ked away back in the ages. For though I'm attracted by the
place, I'm frightened too!"

There seemed no room for fear in the delicate landscape now opening
before them. In front, in groves of birch and rowan, smoked the first
houses of a tiny village. The road had become a green "loaning," on
the ample margin of which cattle grazed. The moorland still showed
itself in spits of heather, and some distance off, where a rivulet ran
in a hollow, there were signs of a fire and figures near it. These last
Mr. Heritage regarded with disapproval.

"Some infernal trippers!" he murmured. "Or Boy Scouts. They desecrate
everything. Why can't the TUNICATUS POPELLUS keep away from a paradise
like this!" Dickson, a democrat who felt nothing incongruous in the
presence of other holiday-makers, was meditating a sharp rejoinder,
when Mr. Heritage's tone changed.

"Ye gods! What a village!" he cried, as they turned a corner. There
were not more than a dozen whitewashed houses, all set in little
gardens of wallflower and daffodil and early fruit blossom. A triangle
of green filled the intervening space, and in it stood an ancient
wooden pump. There was no schoolhouse or kirk; not even a
post-office--only a red box in a cottage side. Beyond rose the high
wall and the dark trees of the demesne, and to the right up a by-road
which clung to the park edge stood a two-storeyed building which bore
the legend "The Cruives Inn."

The Poet became lyrical. "At last!" he cried. "The village of my
dreams! Not a sign of commerce! No church or school or beastly
recreation hall! Nothing but these divine little cottages and an
ancient pub! Dogson, I warn you, I'm going to have the devil of a
tea." And he declaimed:

"Thou shalt hear a song
After a while which Gods may listen to;
But place the flask upon the board and wait
Until the stranger hath allayed his thirst,
For poets, grasshoppers, and nightingales
Sing cheerily but when the throat is moist."

Dickson, too, longed with sensual gusto for tea. But, as they drew
nearer, the inn lost its hospitable look. The cobbles of the yard were
weedy, as if rarely visited by traffic, a pane in a window was broken,
and the blinds hung tattered. The garden was a wilderness, and the
doorstep had not been scoured for weeks. But the place had a landlord,
for he had seen them approach and was waiting at the door to meet them.

He was a big man in his shirt sleeves,