"
Side by side the three swam, Phoebus swimming gently to keep
pace with the children. Their marble clothes did not seem to
interfere at all with their swimming, as your clothes would if you
suddenly jumped into the basin of the Trafalgar Square fountains
and tried to swim there. And they swam most beautifully, with that
perfect ease and absence of effort or tiredness which you must
have noticed about your own swimming in dreams. And it was the
most lovely place to swim in; the water-lilies, whose long, snaky
stalks are so inconvenient to ordinary swimmers, did not in the
least interfere with the movements of marble arms and legs. The
moon was high in the clear sky-dome. The weeping willows,
cypresses, temples, terraces, banks of trees and shrubs, and the
wonderful old house, all added to the romantic charm of the scene.
"This is the nicest thing the ring has brought us yet," said Mabel,
through a languid but perfect side-stroke.
"I thought you'd enjoy it," said Phoebus kindly; "now once more
round, and then the island."
They landed on the island amid a fringe of rushes, yarrow,
willow-herb, loose-strife, and a few late, scented, powdery, creamy
heads of meadow-sweet. The island was bigger than it looked from
the bank, and it seemed covered with trees and shrubs. But when,
Phoebus leading the way, they went into the shadow of these, they
perceived that beyond the trees lay a light, much nearer to them
than the other side of the island could possibly be.
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