r a slight
headache. Before getting into bed she went to the window, and lifted the
white curtains that hung across it. The moon was shining, though not as
yet into the valley, but just peeping above the ridge of the down, where
the white cones of the encampment were softly touched by its light. The
quarter-guard and foremost tents showed themselves prominently; but the
body of the camp, the officers' tents, kitchens, canteen, and
appurtenances in the rear were blotted out by the ground, because of its
height above her. She could discern the forms of one or two sentries
moving to and fro across the disc of the moon at intervals. She could
hear the frequent shuffling and tossing of the horses tied to the
pickets; and in the other direction the miles-long voice of the sea,
whispering a louder note at those points of its length where hampered in
its ebb and flow by some jutting promontory or group of boulders. Louder
sounds suddenly broke this approach to silence; they came from the camp
of dragoons, were taken up further to the right by the camp of the
Hanoverians, and further on still by the body of infantry. It was
tattoo. Feeling no desire to sleep, she listened yet longer, looked at
Charles's Wain swinging over the church tower, and the moon ascending
higher and higher over the right-hand streets of tents, where, instead of
parade and bustle, there was nothing going on but snores and dreams, the
tired soldiers lying by this time under their proper canvases, radiating
like spokes from the pole of each tent.

At last Anne gave up thinking, and retired like the rest. The night wore
on, and, except the occasional 'All's well' of the sentries, no voice was
heard in the camp or in the village below.

III. THE MILL BECOMES AN IMPORTANT CENTRE OF OPERATIONS

The next morning Miss Garland awoke with an impression that something
more than usual was going on, and she recognized as soon as she could
clearly reason that the proceedings, whatever they might be, lay not far
away from her bedroom window. The sounds were chiefly those of pickaxes
and shovels. Anne got up, and, lifting the corner of the curtain about
an inch, peeped out.

A number of soldiers were busily engaged in making a zigzag path down the
incline from the camp to the river-head at the back of the house, and
judging from the quantity of work already got through they must have
begun very early. Squads of men were working at several equidista