"Would I were a morris-dancer now, with practice of this motion," he thought, as the muscles of his legs became more and more weary; and he marvelled understandingly at Will Kempe's famous dance to pipe and tabor from London to Norwich. "Better, after all, to be a tree," he sighed, "and not have to toil thus all night lest the earth swallow me."
His legs finally rebelling against this monotonous exercise, he resolved to go forward whatever befall; and just at that moment he saw, at what distance he could not determine, a faint light. He uttered a cry of satisfaction, supposing it to be a cottage window, or a lantern borne by some night-walking countryman. As it moved not at his cry, he decided it was a cottage window, and he hastened toward it, through the tall grass, careless how far he sank into the marsh. But, as he drew near, it started away from him; then he told himself it was a lantern, and he called out to its bearer not to be afraid, as he was but a poor scholar lost in the fen. The light fled all the faster. As he increased his pace, so did it. At last, out of breath, he stopped in despair. The lantern stopped, also. He started again; it started, too.
"Oh, churl, boor, clodpate, whatever thou art!" he shouted. "To treat a poor benighted traveller thus, that means thee no harm! These are country manners, sure enough. Go to the devil, an thou wilt. I'll no more follow thee."
But as the light now came to a stand, he ran toward it, thinking the rustic had taken heart. He was almost upon it, when suddenly it separated into three lights, which leaped in three different directions. Knowing not which to follow, he stood bewildered. After a moment, he made for the nearest light; it disappeared entirely. He turned to watch the others; they had vanished.
"Oh, this is ridiculous!" he said. "This cannot be real. I perceive what it is. It is a dream I am having; a foolish, bad dream. It has been a dream ever since--since when? I was writing a puppet play, and I must have fallen asleep; I wrought my mind into a poetic fever, and therefore my dream is so troubled and wild. My courtship of that maid,--but no, that was in bright day, 'tis certain, and 'tis never bright day in dreams. Well, when I wake, I shall see where I am, and learn where the dream began; perchance I am still at that horrible tree. No; alas! these aches and scratches, this wretched marsh, are too palpable. 'Tis no dream. Would it were. Perhaps those rascals killed me in the wood, and I am in hell. Well, I will on, then, till I meet the devil; he may condescend to discourse with a poor scholar; he should have much to tell worth a man's hearing; no doubt, if he cannot talk in English, he can in Latin. Ah, what? I am again on _terra firma_: but _terra incognita_ still. I'll go on till something stops me. Oh!" he ejaculated, as he bumped against a tree. "Here is another wood. Or is it the same wood? I know not; but I will on."