dabbled in was natural history and fairy-tales, and he just took
them as they came, in a sandwichy sort of way, without making any
distinctions; and really his course of reading strikes one as
rather sensible.

One evening the shepherd, who for some nights past had been
disturbed and preoccupied, and off his usual mental balance, came
home all of a tremble, and, sitting down at the table where his
wife and son were peacefully employed, she with her seam, he in
following out the adventures of the Giant with no Heart in his
Body, exclaimed with much agitation:

"It's all up with me, Maria! Never no more can I go up on them
there Downs, was it ever so!"

"Now don't you take on like that," said his wife, who was a
VERY sensible woman: "but tell us all about it first, whatever
it is as has given you this shake-up, and then me and you and the
son here, between us, we ought to be able to get to the bottom of
it!"

"It began some nights ago," said the shepherd. "You know that
cave up there--I never liked it, somehow, and the sheep never
liked it neither, and when sheep don't like a thing there's
generally some reason for it. Well, for some time past there's
been faint noises coming from that cave--noises like heavy
sighings, with grunts mixed up in them; and sometimes a snoring,
far away down--REAL snoring, yet somehow not HONEST
snoring, like you and me o'nights, you know!"