A few months ago I had shouted with joy to possess it;
to-day, with more admiring eyes, I worshipped it for the lists of my
greater adventure; and surely Nat's spirit marched with me to the air
of his favourite song--
"If doughty deeds my lady please,
Right soon I'll mount my steed;
And strong his arm and fast his seat
That bears frae me the meed . . ."
But, in fact, it was not until the third morning of our journey that
Marc'antonio (who, like every Corsican, abhorred walking) was able to
purchase us a steed apiece in the shape of two lean and shaggy hill
ponies. They belonged to a decayed gentleman--of the best blood in
the island, as he assured me--whom poverty had driven with his family
to inhabit a shepherd's hut above the Restorica on the flank of Monte
Rotondo where it looks towards Corte. We had slept the night under
his roof, and I remember that I was awakened next morning on my bed
of dry fern by the small chatter of the children, themselves awaking
one by one as the daylight broke. After breakfast our host led us
down to the pasture where the ponies were tethered; and when he and
Marc'antonio had haggled for twenty minutes, and I was in the act of
mounting, three of the children, aged from five downwards, came
toddling with bunches of a blue flower unknown to me, but much like a
gentian, which they had gathered on the edge of the tumbling
Restorica, some way up-stream.
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