After
fatigues and terrors that as yet he could not recollect he seemed now
to be resting in the easiest of all easy chairs in a dim, low room.
In the hearth there was a glint of fire and a blue, sweet-scented puff
of wood smoke; a great black oak beam roughly hewn crossed the
ceiling. Through the leaded panes of the windows he saw a rich glow of
sunlight, green lawns, and against the deepest and most radiant of all
blue skies the wonderful far-lifted towers of a vast, Gothic
cathedral--mystic, rich with imagery.
"Good Lord!" he murmured to himself. "I didn't know they had such
places in France. It's just like Wells. And it might be the other day
when I was going past the Swan, just as it might be past that window,
and asked the ostler what time it was, and he says, 'What time? Why,
summer-time'; and there outside it looks like summer that would last
for ever. If this was an inn they ought to call it _The Soldiers'
Rest_."
He dozed off again, and when he opened his eyes once more a kindly
looking man in some sort of black robe was standing by him.
"It's all right now, isn't it?" he said, speaking in good English.
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