green gown was not fully done, and said to herself that she would
consider what she would do with her holiday when she was amidst of
her bathing.

So she went down to the water-side, and when she was standing knee-
deep in the little sandy bight aforesaid, she looked over to Green
Eyot, and was minded to swim over thither, as oft she did. And it
was a windless dawn after a hot night, and a light mist lay upon the
face of the water, and above it rose the greenery of the eyot.

She pushed off into the deep and swam strongly through the still
water, and the sun rose while she was on the way, and by then she had
laid a hand on the willow-twigs of the eyot, was sending a long beam
across the waters; and her wet shoulders rose up into the path of it
and were turned into ruddy gold. She hoisted herself up, and
climbing the low bank, was standing amongst the meadow-sweet, and
dripping on to its fragrance. Then she turned about to the green
plain and the house and the hedge of woodland beyond, and sighed, and
said softly: A pity of it, to leave it! If it were no better
otherwhere, and not so fair?

Then she turned inward to the eyot, which had done her nought but
good, and which she loved; and she unbound her hair, and let it fall
till the ends of the tresses mingled with the heads of the meadow-
sweet, and thereafter walked quietly up into the grassy middle of the
isle.

She was wont to go to a knoll there where the grass was fine, and
flowery at this time with white clover and dog violet, and lie down
under the shade of a big thorn with a much-twisted bole: but to-day