IN THE RAIN 363 



wood altogether, in the mist and gathering dusk. So 

 we drive them by platoons till, with one great roll of 

 thunder, the whole army at length rises and makes 

 back on both flanks to the place from which they 

 were originally disturbed. The starlings that roost 

 in the hazel rods, we imagine, have not performed 

 this evening their bedtime evolutions. As we pass 

 through the midst of their dormitory, an occasional 

 whistle proclaims the fact that they have not yet quite 

 sunk to sleep. Yet it is well past four, and only 

 owing to the superior refractive power of a damp 

 evening can we see to the south a staining of our 

 woolly nightcap that proclaims that there the sun 

 has set in a splendour that only those that soar above 

 the mist can see. 



