MOORLAND IDYLLS. 



But to me the actual world as it stands is 

 beautiful. I love to descry the very contour 

 of the hills ; I love to watch from afar the 

 saucer-shaped combes on the flanks of the 

 South Downs, when the afternoon light 

 floods and bathes them in its glory. Illusion 

 to my mind is less lovely than reality. 

 Nothing on earth seems more beautiful than 

 Truth. I love to catch her face behind the 

 clouds that conceal her. 



And now it is the plain unvarnished Truth 

 I am going to give you in this Moorland 

 Idyll. I am going to tell you just what we 

 saw to-day, without one episode or incident 

 save what really occurred to us. I could 

 not make that stroll more exquisite than I 

 found it, if I tried till Doomsday. It was an 

 idyll of real life. May many more so come 

 to me! 



We strayed together the Poet, Elsie, 

 Lucy, and myself across the moor to High- 

 field, in search of strawberries. Highfield 

 lies some two miles off, at the beginning of 

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