"There, John," whispered I, "you may have your wish, and run wild to-morrow." He said, "the wish had gone out of him." So we planned a sweet lazy day under the Midsummer sky, in some fields about a mile off, called the Vineyards.
The morning came, and we took our way thither, under the Abbey walls, and along a lane, shaded on one side by the "willows in the water-courses." We came out in those quiet hay-fields, which, tradition says, had once grown wine for the rosy monks close by, and history avers, were afterwards watered by a darker stream than the blood of grapes.

The Vineyards had been a battle-field; and under the long wavy grass, and the roots of the wild apple trees, slept many a Yorkist and Lancastrian.

Sometimes an unusually deep furrow turned out a white bone--but more often the relics were undisturbed, and the meadows used as pastures or hay-fields.
John and I lay down on some wind-rows, and sunned ourselves in the warm and delicious air.

How beautiful everything was! so very still! with the Abbey-tower--always the most picturesque point in our Norton Bury views--showing so near, that it almost seemed to rise up out of the fields and hedge-rows.
"Well, David," and I turned to the long, lazy figure beside me, which had considerably flattened the hay, "are you satisfied ?" "Ay." Thus we lounged out all the summer morning, recurring to a few of the infinitude of subjects we used to compare notes upon; though we were neither of us given to wordiness, and never talked but when we had something to say.

Often--as on this day--we sat for hours in a pleasant dreaminess, scarcely exchanging a word; nevertheless, I could generally track John's thoughts, as they went wandering on, ay, as clearly as one might track a stream through a wood; sometimes--like to-day--I failed.
In the afternoon, when we had finished our bread and cheese--eaten slowly and with graceful dignity, in order to make dinner a more important and lengthy affair--he said abruptly-- "Phineas, don't you think this field is rather dull?
Shall we go somewhere else?
not if it tires you, though." I protested the contrary, my health being much above the average this summer.