Stone fences

Hiking as they were, over this countryside which had inspired the likes of Wordsworth, one could sense the history of the place. Pockets of wooded areas peppered the land, a gentle contrast to the stretches of what once had been a continuous patchwork of pasture and garden, green, grassy and bordered on all sides by the ubiquitous stone fences.

The stones emerged each year out of the hillside as though the earth were trying to purge itself of an irritation. Farmers of yore had spent the first part of each spring clearing their fields of the rubble, and one wondered, hiking as they were, whether the walls were constructed to contain the fields, or simply as the most convenient place to store the never-ending stream of rocky sediment.

There were also boulders, smooth from centuries of being washed by the frequent rain showers of the region, and useful as landmarks. They had identified two of these, carefully matching the dots in the distant landscape to those on the map, and had been picking their way across the ridge and down the grassy slope toward their target, when they paused, noticing the movement, and realizing all in an instant that their supposed landmarks were in fact two dozing sheep. Lost in the English countryside, they folded the errant map and sat down on the stone fence, wondering if they would discover their location before the next rain shower overtook them.