On the higher paths a fresh breeze was energetically chasing the butterflies and driving the few small clouds disconsolate out of the sky. The lovers stood for some time watching the people of the farm in the down below dip their sheep on this sunny morning. There was a ragged noise of bleating from the flock penned in a corner of the yard. Two red-armed men seized a sheep, hauled it to a large bath that stood in the middle of the yard, and there held it, more or less in the bath, whilst a third man baled a dirty yellow liquid over its body. The white legs of the sheep twinkled as it butted this way and that to escape the yellow douche, the blue-shirted men ducked and struggled. There was a faint splashing and shouting to be heard even from a distance. The farmer’s wife and children stood by ready to rush in with assistance if necessary. Helena laughed with pleasure. “That is really a very quaint and primitive proceeding,” she said. “It is cruder than Theocritus.” “In an instant it makes me wish I were a farmer,” he laughed. “I think every man has a passion for farming at the bottom of his blood. It would be fine to be plain-minded, to see no farther than the end of one’s nose, and to own cattle and land.” “Would it?” asked Helena sceptically. “If I had a red face, and went to sleep as soon as I sat comfortable, I should love it,”he said. “It amuses me to hear you long to be stupid,” she replied. “To have a simple, slow-moving mind and an active life is the desideratum.” “Is it?” she asked ironically. “I would give anything to be like that,” he said. “That is, not to be yourself,” she said pointedly. He laughed without much heartiness. “Don’t they seem a long way off?” he said, staring at the bucolic scene. “They are farther than Theocritus—down there is farther than Sicily, and more than twenty centuries from us. I wish it weren’t.” “Why do you?” she cried, with curious impatience. He laughed. Crossing the down, scattered with dark bushes, they came directly opposite the path through the furze. “There it is!” she cried, “How could we miss it?” “Ascribe it to the fairies,” he replied, whistling the bird music out of _Siegfried_, then pieces of _Tristan_. They talked very little. She was tired. When they arrived at a green, naked hollow near the cliff’s edge, she said: “This shall be our house today.” “Welcome home!” said Siegmund. He flung himself down on the high, breezy slope of the dip, looking out to sea. Helena sat beside him. It was absolutely still, and the wind was slackening more and more. Though they listened attentively, they could hear only an indistinct breathing sound, quite small, from the water below: no clapping nor hoarse conversation of waves. Siegmund lay with his hands beneath his head, looking over the sparkling sea. To put her page in the shadow, Helena propped her book against him and began to read.