Now, if this plain were a little valley couched among the hills, if to the westward rose dark blue mountains like a rampart, if the runlet yonder were broad and clear, if this beech were a sugar-tree"-- He broke off, content to see her eyes dilate, her bosom rise and fall, her hand go trembling for support to the column of the beech.
"Oh, the mountains!" she cried.

"When the mist lifted, when the cloud rested, when the sky was red behind them! Oh, the clear stream, and the sugar-tree, and the cabin! Who are you?
How did you know about these things?
Were you--were you there ?" She turned upon him, with her soul in her eyes.

As for him, lying at length upon the ground, he locked his hands beneath his head and began to sing, though scarce above his breath.

He sang the song of Amiens:-- "Under the greenwood tree, Who loves to lie with me." When he had come to the end of the stanza he half rose, and turned toward the mute and breathless figure leaning against the beech-tree.

For her the years had rolled back: one moment she stood upon the doorstep of the cabin, and the air was filled with the trampling of horses, with quick laughter, whistling, singing, and the call of a trumpet; the next she ran, in night-time and in terror, between rows of rustling corn, felt again the clasp of her pursuer, heard at her ear the comfort of his voice.