Now, when wandering about sleepless, I could gaze as from a nest of safety out upon the beautiful fear.

From window to window I would go in the middle of the night, now staring into a blank darkness out of which came, the only signs of its being, the raindrops that bespattered or the hailstones that berattled the panes; now gazing into the deeps of the blue vault, gold-bespangled with its worlds; or, again, into the mysteries of soft clouds, all gathered into an opal tent by the centre-clasp of the moon, thinking out her light over its shining and shadowy folds.
This, I have said, was one of those nights on which I could not sleep.
It was the summer after the winter-story of the kelpie, I believe; but the past is confused, and its chronology worthless, to the continuous _now_ of childhood.

The night was hot; my little brothers were sleeping loud, as wee Davie called _snoring_; and a great moth had got within my curtains somewhere, and kept on fluttering and whirring.

I got up, and went to the window.

It was such a night! The moon was full, but rather low, and looked just as if she were thinking--"Nobody is heeding me: I may as well go to bed." All the top of the sky was covered with mackerel-backed clouds, lying like milky ripples on a blue sea, and through them the stars shot, here and there, sharp little rays like sparkling diamonds.