A NIGHT OUT 157 



Touch wood, and like magic, the whole scene 

 is changed. The haystack becomes a tree, and 

 a calf shed springs up where there had been a 

 willow. The avenue is the gap of a dead tree in 

 the wood, an open field wheels into position and 

 occupies the place of a larch copse. All because 

 one familiar object in a world of mystery has been 

 identified. As soon as I touched the top rail of a 

 gate, unsubstantial in the dark as all the rest, I 

 found myself to my surprise at the south end of the 

 wood instead of the north. It is the gate of the 

 outermost field of Dingle Farm. 



Here are the white campions again, faintly 

 swimming out of the night in a field that only 

 memory knows is of sainfoin. The night- jar no 

 longer flies over, though he may give another 

 rattle just before dawn. By persistent peering I 

 can see quite close to the path the tops of the 

 grass, though nothing of the rest of the blade. 

 It might be a sudd floating on the sea, or the top- 

 most fronds of a tall forest. And though it is 

 undoubtedly grass it has no colour but grey. When 

 I grope and find flowers they too are grey. Grey 

 geraniums that I know to be blue, grey prunella, 

 grey rest-harrow, grey basil and centaury. 



Over the wall from the campion field stretches 

 a high and open ploughed field. Here is seen 

 the first colour of the day, for the strong red soil 

 just shows a glimpse of its quality. Somewhere 

 at the far end of the ploughing wails a lapwing. 

 A grey moth, traceable in flight because it has 



