" laughs the conductor as he pulls her aboard.

"Toot! Toot!" And off goes the little get-off-the-track again, rocking
and rumbling along past desert stretches of sand dunes screening the
blue sea; past modern villas, isolated horrors in brick, pink, and baby
blue, carefully planted away from the trees. Then suddenly the desert is
left behind! Past the greenest of fields now, dotted with sleek, grazing
cattle; past groves of pine; past snug Norman farms with low-thatched
roofs half-smothered in yellow roses. Again the dunes, as the toy train
swings nearer the sea. They are no longer desert wastes of sand and
wire-grass, but covered now with a riot of growing things, running in
one rich congested sweep of orchards, pastures, feathery woodlands and
matted hedges down to the very edge of the blue sea.

A sudden turn, and the toy train creeps out of a grove of pines to the
open bay. It is high tide. A flight of plover, startled by the engine,
go wheeling away in a silver streak to a spit of sand running out from
the marsh. A puff of smoke from the sand-spit, and the band leaves two
of its members to a gentleman in new leather leggings; then, whistling
over the calamity that has befallen them, they wheel again and strike
for the open sea and safety.

Far across the expanse of rippling turquoise water stands a white
lighthouse that at dusk is set with a yellow diamond. Snug at the lower
end of the bay, a long mile from where the plovers rise, lies the lost
village. Now the toy train is crawling through its crooked single
street, the engine-bell ringing furiously that stray dogs and children,
and a panicky flock of sheep may have time to get out of the way. The
sheep are in charge of a rough little dog with a cast in one eye and a
slim, barelegged girl who apologizes a dozen times to monsieur the
engineer between her cries to her flock.

"They are not very well brought up, my little one--those sacred mutton
of yours," remarks the engineer as he comes to a dead stop, jumps out of
his cab, and helps straighten out the tangle.

"Ah, monsieur!" sighs the girl in despair. "What will you have? It is
the little black one that is always to blame!"

The busy dog crowds them steadily into line. He seems to be everywhere
at once, darting from right to left, now rounding up a stubborn ewe and
her first-born, now cornering the black one.

"Toot! Toot!" And the little get-off-the-track goes rumbling on through
the villa