Armorel of Lyonesse

the compass than these isles of Scilly. They sailed from point to point, and from island to island, landing where they listed or where Armorel led, wandering for long hours round the sh

ected places: strange places, beautiful places: beaches of dazzling white: wildly heaped carns: here a cromlech, a logan stone, a barrow-Samson is not the only island which guards the tombs of the Great Departed-a new view of sea and sky and white-footed rock. I believe that there does not live any single man who has actually explored all the isles of Scilly: stood upon every rock, climbed every hill, and searched on every island for its treasures of ancient barrows, plants, birds, carns, a

the Port: St. Agnes he knew, having wooed and won a wife there: he had been to Bryher Church, which is close to the shore-the rest of Bryher was to him as unknown as Iceland. As for St. Martin's, or Annet, or Great Ganilly, he saw them constantly; they were always within his sight, yet he had never desired to visit them. They were an emblem, a shape, a name to him, and nothing more. It is so always with those w

istant mountain, 'give-give more islands-still more islands! Let us sail for yonder cloud! Let us sail on until the cloud becomes a hill-top, and the hill another island! Largesse for him who first calls "Land ahead!" There shall we find strange monsters and treasures rare, with friendly natives, and girls more blooming than those of fair Tahiti. Let us sail thi

se absolutely to leave their native soil. You cannot go picking pepper here, nor can you strip the cinnamon-tree of its bark. But here you will see the bamboos cluster, tall and graceful: the eucalyptus here parades his naked trunk and his blue leaves: here the fern-tree lifts its circle of glory of lace and embroidery twenty feet high: the prickly pear nestles in warm corners: the aloe shoots up its tall stalk of flower and of seed: the palms stand in long rows: and every lovely plant, every sweet flower, created for the solace of man, grows abundantly, and hastens with zeal to display its blossoms: the soft air is full of perfumes, strange and familiar: it is as if Kew had taken off her glass roofs and placed all her plants and trees to face the English winter. But, then, the winter of Scilly

t is nine hundred miles round, and, for its length, the most wonderful walk in all the world. They crossed the broad Sound to St. Agnes, and saw St. Warna's wondrous cove: they stood on the desolate Gugh and the lonely Annet, beloved of puffins: the

e joists, the blue china, the ancient pewter platters, the long bright spit-a kitchen of the eighteenth century. And then she took him into a room which no longer exists anywhere else save in name. It was the still-room, and on the shelves there stood the elixirs and cordials of ancient time: the currant gin to fortify the stomach on a raw morning before crossing the Road; the cherry brandy for a cold and stormy night; the elderberry wine, good mulled and spiced at Christmas-time; the blackberry w

stor is well known to have been the bravest and mo

d not go home: he married

-old-fashioned watches, old compasses, sextants, telescopes, flint-and-steel pi

: it contained a whole body of theology of the Methodist kind. Roland tossed them over impatiently. 'I don't wond

her guest. He had come from Australia-from that far-distant land-in search of fortune. He had as yet made but few friends. He was unknown and without patrons. He had no family connections which would help him. The patrimony on which he was to live until he should begin to succeed was but small, and although he held money-making in the customary contempt, it was necessary that he should make a good deal, because-which is often the case-his standard of comfort was pitched rather hig

y the thousand. You make every picture by itself-how can you sell the beautiful things? You must want t

the danger that no one will care about seeing them or buying them. That is much more terrible, because it means failure. Sometimes I dream that I have become old and grey, and have been working all my life, and have had no success at all, and

or any painting save her own coloured engravings. 'You are a good painter, Rolan

. 'When I am melancholy, and the future looks d

ut the waters, lest he lose self-confidence. Continually these wrecks occur, and there is no insurance against them: yet continually other ba

ess. Heavens! what a kind! To struggle all their lives for admission t

ters,' the girl of large ex

rest. There is luck in things. It is not every good man who succeeds, Armorel. To every man, however, there

could not be contente

work alone. It is a hard saying, Armorel. It

, and if you are happy

ee their pictures in the galleries-poor, stunted things. It is because they live

preserved his ideals beyond the usual age by some accident. The ideals and beliefs and aspirations of young men, when they first begin the study of Art in any of its branches, are very beautiful things, and full of truths which can only, somehow, be expressed by very young men. The third explanation is that in certain circumstances, as in the compa

could not, as yet, understand. But she remembered. Women at all ages remember tenaciously, a

pulled the other way. Sometimes it makes me tremble all over only to think of the flowery way. I know what the end would be. But yet, Armorel, what can you know or understan

of Way is i

ure and the Way of Wealth. These are the two roads by which the

with glistening eyes. 'Oh! how happy you will be when yo

Armorel, I will take it from your lips-

to think that it meant being too fond of pretty frocks and ribbons. Dorcas said so once. Since you have come I see that there are many, many things that I know nothing of. If I am to be dragged to them by ropes, I do not w

rprised that the manner has not before now been revived. When we again tie our hair behind and assume silver-buckled shoes and white silk stockings, we shall once more adopt that manner. It was not, however, artificial with Armore

s there is no more talk about Sin-at least, outside certain circles. There are habits, it is true, which harm an artist's eye and destroy his hand. We say that it is a pity whe