smoke; then, turning to my companion (of the politer sex) with the air of
one who has made himself perfect master of a foreign tongue, he smiled,
and spoke.

"Too-quiet!"

"Precisely; the name of your inn, perhaps, suggests----"

"I change all that--soon I call it Anglo-American hotel."

"Ah! yes; you are very up-to-date already."

He closed one eye and smiled.

Having passed a few more compliments, we saluted and walked on; and,
coming presently to the edge of the cliff, lay down on the thyme and the
crumbled leaf-dust. All the small singing birds had long been shot and
eaten; there came to us no sound but that of the waves swimming in on a
gentle south wind. The wanton creatures seemed stretching out white arms
to the land, flying desperately from a sea of such stupendous serenity;
and over their bare shoulders their hair floated back, pale in the
sunshine. If the air was void of sound, it was full of scent--that
delicious and enlivening perfume of mingled gum, and herbs, and sweet
wood being burned somewhere a long way off; and a silky, golden warmth
slanted on to us through the olives and umbrella pines. Large wine-red
violets were growing near. On such a cliff might Theocritus have lain,
spinning his songs; on that divine sea Odysseus should have passed. And
we felt that presently the goat-god must put his head forth from behind a
rock.