quite without trees too, and the river wound very much, making all kinds
of quaint curves, and on the side where I stood there grew nothing but
long grass, but on the other side grew, quite on to the horizon, a great
sea of red corn-poppies, only paths of white lilies wound all among them,
with here and there a great golden sun-flower. So I looked down at the
river by my feet, and saw how blue it was, and how, as the stream went
swiftly by, it swayed to and fro the long green weeds, and I stood and
looked at the river for long, till at last I felt some one touch me on
the shoulder, and, looking round, I saw standing by me my friend Amyot,
whom I love better than any one else in the world, but I thought in my
dream that I was frightened when I saw him, for his face had changed so,
it was so bright and almost transparent, and his eyes gleamed and shone
as I had never seen them do before. Oh! he was so wondrously beautiful,
so fearfully beautiful! and as I looked at him the distant music swelled,
and seemed to come close up to me, and then swept by us, and fainted
away, at last died off entirely; and then I felt sick at heart, and
faint, and parched, and I stooped to drink of the water of the river, and
as soon as the water touched my lips, lo! the river vanished, and the
flat country with its poppies and lilies, and I dreamed that I was in a
boat by myself again, floating in an almost land-locked bay of the
northern sea, under a cliff of dark basalt. I was lying on my back in
the boat, looking up at the intensely blue sky, and a long low swell from
the outer sea lifted the boat up and let it fall again and carried it
gradually nearer and nearer towards the dark cliff; and as I moved on, I
saw at last, on the top of the cliff, a castle, with many towers, and on
the highest tower of the castle there was a great white banner floating,
with a red chevron on it, and three golden stars on the chevron;
presently I saw too on one of the towers, growing in a cranny of the worn
stones, a great bunch of golden and blood-red wall-flowers, and I watched
the wall-flowers and banner for long; when suddenly I heard a trumpet