sack, did not take my curiosity in good part, but glared at me
morosely. The younger men of this interesting community were
elsewhere--perhaps mending saucepans, or reassuring ducks alarmed by
the thunderstorm. A musician of the party must have been kept in by
the bad weather, for from one of the caravans came the diabolic
screech of a wheezing concertina that had got rid of all its ideals
and dreams of distinction.

The bright line in the west moved very slowly upwards, and the rain
continued to fall, although less drenchingly than before. The setting
sun strove with the cloud-rack and coloured the veil of vapour that
its rays could not pierce. The nightingales and thrushes in the
shrubs, and the finches amidst the later blossoms of the may, took
heart again, and the song rose from so many throats near and far that
the whole valley of the Dordogne was filled with warbling. As the
birds grew drowsy the frogs came out to spend a happy night on the
margins of the pools and the brooks, until their joyful screaming and
croaking was a universal chorus. I was by the side of the broad river
that flowed calmly through the fairest meadows. The face of the
stream, the pools in the road, the grass and the leaves, were
brightened with the orange glow of a veiled light as of some sacred
fire shining in the dusk through clouds of incense. It grew warmer and
warmer until it purpled and died away in grayness and mournful shadow.
The beauty of nature at such moments, when the colours brighten and
fade like the powers of the mind as the human day is closing, takes a
solemnity that is unearthly, and it is good to be alone with the
mystery.

It was dark when I reached Carennac. I did not realize how wet I was
until I sat down in an auberge and tried to make myself comfortable