All these tiny sleepers were awake to-day; himself awake, too, and aware, with some super-awareness, of the last stages of his oft-promised journey home, achieved at length after the long, oppressive interval of weariness and restraint. This interval was fast receding now, and he made no effort to recall it, for he was eager to slough off all memory of that heavy weakness as well as all shackles of solicitous and hampering devotion. He’d had his will at last, however, though how he could not well imagine; and here he was, free of them all,—comely, stylish wife; modern, masterful daughters. They could spare themselves the pain of drawing long faces over him; he’d no mind to give up with his visit home unpaid. A good, dutiful family, no doubt, God have them in his care; but this was a time when a man must cut free of all bonds of maturer years and turn to the land that gave him birth,—and to his mother, long unvisited, but by no means forgotten. Many a money-order had crossed the counter at the country post-office, and of late, many a cheque. But the first years had been bitterly hard, and all the years breathlessly busy. That land over-seas took you and drove you whether or no; but its rewards were adequate. Foot-loose on the old sod now, no longer earthbound but light with a marvellous buoyancy, the reek of peat in his nostrils, the corncrake’s homely tune in his ears. His eyes strained forward for familiar landmarks, carrying always before them the expectant image of a white cot in a green hollow. Uplifted by an exhilaration that seemed stranger to any possible fatigue, he pressed on again, this time with a pleasant sense of anticipation in place of the former gnawing avidity, keenly alive to the delights of this long-desired green world, brilliant with sunshine yet fresh from frequent rains, and rocked with the rising wind. At last the silver stretches of the Shannon appeared, and a certain well-known white ribbon of road, winding among farms. As he went, the trees began to take on the look of friendly faces;—tall beeches, whispering limes, blackthorn bushes, white with blossom. A field of gorse, ablaze with yellow spikes of bloom, sent out its heavy bitter-sweet perfume. Grassy hills, lined with grey stone walls, beckoned him, each with its happy memory.—The brook! where trout hung under the bank and water-cress wove its green mazes. The sight of its pebbly bed recalled the chilly prickle of gooseflesh on adventurous legs. He leaned over the rude railing to watch its spring rush, giving himself to its cool voice, its freshness on his face. He felt clean now at last of the dusty breath of cities.—Here, too, were the elder bushes, all abloom. To think of the “scouting guns” he’d hollowed out of their pithy stalks, filling them with water by means of a piston-like wadded stick to discharge on good-natured passersby!