Another hour of silence while the light throbbed and flamed in the
east; then the larks rose harmonious from a neighbouring field, the
rabbits scurried with ears alert to their morning meal, the day had
begun.

I passed through the coppice and out into the fields beyond. The
dew lay heavy on leaf and blade and gossamer, a cool fresh wind
swept clear over dale and down from the sea, and the clover field
rippled like a silvery lake in the breeze.

There is something inexpressibly beautiful in the unused day,
something beautiful in the fact that it is still untouched,
unsoiled; and town and country share alike in this loveliness. At
half-past three on a June morning even London has not assumed her
responsibilities, but smiles and glows lighthearted and smokeless
under the caresses of the morning sun.

Five o'clock. The bell rings out crisp and clear from the
monastery where the Bedesmen of St Hugh watch and pray for the
souls on this labouring forgetful earth. Every hour the note of
comfort and warning cries across the land, tells the Sanctus, the
Angelus, and the Hours of the Passion, and calls to remembrance and
prayer.

When the wind is north, the sound carries as far as my road, and
companies me through the day; and if to His dumb children God in
His mercy reckons work as prayer, most certainly those who have
forged through the ages an unbroken chain of supplication and
thanksgiving will be counted among the stalwart labourers of the