The next morning John Shelley was up betimes, as, indeed, he always was;
but it was shearing time, and he was unusually busy, and it was,
moreover, Saturday, and he hoped, with the help of the men who went
round the country shearing in the month of June, to finish his flock
that evening, so taking his breakfast and dinner with him, he told Mrs.
Shelley not to expect him back till the evening. Across the dewy meadows
in the fresh June morning, the loveliest part of the day, went John
Shelley, startling a skylark every now and then from the ground, from
whence it rose carolling forth its matin song, gently at first, but
louder and louder as it sprang higher and higher, until lost to sight,
its glorious song still audible, though John Shelley was too much
occupied with his own thoughts, and, perhaps, too much accustomed to the
singing of the lark, to pay much attention to it. Even his dogs, Rover
and Snap, failed to wake him from his meditation, until he reached the
meadow where he had folded his sheep for the night, and then every
thought, except whether the sheep were all safe, vanished from his mind
as he stood counting them.
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