It was pitiful in a way, and yet cheering--
even exhilarating. He was glad that he liked the country undecorated,
hard, and stripped of its finery. He had got down to the bare bones
of it, and they were fine and strong and simple. He did not want the
warm clover and the play of seeding grasses; the screens of quickset,
the billowy drapery of beech and elm seemed best away; and with great
cheerfulness of spirit he pushed on towards the Wild Wood, which lay
before him low and threatening, like a black reef in some still
southern sea.
There was nothing to alarm him at first entry. Twigs crackled under
his feet, logs tripped him, funguses on stumps resembled caricatures,
and startled him for the moment by their likeness to something
familiar and far away; but that was all fun, and exciting. It led him
on, and he penetrated to where the light was less, and trees crouched
nearer and nearer, and holes made ugly mouths at him on either side.
Everything was very still now. The dusk advanced on him steadily,
rapidly, gathering in behind and before; and the light seemed to be
draining away like flood-water.
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