make no pretence that I bought the bottle of whiskey that the old
shepherd enjoyed so much without at least some thought of my own
advantage. Yet it was pleasant to reflect that it was due to me that
he had pulled himself together and steadied his shaking hand and
cleared his mind, recovered his memory and his self-respect. He spoke
to me quite clearly, no longer slurring his words; he had seen the
city first one moonlight night when he was lost in the mist on the big
moor, he had wandered far in the mist, and when it lifted he saw the
city by moonlight. He had no food, but luckily had his flask. There
never was such a city, not even in books. Travellers talked sometimes
of Venice seen from the sea, there might be such a place or there
might not, but, whether or no, it was nothing to the city on
Mallington Moor. Men who read books had talked to him in his time,
hundreds of books, but they never could tell of any city like this.
Why, the place was all of marble, roads, walls and palaces, all pure
white marble, and the tops of the tall thin spires were entirely of
gold. And they were queer folk in the city even for foreigners. And
there were camels, but I cut him short for I thought I could judge for
myself, if there was such a place, and, if not, I was wasting my time
as well as a pint of good whiskey. So I got him to speak of the way,
and after more circumlocution than I needed and more talk of the city
he pointed to a tiny track on the black earth just beside us, a little
twisty way you could hardly see.

I said the moor was trackless; untrodden of man or dog it certainly
was and seemed to have less to do with the ways of man than any waste
I have seen, but the track the old shepherd showed me, if track it
was, was no more than the track of a hare--an elf-path the old man
called it, Heaven knows what he meant. And then before I left him he
insisted on giving me his flask with the queer strong rum it