Bitterly he reproached himself for his folly in leaving the camp, knowing that gipsies were about, with no other weapon than the bow.  The knife at his belt was practically no weapon at all, useful only in the last extremity.  Had he a short sword, or javelin, he would have faced the two gipsies who first sprang towards him.  Worse than this was the folly of wandering without the least precaution into a territory at that time full of gipsies, who had every reason to desire his capture.  If he had used the ordinary precautions of woodcraft, he would have noticed their traces, and he would not have exposed himself in full view on the ridges of the hills, where a man was visible for miles.  If he perished through his carelessness, how bitter it would be!  To lose Aurora by the merest folly would, indeed, be humiliating.

He braced himself to the journey before him, and set off at a good swinging hunter’s pace, as it is called, that is, a pace rather more than a walk and less than a run, with the limbs somewhat bent, and long springy steps.  The forest was in the worst possible condition for movement; the rain had damped the fern and undergrowth, and every branch showered raindrops upon him.  It was now past sunset and the dusk was increasing; this he welcomed as hiding him.  He travelled on till nearly dawn, and then, turning to the right, swept round, and regained the line of the mountainous hills after sunrise.  There he rested, and reached a camp about nine in the morning, having walked altogether since the preceding morning fully fifty miles.  This camp was about fifteen miles distant from that of his friends; the shepherds knew him, and one of them started with the news of his safety.  In the afternoon ten of his friends came over to see him, and to reproach him.

His weariness was so great that for three days he scarcely moved from the hut, during which time the weather was wet and stormy, as is often the case in summer after a thunderstorm.  On the fourth morning it was fine, and Felix, now quite restored to his usual strength, went out with the shepherds.  He found some of them engaged in throwing up a heap of stones, flint, and chalk lumps near an oak-tree in a plain at the foot of the hill.  They told him that during the thunderstorm two cows and ten sheep had been killed there by lightning, which had scarcely injured the oak.

It was their custom to pile up a heap of stones wherever such an event occurred, to warn others from staying themselves, or allowing their sheep or cattle to stay, near the spot in thunder, as it was observed that where lightning struck once it was sure to strike again, sooner or later.  “Then,” said Felix, “you may be sure there is water there!” He knew from his study of the knowledge of the ancients that lightning frequently leaped from trees or buildings to concealed water, but he had no intention of indicating water in that particular spot.  He meant the remark in a general sense.