"Let you be listening now, Brian Oge, and let also the scholars be
listening. But whether the scholars do or not, I'm not caring.
A pope once listened to me with great respect, and a marshal of
France and poets without number. But the scholars do be turning
up their noses. And, mind you, I've got as much scholarship as
the next man, as you'll see from my story.

"Barring myself, is there no one in this house that takes snuff?
No! Ah, well, times do be changing."



CHAPTER I

Now it's nearing night on the first day of spring, and you could
see how loath day was to be going for even the short time until
the rising of the sun again. And though there was a chill on the
canals, yet there was great color to the sunset, the red of it on
the water ebbing into orange, and then to purple, and losing itself
in the olive pools near the mooring-ties. And a little wind came up
from the Greek islands, and now surged and fluttered, the way you'd
think a harper might be playing. You'd hear no sound, but the melody
was there. It was the rhythm of spring, that the old people recognize.

But the young people would know it was spring, too, by token of the
gaiety that was in the air. For nothing brings joy to the heart
like the coming of spring. The folk who do be blind all the rest
of the year, their eyes do open then, and a sunset takes them, and
the wee virgin flowers coming up between the stones, or the twitter