I must have toiled for many miles in this dreary fashion, sometimes
coming upon shallower mud and sometimes upon deeper, but never making my
way on to the dry, when I perceived through the gloom something which
turned my heart even heavier than it had been before. This was a
curious clump of some whitish shrub--cotton-grass of a flowering
variety--which glimmered suddenly before me in the darkness. Now, an
hour earlier I had passed just such a square-headed, whitish clump; so
that I was confirmed in the opinion which I had already begun to form,
that I was wandering in a circle. To make it certain I stooped down,
striking a momentary flash from my tinder-box, and there sure enough was
my own old track very clearly marked in the brown mud in front of me.
At this confirmation of my worst fears I threw my eyes up to heaven in
my despair, and there I saw something which for the first time gave me a
clue in the uncertainty which surrounded me.

It was nothing else than a glimpse of the moon between two flowing
clouds. This in itself might have been of small avail to me, but over
its white face was marked a long thin V, which shot swiftly across like
a shaftless arrow. It was a flock of wild ducks, and its flight was in
the same direction as that towards which my face was turned. Now, I had
observed in Kent how all these creatures come further inland when there
is rough weather breaking, so I made no doubt that their course
indicated the path which would lead me away from the sea. I struggled
on, therefore, taking every precaution to walk in a straight line, above
all being very careful to make a stride of equal length with either leg,
until at last, after half an hour or so, my perseverance was rewarded by
the welcome sight of a little yellow light, as from a cottage window,
glimmering through the darkness. Ah, how it shone through my eyes and
down into my heart, glowing and twinkling there, that little golden
speck, which meant food, and rest, and life itself to the wanderer!