It rose nowhere more than a few feet above the level of the waters, which flowed deep all around its border.

Here there seemed to be neither tide nor storm.

A sense of persistent calm and fulness arose in the mind at the sight of the slow, pulse-like rise and fall of the deep, clear, unrippled waters against the bank of the island, for shore it could hardly be called, being so much more like the edge of a full, solemn river.

As I walked over the grass towards the cottage, which stood at a little distance from the bank, all the flowers of childhood looked at me with perfect child-eyes out of the grass.

My heart, softened by the dreams through which it had passed, overflowed in a sad, tender love towards them.