Their anger went down to a
murmur, just like soda-water settling down into a glass.
I stood wine; we drank. I showed them my book, and as my pencil needed
sharpening the large man lent me his knife for courtesy. When I got it
in my hand I saw plainly that it was no knife for stabbing with; it
was a pruning-knife, and would have bit the hand that cherished it (as
they say of serpents). On the other hand, it would have been a good
knife for ripping, and passable at a slash. You must not expect too
much of one article.
I took food, but I saw that in this parish it was safer to sleep out
of doors than in; so in the falling evening, but not yet sunset, I
wandered on, not at a pace but looking for shelter, and I found at
last just what I wanted: a little shed, with dried ferns (as it
seemed) strewed in a corner, a few old sacks, and a broken piece of
machinery - though this last was of no use to me.
I thought: 'It will be safe here, for I shall rise before day, and the
owner, if there is one, will not disturb me.'
The air was fairly warm. The place quite dry. The open side looked
westward and a little south.
The sun had now set behind the Apennines, and there was a deep
effulgence in the sky. I drank a little wine, lit a pipe, and watched
the west in silence.
Whatever was left of the great pall from which all that rain had
fallen, now was banked up on the further side of heaven in toppling
great clouds that caught the full glow of evening.
The great clouds stood up in heaven, separate, like persons; and no
wind blew; but everything was full of evening. I worshipped them so
far as it is permitted to worship inanimate things.
They domed into the pure light of the higher air, inviolable. They
seemed halted in the presence of a commanding majesty who ranked them
all in order.
This vision filled me with a large calm which a travelled man may find
on coming to his home, or a learner in the communion of wise men.
Repose, certitude, and, as it were, a premonition of glory occupied my
spirit. Before it was yet quite dark I had made a bed out of the dry
bracken, covered myself with the sacks and cloths, and very soon I
fell asleep, still thinking of the shapes of clouds and of the power
of God.
Next morning it was as I had thought. Going out before it was fully
light, a dense mist all around and a clear sky showed what the day was
to be.
