have the whole stage to themselves. As like as not they'll weary of the
play, and of themselves, if left alone. No harm will come of all the
sentimental strutting and the romantic attitudinizing, other than
viewing the scene, later, in perspective, as a rather amusing bit of
emotional farce.

Besides being in the very height of the spring fashion, in the matter
of the sentiments, these two were also busily treading, at just this
particular moment, the most alluring of all the paths leading to what
may be termed the outlying territorial domain of the emotions; they
were wandering through the land called Mutual Discovery. Now, this, I
have always held, is among the most delectable of all the roads of
life; for it may lead one--anywhere or nowhere.

Therefore it was from a purely generous impulse that I continued to
look at the view. The surroundings were, in truth, in conspiracy with
the sentimentalists on the front seat; the extreme beauty of the road
would have made any but sentimental egotists oblivious to all else. The
road was a continuation of the one we had followed in the morning's
drive. Again, all the greenness of field and grass was braided,
inextricably, into the blue of river and ocean. Above, as before, in
that earlier morning drive, towered the giant aisles of the beaches
and elms. Through those aisles the radiant Normandy landscape flowed
again, as music from rich organ-piped throats flows through cathedral
arches. Out yonder, on the Seine's wide mouth, the boats were balancing
themselves, as if they also were half divided between a doubt and a
longing; a freshening spurt of breeze filled their flapping sails, and
away they sped, skipping through the waters with all the gayety which
comes with the vigor of fresh resolutions. The light that fell over the
land and waters was dazzling, and yet of an astonishing limpidity; only