As I wandered up into the woods, followed by the lagging Tony, I knew it was going to be a very hot day, though it was not nearly so hot at present as Tony pretended. I hunted about till I had found a pleasant place――where the rising ground formed a kind of natural couch, covered with golden moss and bracken, and where the sun at noon would not be too strong as it dropped down through thick green beech branches. I took my book from my pocket, but it was only to make myself more comfortable, not with any intention of reading. I lay there and let the green summer morning steal into my soul, staining my mind to its own deep cool colour, while Tony gnawed at the trunk of a fallen tree, stripping off the bark in sheets, till he was tired and hot, when he came over beside me and stretched himself on the bracken, with his red tongue hanging out and his eyes nearly closed. And I lay on in the enchanted morning, my hands under my head, gazing up through the flat, shady branches, and thinking “long, long thoughts.” Already I seemed to have cast from me, as a snake his old skin, the weight and grime of a year of town life; already I felt better, cleaner, felt the sap of my youth fresh and strong within me. After an hour or two I opened my book and began to read:―― “If music be the food of love, play on; Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken, and so die. That strain again! it had a dying fall; O! it came o’er my ear like the sweet sound That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour....” I was lost in that world of poetry and music, of lingering melodies and songs, dreamy and happy and sad. Romance! romance! I felt it stirring in my blood, singing within me! This play of passion, where passion is never stormy, but a kind of dreaming of love, exactly suited my present mood. Love was the world I lived in, love was in the rustling of the beech-leaves, love was in the breaking of the invisible sea, love was even in the snores of Tony. I closed the book, my mind filled with laughter and love and poetry. Beautiful figures glided before me through the sun-washed, leaf-green air――Viola in her boy’s clothes――Olivia――moving in an atmosphere of sensuous sweetness. I imagined myself a page, visiting Olivia in her palace; I imagined her falling in love with me; I began to weave a romance of my own, in which scenes from other romances lingered, the music of their words....