possibly his appearance had prevented her from having her bath
that morning. If he should have the good fortune to see her again,
he would show her a place far fitter for the purpose--a perfect
arbour of rocks, utterly secluded, with a floor of deep sand, and
without a hole for crab or lobster.

His road led him in the direction of a few cottages lying in
a hollow. Beside them rose a vision of trees, bordered by an ivy
grown wall, from amidst whose summits shot the spire of the church;
and from beyond the spire, through the trees, came golden glimmers
as of vane and crescent and pinnacled ball, that hinted at some
shadowy abode of enchantment within; but as he descended the slope
towards the cottages the trees gradually rose and shut in everything.

These cottages were far more ancient than the houses of the town,
were covered with green thatch, were buried in ivy, and would
soon be radiant with roses and honeysuckles. They were gathered
irregularly about a gate of curious old ironwork, opening on the
churchyard, but more like an entrance to the grounds behind the
church, for it told of ancient state, bearing on each of its pillars
a great stone heron with a fish in its beak.

This was the quarter whence had come the noises of children, but
they had now ceased, or rather sunk into a gentle murmur, which
oozed, like the sound of bees from a straw covered beehive, out
of a cottage rather larger than the rest, which stood close by the
churchyard gate. It was the parish school, and these cottages were
all that remained of the old town of Portlossie, which had at one
time stretched in a long irregular street almost to the shore.
The town cross yet stood, but away solitary on a green hill that