Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 1).djvu/134

 and even here the world was once more young. Musa passed singing—like the poet's Pippa.

She was accursed for no fault of her own, like her native Maremma, but it was springtime with her also, for it was youth.

Suddenly as her light feet went over hills and hillocks that here were of yellow sandstone, not of tufa, and were clothed and covered up in greenery, she felt the earth give way beneath her; she sank through the creeping-moss and maidenhair up to her hips; she thought it was one of the innumerable spots where stagnant water was hidden under foliage and flowers, but her feet were not wet; it was not even mud. She had caught hold of some tangled junipers as she felt herself sink, and by these raised herself on to safer standing ground. Looking down to see why it was the earth had given Way, since there was no water and no swamp, she saw a hole in the ground like a fox's earth. It was into this hole her feet had gone. Thinking always of the creatures of the moorland she leaned down to see which of them might have made his lair there.

The wood grew very thickly everywhere, but the arbutus unedo and bilberry and