Once upon a time, in a pleasant country of meadows sweeping seaward from wooded inland heights, there were two millers and two mills. If you came to the country in a ship, you saw the windmill first, for it was built upon a tongue of land rising above the wide salt meadows and the washing midnight-tides; but if you came to the country by the land, it was the water mill you saw, for it stood beside the highway in the valley of a brooklet rushing to the sea. Now the wind-miller, who was a great tall man with blue eyes and fair hair, had a daughter named Cecily, whilst the water-miller, who was a little nimble man with a red face and crisp, black curls, had a son named Valentine. And because both the millers were merry men, and there was a plenty of grain for both the mills to grind, these millers were excellent cronies, and the maiden Cecily had been betrothed to the young man Valentine. Every eve, when the day’s task at the water mill had been brought to an end, the gates lowered, and the brooklet turned free to rush unhindered down the glen, Valentine would walk from his wooded hills to the headland by the sea, and call at the mill for Cecily. The nights were often still, and the golden shield of the moon, rising over the hilly woods, gleamed upon the curling foam of the little long waves, and filled their glassy hollows with her light. Now it befell that as Valentine and Cecily walked by the shore on such a night, they heard from the hollow of the hills a faint and far-off rumble like the echoing of thunder. Such mysterious sounds were forever rising in the hills, and because no one could tell whence they came, a legend had grown up that somewhere in the forest depths there dwelt a hidden someone, known as the Husbandman of the Hills. “Listen, Valentine,” said Cecily, “the Husbandman of the Hills is closing the door of his barn. Think you that some day a mortal may find him in his hiding-place in the hills?” “But suppose it were naught but an idle tale?” said the merry youth, with a smile. “Oh no, Valentine,” said the maiden seriously. “All my life long have I dwelt here on the shore, and heard the mysterious echoes from the hills. Sometimes the sound is of the lowing of cattle, sometimes of the threshing of grain, sometimes ’tis the creaking of a hay wain in a field. And always the old and wise tell of the Husbandman of the Hills. Some day a mortal will find the hidden Husbandman--do you but wait and see.” It was the early summer now, and all went merry as a marriage bell. The heavy water-wheel turned with a rolling thunder and a sound of endless splashing; and the four arms of the windmill spun with a windy thrum and a clock-like clack from the rising of the wind to the calm of sundown and the eve. And now, alas, events were at hand which were to shatter the plans of the two millers and wreck the hopes of Cecily and Valentine!