Sir Theodore Martin
The Gresham Salver




CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY


North-West Donegal. A fine afternoon in September. The mountain ranges
were bathed in sunshine and the scarred and seamy face of stern old
Errigal seemed almost to smile. A gentle breeze stirred the air and the
surface of the lakes lay shimmering in the soft autumnal light. The blue
sky, flecked with white cloudlets, the purple of the heather, the dark
hues of the bogs, the varied greens of bracken, ferns and grass, the gold
of ripening grain, and the grey of the mountain boulders, together formed
a harmony of colour which charmed the eye and soothed the mind.

I had been travelling most of the day by railway through this delightful
country, not by an express that rushed you through the scenery with
breathless haste, but by an easy-going mixed train which called at every
station. Sometimes its speed reached twenty-five miles an hour, but
never more, and because of numerous curves and gradients--for it was a
narrow gauge and more or less a surface line--the rate of progress was
much less during the greater part of the journey.

The work of the day was over. My companion and I had dined at the
Gweedore Hotel, where we were staying for the night. With the setting
sun the breeze had died away. Perfect stillness and a silence deep,