Chapter 12

A traveller with a knapsack on his shoulders comes out of the duskiness
of vague, unchronicled times, throwing his shadow before him in the
morning sunshine along a well-trodden, though solitary path.

It was early summer, or perhaps latter spring, and the most genial
weather that either spring or summer ever brought, possessing a
character, indeed, as if both seasons had done their utmost to create
an atmosphere and temperature most suitable for the enjoyment and
exercise of life. To one accustomed to a climate where there is seldom
a medium between heat too fierce and cold too deadly, it was a new
development in the nature of weather. So genial it was, so full of all
comfortable influences, and yet, somehow or other, void of the torrid
characteristic that inevitably burns in our full sun-bursts. The
traveller thought, in fact, that the sun was at less than his brightest
glow; for though it was bright,--though the day seemed cloudless,--
though it appeared to be the clear, transparent morning that precedes
an unshadowed noon,--still there was a mild and softened character, not
so perceptible when he directly sought to see it, but as if some veil
were interposed between the earth and sun, absorbing all the passionate
qualities out of the latter, and leaving only the kindly ones. Warmth
was in abundance, and, yet, all through it, and strangely akin to it,
there was a half-suspected coolness that gave the atmosphere its most
thrilling and delicious charm. It was good for human life, as the
traveller, felt throughout all his being; good, likewise, for vegetable
life, as was seen in the depth and richness of verdure over the gently
undulating landscape, and the luxuriance of foliage, wherever there was
tree or shrub to put forth leaves.

The path along which the traveller was passing deserved at least a word
or two of description: it was a well-trodden footpath, running just
here along the edge of a field of grass, and bordered on one side by a
hedge which contained materials within itself for varied and minute
researches in natural history; so richly luxuriant was it with its
diverse vegetable life, such a green intricacy did it form, so
impenetrable and so beautiful, and such a Paradise it was for the birds
that built their nests there in a labyrinth of little boughs and twigs,
unseen and inaccessible, while close beside the human race to which
they attach themselves, that they must have felt themselves as safe as
when they sung to Eve. Homely flowers likewise grew in it, and many
creeping and twining plants, that were an original part of the hedge,
had come of their own accord and dwelt here, beautifying and enriching
the verdant fence by way of repayment for the shelter and support which
it afforded