“Lor’ bless you, Master Austin, where was you brought up?  Everybody hereabouts know what a noise o’ ducks is.  Same as a flock o’ geese, only one quacks and the other cackles.  Well, now I’m off home, for its peckish work mowing on an empty belly, and the mother’ll be looking out for me.  Geese for me, ghosts for you, and in the end we’ll see which pans out the best.”

So Lubin trudged away to his breakfast and left Austin to his reflections.  The predicted rain held off in spite of the terpsichorean importunity of Lubin’s geese, and Austin passed a lovely morning on the moors; but next day it came down with a vengeance, and for six hours there was a regular deluge.  However, Austin didn’t mind.  When it was fine he spent his days in the fields and woods; if it rained, he sat at a window where he could watch the grey mists, and the driving clouds, and the straight arrows of water falling wonderfully through the air.  His books, too, were a resource that never failed, and if he was unable personally to participate in beautiful scenes, he could always read about them, which was the next best thing after all.

The weather continued unsettled for some days, and then it cleared up gloriously, so that Austin was able to lead what he called his Daphnis life once more.  The rains had had rather a depressing effect upon his general health, and once or twice he had fancied that something was troubling him in his stump; but with the return of the sun all such symptoms disappeared as though by magic, and he felt younger and lighter than ever as he stepped forth again into the glittering air.  More than a week had elapsed since his day at the Court, and he began to think that now he really might venture to go and call.  So off he set one sunny afternoon, and with rather a beating heart presented himself at the park gates.

Here, however, a disappointment awaited him.  The lodge-keeper shook his head, and announced that Mr St Aubyn was away and wouldn’t be back till night.  Austin could do nothing but leave a card, and hope that he might be lucky enough to meet him by accident before long.

So he turned back and made for the meadow by the river side, feeling sure that he would be safe from rabid dogs that time at any rate.  And certainly no mysterious influences intervened to prevent him sitting on the stile for a rest, and indulging in pleasant thoughts.  Then he pulled out his pocket-volume of the beloved Eclogues, and read the musical contest between Menalcas and Damaetas with great enjoyment.  Why, he wondered, were there no delightful shepherd-boys now-a-days, who spent their time in lying under trees and singing one against the other?  Lubin was much nicer than most country lads, but even Lubin was not equal to improvising songs about Phyllis, and Delia, and the Muses.  Then he looked up, and saw a stranger approaching him across the field.

He was a big, stoutish man, with a fat face, a frock-coat tightly buttoned up, a large umbrella, and a rather shabby hat of the shape called chimney-pot.  A somewhat incongruous object, amid that rural scene, and not a very prepossessing one; but apparently a gentleman, though scarcely of the stamp of St Aubyn.  At last he came quite near, and Austin moved as though to let him pass.