52 BEYOND THE BLUE MOUNTAINS.

“Oh, I cannot eat that horrid bread,” exclaimed Cowslip. “See
how dry itis. It must be very stale and very old.”

“T, for one, am hungry,” said Clover, ‘“‘and dry as the bread looks
I mean to eat a little.”

He broke off a piece as he spoke and ate it.

“Why, Cowslip,” he exclaimed, ‘this bread is delicious. I don’t
know what it tastes like—something like honey and fresh flowers and
fruit all mixed up together. It satisfies me; it makes me feel so
strong and well. Here, let me put a morsel into your mouth,
darling.”

As Clover spoke he held the piece of bread to his sister’s lips.
She opened her mouth to receive it unwillingly, but the moment she
had tasted it her dislike vanished. She agreed with Clover that it
was delicious, and the two children made a hearty meal.

They drank some of the cold water out of the pitcher, which
refreshed them as no milk had ever done, and then they lay down on
the sheepskins and fell fast asleep.

In this rough cave the two children had golden dreams. They
dreamt of the time when the troublesome journey would be over, and they
would have entered the land of rest and of peace-—they dreamt of meeting
their father and mother again, and they even dreamt, although that
part of the dream was a little indistinct, of seeing the King himself.

They both awoke with smiles on their lips, and with a feeling
which they could not explain, that their journey would be over soon.
Cowslip had not a discontented word this morning.

The sunlight was now pouring into the cave, and the little
lantern only glowed once again very faintly. Clover took it back into
its distant corner and then returned to Cowslip.

“There is a well of water here,” he said; ‘let us wash in it, and
let us dip our white dresses in, so that they may be quite clean
and fresh.”

Cowslip also washed her long fair hair in the pleasant cold water.
They then ate some more of the bread and took a long draught each of
the cold water, and refreshed as they had never been before in their
lives, started uphill on their journey.