imagination, into a 40-horse-power motor car.

On the map the road is not called the Boundary. If you want to know
why I call it so I can only say that once you have crossed it things
are different; I do not mean a difference merely of country or
scenery, but a difference of atmosphere; better, and more literally, a
change of spirit. To put it bluntly, I never knew the reality of
fairyland until I blundered across that road one grey gusty evening
ten years ago, and heard the tall grasses whistling in the wind. Since
then the road has always been a frontier, not to be crossed without
preparation.

As "3.7" tumbled out of his go-cart I looked at my watch and saw it
lacked but a few minutes to noon. It was just such a cloudless June
day as must have inspired Shelley's _Hymn of Apollo_. No smallest
cloud to break the dazzling blue; and, high above our heads, Apollo,
standing "at noon upon the peak of heaven."

If it had been Midsummer Day I should have thought twice about
crossing the Boundary. As it was, we were quite near enough to the
24th of June to make it risky. So, as "3.7" bent a tangled head over
the bonnet of his Daimler, I flung myself down on the level turf
beside him and stared across the road.

Behind us and on either side were clumps of gorse bushes, and beyond
them the immense level expanse of the open heath. Immediately in front
was the road, sunk a foot beneath the turf, which comes right up to
it, both on this side and that.

"Another piece of string, please," said "3.7," rummaging in my pockets