d upright and stock-still. By the whiteness
of the pack-saddle, I could see Modestine walking round and round at the
length of her tether; I could hear her steadily munching at the sward;
but there was not another sound, save the indescribable quiet talk of
the runnel over the stones. I lay lazily smoking and studying the colour
of the sky, as we call the void of space, from where it showed a reddish
grey behind the pines to where it showed a glossy blue-black between the
stars. As if to be more like a pedlar, I wear a silver ring. This I
could see faintly shining as I raised or lowered the cigarette; and at
each whiff the inside of my hand was illuminated, and became for a
second the highest light in the landscape.

A faint wind, more like a moving coolness than a stream of air, passed
down the glade from time to time; so that even in my great chamber the
air was being renewed all night long. I thought with horror of the inn
at Chasserades and the congregated nightcaps; with horror of the
nocturnal prowesses of clerks and students, of hot theatres and
pass-keys and close rooms. I have not often enjoyed a more serene
possession of myself, nor felt more independent of material aids. The
outer world, from which we cower into our houses, seemed after all a
gentle habitable place; and night after night a man's bed, it seemed,
was laid and waiting for him in the fields, where God keeps an open
house. I thought I had rediscovered one of those truths which are
revealed to savages and hid from political economists; at the least, I
had discovered a new pleasure for myself. And yet even while I was
exulting in my solitude I became aware of a strange lack. I wished a
companion to lie near me in the starlight, silent and not moving, but
ever within touch. For there is a fellowship more quiet even than
solitude, and which rightly understood, is solitude made perfect. And to
live out of doors with the woman a man loves is of all lives the most
complete and free.

As I thus lay, between content and longing, a faint noise stole towards
me through the pines. I thought, at first, it was the crowing of cocks
or the barking of dogs at some very distant farm; but steadily and
gradually it took articulate shape in my ears, until I became aware
that a passenger was going by upon the high-road in the valley, and
singing loudly as he went. There was more of good-will than grace in his
performance; but he trolled with ample lungs; and the sound