But Sable said no; that it was still too hot for the children. That I had better go alone. If the oats were really ripe, we would all journey there next morning for breakfast. I never argue with my wife. My first week of wedded life taught me that such a proceeding is an entire waste of time and energy. So answering, ‘Very well, my dear,’ I rose, stretching and yawning lazily, and went leisurely away towards my destination. After all, Sable was quite right When I reached the open, the sun still stung with hardly abated power, and the heat mist shimmered over the baking ground. The oat-field had turned quite golden in the past few days, but it was pitiful to see how short was the straw, how light the heads, and how small the grain. I had it all to myself, and wandered about, picking out the heaviest heads and nibbling in leisurely fashion. Suddenly a low distant mutter of thunder boomed through the stagnant air, and it struck me that it might be wise to make for home. But before I could even reach the hedge there sounded a second and louder peal, and to my amazement a quarter of the northern sky was already swallowed by a huge mass of vapour, purplish-black in colour, and rimmed with a tumbling edge of boiling mist white as snow. The cloud was advancing with amazing rapidity, and as I sprang into a pollard oak at the corner of the hedge, to get a better view, it swallowed up the sun, and a sudden darkness fell upon the thirsty land. Then I saw that the deep bosom of the ponderous storm-cloud was laced by constant streaks of blue and silver fire. Such a sight is not seen once in a generation of squirrels, and it so deeply interested me that for the moment I entirely forgot my intention of returning home, and sat there watching the gathering tempest with fascinated eyes. A great tongue of blue flame licked downwards, and a moment later the thunder crashed in real earnest. There was a hoarse murmur in the far distance, and I saw the tree-tops, fields away across the level country-side, bend their tall heads as the first gust struck them. Presently a breath of air, cold, damp, and delicious, ruffled my fur, and, as the lightning flared again through the gloom, the first drop of rain, the size of a wren’s egg, struck me full in the face.