They passed the slight hollow where Eval House sought a faint shelter, and the farm-yard whence, after depositing the sick gosling, Miss Willina had to escape at a run from a motley following of birds and beasts. So to the level stretches of moor and the full force of the blustering wind. A strange landscape to southern eyes. Earth, air, and water blent in a triple alliance so close as to destroy individuality. The sea lay landwards, the land seawards, and over both the nor'wester swept unrestrained, cresting green waves of heather as water with an edging of white foam or purple blossom. Were those hills, eastward across the Minch, or clouds? Was that level streak of light westwards the Atlantic or a glint of sky? Was the water showing at your feet between miniature cliffs of sphagnum moss salt or fresh? And did the land really sway before the wind? or was it only your footstep making the spongy soil rise and fall? This, however, was in the low ground eastward. Westward the rocks began to pile themselves gregariously in cairns, and the moorland rose gradually, so gradually that when its edge was reached you were surprised to find yourself so far above the shining plain of sea. Here on a promontory commanding a magnificent view, and also a perfect exposure to all the winds of heaven, stood the modern shooting-box of Roederay Lodge. Substantial enough for the nineteenth century, yet reminding one irresistibly of those Swiss châlets in boxes which are to be bought for a sixpence in the Lowther Arcade. The fault, no doubt, of its surroundings; above all, of a sound which seemed to monopolize the whole landscape,--the sound of the Atlantic rolling in upon two miles of shelving sand a little to the southward. A sound that went on night and day, day and night, without a pause. Rhythmically true to a second, not to be shut out by any device of man. The strongest must put up with it or go away. On this particular September day, with the keen bright nor'wester sending a cross sea round the point, its voice had a querulous ring in it very different from the roar which echoed for fifteen miles across the island when the Atlantic was in a southwesterly mood.