"But we aren't allowed to go on the water by ourselves," he

cried.
"No," said Edward, with fine scorn: "we aren't allowed; and Jason

wasn't allowed either, I daresay--but he WENT!"
Harold's protest had been merely conventional: he only

wanted to be convinced by sound argument. The next question was,
How about the girls? Selina was distinctly handy in a boat: the

difficulty about her was, that if she disapproved of the
expedition--and, morally considered, it was not exactly a

Pilgrim's Progress--she might go and tell; she having just
reached that disagreeable age when one begins to develop a

conscience. Charlotte, for her part, had a habit of day-dreams,
and was as likely as not to fall overboard in one of her rapt

musings. To be sure, she would dissolve in tears when she found
herself left out; but even that was better than a watery tomb.

In fine, the public voice--and rightly, perhaps--was against the
admission of the skirted animal: spite the precedent of Atalanta,

who was one of the original crew.
"And now," said Edward, "who's to ask Farmer Larkin? I can't;

last time I saw him he said when he caught me again he'd smack my
head. YOU'LL have to."

I hesitated, for good reasons. "You know those precious calves
of his?" I began.

Edward understood at once. "All right," he said; "then we won't
ask him at all. It doesn't much matter. He'd only be

annoyed, and that would be a pity. Now let's set off."
We made our way down to the stream, and captured the farmer's

boat without let or hindrance, the enemy being engaged in the
hayfields. This "river," so called, could never be discovered by

us in any atlas; indeed our Argo could hardly turn in it without
risk of shipwreck. But to us 't was Orinoco, and the cities of

the world dotted its shores. We put the Argo's head up stream,
since that led away from the Larkin province; Harold was

faithfully permitted to be Jason, and we shared the rest of the
heroes among us. Then launching forth from Thessaly, we threaded

the Hellespont with shouts, breathlessly dodged the Clashing
Rocks, and coasted under the lee of the Siren-haunted isles.

Lemnos was fringed with meadow-sweet, dog-roses dotted the Mysian
shore, and the cheery call of the haymaking folk sounded along

the coast of Thrace.
After some hour or two's seafaring, the prow of the Argo embedded

itself in the mud of a landing-place, plashy with the tread of
cows and giving on to a lane that led towards the smoke of human

habitations. Edward jumped ashore, alert for exploration, and
strode off without waiting to see if we followed; but I

lingered behind, having caught sight of a moss-grown water-gate
hard by, leading into a garden that from the brooding quiet

lapping it round, appeared to portend magical possibilities.
Indeed the very air within seemed stiller, as we circumspectly

passed through the gate; and Harold hung back shamefaced, as if
we were crossing the threshold of some private chamber, and

ghosts of old days were hustling past us. Flowers there were,
everywhere; but they drooped and sprawled in an overgrowth

hinting at indifference; the scent of heliotrope possessed the
place, as if actually hung in solid festoons from tall untrimmed

hedge to hedge. No basket-chairs, shawls, or novels dotted the
lawn with colour; and on the garden-front of the house behind,

the blinds were mostly drawn. A grey old sun-dial dominated the
central sward, and we moved towards it instinctively, as the most

human thing visible. An antique motto ran round it, and with
eyes and fingers we struggled at the decipherment.

"TIME: TRYETH: TROTHE:" spelt out Harold at last. "I wonder what
that means?"

I could not enlighten him, nor meet his further questions as to
the inner mechanism of the thing, and where you wound it up.

I had seen these instruments before, of course, but had never
fully understood their manner of working.

We were still puzzling our heads over the contrivance, when I
became aware that Medea herself was moving down the path from the

house. Dark-haired, supple, of a figure lightly poised and
swayed, but pale and listless--I knew her at once, and having

come out to find her, naturally felt no surprise at all. But
Harold, who was trying to climb on the top of the sun-dial,

having a cat-like fondness for the summit of things, started and
fell prone, barking his chin and filling the pleasance with

lamentation.
Medea skimmed the ground swallow-like, and in a moment was on her

knees comforting him,--wiping the dirt out of his chin with her
own dainty handkerchief,--and vocal with soft murmur of

consolation.
"You needn't take on so about him," I observed, politely" target="_blank" title="ad.温和地；文雅地">politely. "He'll

cry for just one minute, and then he'll be all right."
My estimate was justified. At the end of his regulation time

Harold stopped crying suddenly, like a clock that had struck its
hour; and with a serene and cheerfulcountenance wriggled

out of Medea's embrace, and ran for a stone to throw at an
intrusive blackbird.

"O you boys!" cried Medea, throwing wide her arms with
abandonment. "Where have you dropped from? How dirty you are!

I've been shut up here for a thousand years, and all that time
I've never seen any one under a hundred and fifty! Let's play at

something, at once!"
"Rounders is a good game," I suggested. "Girls can play at

rounders. And we could serve up to the sun-dial here. But you
want a bat and a ball, and some more people."

She struck her hands together tragically. "I haven't a bat," she
cried, "or a ball, or more people, or anything sensible whatever.

Never mind; let's play at hide-and-seek in the kitchen garden.
And we'll race there, up to that walnut-tree; I haven't run for a

century!"
She was so easy a victor, nevertheless, that I began to doubt, as

I panted behind, whether she had not exaggerated her age by a
year or two. She flung herself into hide-and-seek with all the

gusto and abandonment of the true artist, and as she flitted
away and reappeared, flushed and laughing divinely, the pale

witch-maiden seemed to fall away from her, and she moved rather
as that other girl I had read about, snatched from fields of

daffodil to reign in shadow below, yet permitted once again to
visit earth, and light, and the frank, caressing air.

Tired at last, we strolled back to the old sundial, and Harold,
who never relinquished a problem unsolved, began afresh, rubbing

his finger along the faint incisions, "Time tryeth trothe.
Please, I want to know what that means."

Medea's face drooped low over the sun-dial, till it was almost
hidden in her fingers. "That's what I'm here for," she said

presently, in quite a changed, low voice. "They shut me up
here--they think I'll forget--but I never will--never, never!

And he, too--but I don't know--it is so long--I don't know!"
Her face was quite hidden now. There was silence again in the

old garden. I felt clumsily helpless and awkward; beyond a vague
idea of kicking Harold, nothing remedial seemed to suggest

itself.
None of us had noticed the approach of another she-creature--one

of the angular and rigid class--how different from our dear
comrade! The years Medea had claimed might well have belonged to

her; she wore mittens, too--a trick I detested in woman. "Lucy!"
she said, sharply, in a tone with AUNT writ large over it; and

Medea started up guiltily.
"You've been crying," said the newcomer, grimlyregarding her