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But though Christian would go his own gait, and skipping was unsafe because the adventure were tucked away among the arguments like strawberries in a bed of leaves, he did at last bring her past the Enchanted Ground (disappointingly unproductive of fairies) to the Land of Beulah and a clear view of the Cœlestial City itself.

Absorbed Laura, curled-up by Gran’papa’s fire on that clear October morning, reading of the Reflexion of the sun on the City (for the City was of pure gold) and dutifully looking up Rev. xxi. 28, had just stumbled upon a more marvellous heaven than even Bunyan drew, when the nursemaid, as it always happened, pounced upon her and brushed her and buttoned her and gloved her and stuck a hat upon her and hurried her off for a walk, too dazed to protest, with her head full of rivers of life and fruit trees and gates that were one pearl (like Mother’s ring) and strange, intoxicating, unpronounceable names—the third, chalcedony, and the seventh, chrysolite, and the eighth, beryl. She was far too absorbed to notice the way they went, and Wilfred and James were pelting each other with fallen leaves, and Nurse was leaning panting against the perambulator, before she realized that they had climbed the long Beech Hill Road that Nurse disliked because it was steep and lonely, but which, as the highest point of the highest village in a hilly county, did certainly satisfy Aunt Adela’s belief in fresh air.