As soon as supper was over and cleared away, Gratian set to work at his lessons with a light heart. It was wonderful how much easier and more interesting they seemed now that he really gave his whole attention, and especially since he had tried to understand what the teacher had said about them. "If only I had tried like this before, how much further on I should be now," he could not help saying to himself with a sigh. "And the queer thing is, that the more I try the more I want to try. My head begins to feel so much tidier." But with all the goodwill in the world, at nine years old a head cannot do _very_ much at a time. Gratian had finished all the lessons he _had_ to do for the next day and was going back in his books with the wish to learn over again, and more thoroughly, much that he had not before really taken in or understood, when to his distress his poor little head bumped down on to the volume before him, and he found by the start that he was going to sleep! Still it wasn't very late--mother had said nothing yet about bed-time. "It is that I have got into such a stupid, lazy way of learning, I suppose," he said to himself, getting up from his seat. "Perhaps the air will wake me up a bit," and he went through the little entrance hall and stood in the porch, looking out. It was a very different night from the last. All was so still and calm that for once the name of the Farm did not seem to suit it. Gratian leant against the door-post, looking up to the sky, and just then, like the evening before, old Jonas, followed by Watch, came round the corner. "Good evening, Jonas," said the boy. "How quiet it is to-night! There wasn't much of a storm after all." "No, Master Gratian," replied the shepherd; "I told you they were only a-knocking about a bit to keep their hands in;" and he too stood still and looked up at the sky. "I don't like it so still as this," said the boy. "It doesn't seem right. I came out here for a breath of air to wake me up. I've been working hard at my lessons, Jonas; I'm going always to work hard now. But I wish I wasn't sleepy." "Sign that you've worked enough for to-night, maybe," said Jonas. But as he spoke, Gratian started. "Jonas," he said, "did you see a sort of light down there--across the grass there in front, a sort of golden-looking flash? ah, there it is again," and just at the same moment a soft, almost warm waft of air seemed to float across his face, and Gratian fancied he heard the words, "good boy, good boy." "'Tis a breath of south wind getting up," said old Jonas quietly. "I've often thought to myself that there's colours in the winds, Master Gratian, though folk would laugh at me for an old silly if I said so." "_Colours_," repeated Gratian, "do you mean many colours? I wasn't saying anything about the wind though, Jonas--did you feel it too? It was over there--look, Jonas--it seemed to come from behind the big bush."