What a night it was! The moon was shining at the full from a sky of deep blue that was studded with stars. Not a breath of wind was stirring. The slow beat of the water on the shingle came to the ear over the light lap against the boat. The mere stretched miles away. It seemed to be as still as a white feather on the face of the dead, and to be alive with light. Where the swift but silent current was cut asunder by a rock, the phosphorescent gleams sent up sheets of brightness. The boat, which rolled slowly, half-afloat and half-ashore, was bordered by a fringe of silver. When at one moment a gentle breeze lifted the water into ripples, countless stars floated, down a white waterway from yonder argent moon. Not a house on the banks of the mere; not a sign of life; only the low plash of wavelets on the pebbles. Hark! What cry was that coming clear and shrill? It was the curlew. And when the night bird was gone she left a silence deeper than before.
The citizens, lads and lasses, old men and dames, got into the boat. Robbie Anderson and three other young fellows took the oars.
“We'll row ourselves up in a twinkling,” said Liza, as Ralph and Willy pushed the keel off the shingle.
“Hark ye the lass!” cried Mattha. “We hounds slew the hare, quo' the terrier to the cur.”
The sage has fired off the last rustic proverb that we shall ever hear from his garrulous old lips.
When they were fairly afloat, and rowing hard up the stream, the girls started a song.
The three who stood together at the Water's Head listened long to the dying voices.
A step on the path broke their trance. It was a lone woman, bent and feeble. She went by them without a word.
The brothers exchanged a look.
“Poor Joe,” said Rotha, almost in a whisper.