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T was a lovely morning in the June of 1870, when I left the little town of B, in Brittany, for a walk to the neighbouring hill of Mont St. Gabriel, where there was a celebrated old chapel, commonly counted as one of the sights of the neighbourhood. I had just left Oxford for the vacation, and was refreshing myself, after a term's hard work, by a walking tour in France. My companion, Galton, had sprained his foot, and was staying at the hotel resting himself for the day, but I was unwilling to miss this opportunity of seeing Mont St. Gabriel; so I started on the morning's walk of some four kilometres alone.

It was a quiet and somewhat desolate route, and many thoughts about the past and future