He had played truant all day. The farm-bailiff had wanted him, and he
had kept out of the way.

The wind was from the east, and a white mist rolled in from the sea,
bringing a strange invigorating smell, and making your lips clammy with
salt. It made John Broom's heart beat faster, and filled his head with
dreams of ships and smugglers, and rocking masts higher than the
willow-tree, and winds wilder than this wind, and dancing waves.

Then something loomed through the fog. It was the farm-bailiff's
speckled hat. John Broom hesitated--the thick stick became visible.

Then a cloud rolled between them, and the child turned, and ran, and
ran, and ran coastwards, into the sea mist.



THE SEA.--THE ONE-EYED SAILOR.--THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD.


John Broom was footsore when he reached the coast, but that keen,
life-giving smell had drawn him on and held him up. The fog had cleared
off, and he strained his black eyes through the darkness to see the sea.

He had never seen it--that other world within this, on which one lived
out of doors, and climbed about all day, and no one blamed him.

When he did see it, he thought he had got to the end of the world. If
the edge of the cliff were not the end, he could not make out where the
sky began; and if that darkness were the sea, the sea was full of stars.