A great stillness lay upon the oasis and the desert around. Men and beasts were sleeping, only these two waking, just here, just now. After a moment the dervish spoke again. "The holder-back is the sense of disunity. Sit fast and gather yourself to yourself.... Then will you find how large is your brood!"
He rose, stood a moment above Glenfernie, then went away. The man whom he left sat on, struck from within by fresh shafts. Perception now came in this way, with inner beam. How huge was the landscape that it lighted up!... Alexander sat still. He bent his head—there was a sense, extending to the physical, of a broken shell, of escape, freedom.... He found that he was weeping. He lay upon the sand, and the tears came as they might from a young boy. When they were past, when he lifted himself again, the morning star was in the sky.
CHAPTER XXXI
Strickland, in the deep summer glen, saw before him the feather of smoke from Mother Binning's cot. The singing stream ran clearly, the sky arched blue above. The air held calm and fine, filled as it were with golden points. He met a white hen and her brood, he heard the slow drone of Mother Binning's wheel. She sat in the doorway, an old wise wife, active still.
"Eh, mon, and it's you!—Wish, and afttimes ye'll get!" She pushed her wheel aside. "I've had a feeling a' the day!"
Strickland leaned against her ash-tree. "It's high summer, Mother—one of the poised, blissful days."
"Aye. I've a feeling.... Hae ye ony news at the House?"
"Alice sings beautifully this summer. Jamie is marrying down in England—beauty and worth he says, and they say."