needed quiet and freedom! The afternoon
sun enveloped him in a delicious warmth, the shadows on the grass
danced gayly, as a faint breeze stirred the branches above his head,
the merry little stream near by seemed to prattle of endless content.

The frown above Horace's eyes disappeared, and with it his inner
annoyance. Florus was a dear fellow, after all, and although he
intended to write him a piece of his mind, he would do it in hexameters,
more for his amusement than for his edification. It would be a pretty
task for the morning hours to-morrow. Now he meant to be still, and
forget his writing tablets altogether. He was glad that his house
was empty of guests, much as he had enjoyed the preceding week when
a lively company had come over from Tibur, in whose retreat they were
spending September, to hunt him out. They had had charming dinners
together, falling easily into conversations that were worth while,
and by tacit consent forgetting the inanities of town gossip. But
at present he liked the quiet even better. He had been walking about
his little place more regularly, laughing at his steward who often
grew impatient over the tiny crops, and assuring himself of the
comfort of the few slaves who ran the farm. And on more extended walks
he had felt once more, as he had so often in these long years, the
charm of the village people near him, with their friendly manners,
their patient devotion to work, and their childlike enjoyment of
country holidays.

Certainly, as he grew older and his physical energy diminished (he
had not been really well since he was a very young man, and now before
his time he felt old), he appreciated more and more his good fortune
in owning a corner of the earth so situated. He remembered with
amusement that in earlier days he sometimes used to feel bored by
the solitude of his farm, at the end of his journey from Rome, and
wonder why he had left the lively city. But that was when he was young
enough to enjoy the bustle of the streets, and, especially in the
evenings, to join the crowds of pleasure-seekers and watch the
fortune-tellers and their victims. That he could mingle
inconspicuously with the populace he had always counted one of the
chief rewards of an inconspicuous income. Now, the quiet of the
country and the leisure for reading seemed so much more important.
He was not even as anxious as he used to be to go to fashionable Tibur
or Tarentum or Baiae in search of refreshment. How pl