CHAPTER VI.
After the glare and the noise, the shrill blasts of penny trumpets, and the sustained beating of penny drums, the silence of the Slumberleigh woods was delightful to Ruth; the comparative silence, that is to say, for where Molly was, absolute silence need never be feared.
Long before the first gate had been reached Balaam had, of course, returned to the mode of procedure which suited him and his race best, and it was only when the road inclined to be downhill that he could be urged into anything like a trot.
"Never mind," said Molly, consolingly to Ruth, as he finally settled into a slow lounge, gracefully waving his ears and tail at the army of flies which accompanied him, "when we get to the place where the firs are, and the road goes between the rocks, it's downhill all the way, and we'll gallop down." But it was a long way to the firs, and Ruth was in no hurry.

It was an ideal afternoon, verging towards evening; an afternoon of golden lights and broken shadows, of vivid greens in shady places.

It must have been on such a day as this, Ruth thought, that the Almighty walked in the garden of Eden when the sun was low, while as yet the tree of knowledge was but in blossom, while as yet autumn and its apples were far off, long before fig-leaves and millinery were thought of.
On either side the bracken and the lady-fern grew thick and high, almost overlapping the broad moss-grown path, across which the young rabbits popped away in their new brown coats, showing their little white linings in their lazy haste.

A dog-rose had hung out a whole constellation of pale stars for Molly to catch at as they passed.

A family of honeysuckles clung, faint and sweet, just beyond the reach of the little hand that stretched after them in turn.
They had reached the top of an ascent that would have been level to anything but the mean spirit of a donkey, when Molly gave a start.
"Cousin Ruth, there's something creeping among the trees--don't you hear it?
Oh-h-h!" There really was a movement in the bracken, which grew too thick and high to allow of anything being easily seen at a little distance.
"If it's a lion," said Molly, in a faint whisper, "and I feel in my heart it is, he must have Balaam." Balaam at this moment pricked his large ears, and Molly and Ruth both heard the snapping of a twig, and saw a figure slip behind a tree.
Molly's spirits rose, and Ruth's went down in proportion.