Contrary to my expectations, I am suffering neither pain nor inconvenience from my long journey; and as I lie here in my little bed, looking through the curtained window to the long, low range of the Lowther Hills, and listening to the familiar sounds in the village street below, a blissful peace which I cannot express in words possesses me, my physical and my mental organisation seem to have undergone a change, my experience of city life is blotted out and forgotten, and, strangely enough, I feel myself, as of old, a unit of the village community. Queerer still, this placid acceptance of altered circumstances, this dovetailing into a different condition of life and living, seems to me so natural as to be hardly worth noting; and without a pang of regret I leave behind me urban pleasures and duties, and contemplate with equanimity retirement to this rural retreat, a twelvemonth's sojourn midst scenes to me for ever dear. Nor does the fact that this rustication is compulsory distress or annoy me. My physical weakness has reduced me to a state of indifference towards former pursuits. A long illness, following a deplorable accident, has impaired my appetite for social joys; so much so, indeed, that when my doctors--rather apologetically, I thought--informed me that if ever I wished to be well again I must give up my profession and town residence for twelve months at least, and live quietly somewhere in the country, I hailed their verdict with delight, and my yearning heart at once went out to my native village and the home of my old nurse, Betty Grier. Dear old Betty! To whom else could I turn? She is all--of the human element at least--I have left to me of my home life of long ago. My memories of my father are vague and hazy. I was only five when he died; and, through the misty veil of long-gone years, two pictures only of him are impressed upon my mind. In one I see him standing in the narrow whitewashed pantry, his head 'screeving' the ceiling, and his broad shoulders almost excluding the waning western light that glimmered through the small four-paned window. Betty, white-capped and white-aproned, is there also, with a large ashet in her hands, on which lies a long, thick silver fish--a salmon, as I afterwards learned--one of the many he lured from the depths of Mattha's Pool. My mother's arm is lovingly linked in his, and there is a pleased and happy expression on her face, which somehow is transmitted to me, because, with her, I feel proud of the great big man I call my daddy, who has battled so successfully with the strong-looking monster now lying so quiet, with gaping mouth, on Betty's ashet.