creatures in our neighborhood, that we have escaped out of the Bastille of civilization, and are become, for the time being, a mere kindly animal and a sheep of Nature's flock.

When that hour came to me among the pines, I wakened thirsty. My tin was standing by me, half full of water. I emptied it at a draft. The stars were clear, colored and jewellike, but not frosty. A faint silvery vapor stood for the Milky Way. All around me the black fir points stood upright and stock-still. By the whiteness of the packsaddle, Io I could see Modestine walking round and round at the length of the 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 color of the sky, as 15 we call the void of space, from where it showed a reddish gray behind the pines to where it showed a glossy blueblack between the stars.

A faint wind, more like a moving coolness than a stream of air, passed down the glade from time to time; so that 20 even in my great chamber the air was being renewed all night long. 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 25 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 30 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.

ΙΟ

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 5 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 highroad of 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 of his voice took hold upon the hillside and set the air shaking in the leafy glens. I have heard people passing by night in sleeping cities; some of them sang; one, I remember, played loudly on the bagpipes. I have heard the rattle of a cart or carriage spring 15 up suddenly after hours of stillness and pass, for some minutes, within the range of my hearing as I lay abed. There is a romance about all who are abroad in the black hours, and with something of a thrill we try to guess their business. But here the romance was double: first, this 20 glad passenger, who sent up his voice in music through the night; and then I, on the other hand, buckled into my sack, and smoking alone in the pine woods between four and five thousand feet towards the stars.

When I awoke again (Sunday, 29th September) many of 25 the stars had disappeared, only the stronger companions of the night still burned visibly overhead; and away towards the east I saw a faint haze of light upon the horizon, such as had been the Milky Way when I was last awake. Day was at hand. I lit my lantern, and by its glowworm light put on my boots and gaiters; then I broke up some bread for Modestine, filled my can at the water tap, and

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lit my spirit lamp to boil myself some chocolate. The blue darkness lay long in the glade where I had so sweetly slumbered; but soon there was a broad streak of orange melting into gold along the mountain top of Vivarais. 5 A solemn glee possessed my mind at this gradual and lovely coming in of day. I heard the runnel with delight; I looked round me for something beautiful and unexpected; but the still black pine trees, the hollow glade, the munching ass, remained unchanged in figure. Nothing had 10 altered but the light, and that, indeed, shed over all a spirit of life and of breathing peace, and moved me to a strange exhilaration.

I drank my water chocolate, which was hot if it was not rich, and strolled here and there, and up and down about 15 the glade. While I was thus delaying, a gush of steady wind, as long as a heavy sigh, poured direct out of the quarter of the morning. It was cold and set me sneezing. The trees near at hand tossed their black plumes in its passage; and I could see the thin, distant spires of pines 20 along the edge of the hill, rock slightly to and fro against the golden east. Ten minutes after, the sunlight spread at a gallop along the hillside, scattering shadows and sparkles, and the day had come completely.

I hastened to prepare my pack, and tackle the steep 25 ascent that lay before me; but I had something on my mind. It was only a fancy; yet a fancy will sometimes be importunate. I had been most hospitably received and punctually served in my green caravansary. The room was airy, the water excellent, and the dawn had called me 30 to a moment. I say nothing of the tapestries or the inimitable ceiling, nor yet of the view which I commanded from the windows; but I felt I was in some one's debt for all

this liberal entertainment. And so it pleased me, in a half-laughing way, to leave pieces of money on the turf as I went along, until I had left enough for my night's lodging. I trust they did not fall to some rich and churlish drover.

- Travels with a Donkey.

1. What did Stevenson see during the night? What did he hear? How did he feel? The details are not unlike those in Robinson Crusoe.

2. Re-read the first paragraph, page 178, and tell what its chief idea is. Select the paragraph in which the description is clearest to you. Read it aloud. Observe how the simple words are arranged to make pictures and to produce rhythm. Stevenson rewrote many times to get this easy clearness.

3. If you have ever slept out of doors what impressed you most? What sounds did Stevenson probably fail to hear? Was he a naturalist?

4. Stevenson was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1850. He belonged to a family of civil engineers. His health was always poor, so he traveled a great deal. He went to France and to Switzerland. He came to America and spent some time in the Adirondacks. Finally he settled on an island far out in the Pacific Ocean, where he lived till his death, in 1894. In spite of his poor health, he was a busy writer of novels, essays, short stories, and verse.

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AUTUMN ON THE FARM

BY JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER

This is a poetic description of an old-fashioned autumn scene on a New England farm. The huskers in the field merely jerked the ear of corn from its stalk, leaving the husk on the ear. The husks were afterwards removed in the barn at a big husking bee or picnic, in which the neighbors took part. Read the poem for its pictures.

Through a thin, dry mist, that morning,
The sun rose broad and red;
At first a rayless disk of fire,
He brightened as he sped;
Yet even his noontide glory

Fell chastened and subdued
On the cornfields and the orchards
And softly pictured wood.

And all that quiet afternoon,
Slow sloping to the night,
He wove with golden shuttle

The haze with yellow light;