Finally, I came to the last and largest group of all, the end of the village nearest to the sea, within ten minutes' walk of the shingly beach. Here I was glad to rest. Above, on the giant downs, were stony waste places, and heather and gorse, where the rabbits live, and had for neighbours the adder, linnet, and wheatear, and the small grey titlark that soared up and dropped back to earth all day to his tinkling little tune. On the summit of the cliff I had everything I wanted and had come to seek--the wildness and freedom of untilled earth; an unobstructed prospect, hills beyond hills of malachite, stretching away along the coast into infinitude, long leagues of red sea-wall and the wide expanse and everlasting freshness of ocean. And the village itself, the little old straggling place that had so grand a setting, I quickly found that the woman in the cottage had not succeeded in giving me a false impression of her dear home. It was just such a quaint unimproved, old-world, restful place as she had painted. It was surprising to find that there were many visitors, and one wondered where they could all stow themselves. The explanation was that those who visited Branscombe knew it, and preferred its hovels to the palaces of the fashionable seaside town. No cottage was too mean to have its guest. I saw a lady push open the cracked and warped door of an old barn and go in, pulling the door to after her--it was her bed-sitting-room. I watched a party of pretty merry girls marching, single file, down a narrow path past a pig-sty, then climb up a ladder to the window of a loft at the back of a stone cottage and disappear within. It was their bedroom. The relations between the villagers and their visitors were more intimate and kind than is usual. They lived more together, and were more free and easy in company. The men were mostly farm labourers, and after their day's work they would sit out-of-doors on the ground to smoke their pipes; and where the narrow crooked little street was narrowest--at my end of the village--when two men would sit opposite each other, each at his own door, with legs stretched out before them, their boots would very nearly touch in the middle of the road. When walking one had to step over their legs; or, if socially inclined, one could stand by and join in the conversation. When daylight faded the village was very dark--no lamp for the visitors--and very silent, only the low murmur of the sea on the shingle was audible, and the gurgling sound of a swift streamlet flowing from the hill above and hurrying through the village to mingle with the Branscombe lower down in the meadows. Such a profound darkness and quiet one expects in an inland agricultural village; here, where there were visitors from many distant towns, it was novel and infinitely refreshing.