168 MY DEVON YEAR 



moves alone and looks at the corn ; here another 

 meets a companion, and they praise the fair weather 

 and go on their way ; here lovers wander together, 

 and the ruddy light is woven into their dream of 

 happiness. Unconsciously their hopes are touched by 

 the evening glow ; unknown to him it steals to the 

 boy's understanding, wakes a dumb sense of the ideal 

 hidden even within a rustic breast at love time, in- 

 spires a vague, fleeting emotion, flashes into his being 

 as he kisses the girl and shadows forth a joy resulting 

 to him from her worship a joy beyond possession. 

 And the red light that makes her white sun-bonnet 

 so rosy gladdens the maid's heart also and softens 

 her voice, and sets a pathetic token in her innocent, 

 childish eyes as she lifts them up to him. 



Rest well won is the message of this lingering 

 radiance. It dwells on the pine woods with gentle- 

 ness, and lights the pigeon's wing as he clatters 

 upward ; it lies in level spaces on the meadows and 

 reddens the rabbits at their evening play. It expresses 

 itself musically in the last song of the thrush ; it kisses 

 the river's face, enriches foam and fret of falling water 

 with jewels unnumbered, or paints the smooth, deep 

 reaches with images from the sky ; it transforms the 

 colours of the flower, wins the blush of whole orchards 

 that take the sunset gloriously ; seeks the great, pure 

 umbel-bearers, who for a moment change their colour 

 in its ardent kiss. On wastes and woodlands, down 

 old grass-grown lanes, through the avenues of the 

 trees, and by forgotten ways, long since restored to 



