VI The Last Sahnon before Close Tivie 445 



away sword of some old Norse god ; so fair and calm 

 that, in spite of one's self, the eye wanders ever and 

 anon from the brown, sharp, ivory-tipped antlers that 

 just peer over the heather before us, and which we 

 have crawled after such a weary way, through moss 

 and peat bog — to gaze on its beauty : — calm enough 

 now, when the breeze only crisps its surface, deaden- 

 ing the purple into a steely blue, but wild and stern 

 enough when the gale sweeps down from the hills, 

 and dashes it in short, crisp, angry waves on the 

 sandy shore of the little birch-fringed bay, and carries 

 the white spray in whirling, ghostly columns across 

 its lead-coloured bosom. Mighty ranges of shivered 

 cliffs overhang it on one side, — their bases a wild mass 

 of moss-grown rock, with the feathering birches 

 balancing themselves about them like birds ready to 

 take wing ; where the roe steps hesitatingly and 

 daintily, so light of footfall that the waiter at the 

 pass — not him of the napkin, but perchance yourself, 

 with the old loved and trusted double — hears not 

 ' the fall of her fairy feet,' till she is so near you that 

 the wire case of your cartridge reaches her heart as 

 soon as the shot ; where the cautious long-eared 

 hinds love to shelter themselves and their calves 

 from the autumnal sun and storm, and where the 

 stag keeps close in the warm summer-time, jealous of 

 his velvety, tumid horns. 



Over on the other side, look at that patch of 

 bright yellow cornfield, with the tufts of dark-green 

 alder by the water-side, and the gray tumble-down 



