Now the burn was quiet, running in long shining shallows and falling over little rocks into deep brown pools where the trout darted.

On either side rose the gates of the valley--two craggy knolls each with a few trees on its face.

Beyond was a green lawnlike place with a great confusion of blue mountains hemmed around its head.

Here, if anywhere, primeval peace had found its dwelling, and Alice, her eyes bright with pleasure, sat on a green knoll, too rapt with the sight for word or movement.
Then very slowly, like an epicure lingering at a feast, she walked up the banks of the burn, now high above a trough of rock, now down in a green winding hollow.

Suddenly she came on the spirits of the place in the shape of two boys down on their faces groping among the stones of a pool.
One was very small and tattered, one about sixteen; both were barefoot and both were wet and excited.