The Silent Mill

Old, and weather-beaten, and roofless, its crumbling walls stretch upwards toward the sky, giving free access to every gust of wind. Two large, round stones that once, maybe, bravely fulfilled their task, have broken through the rotten wood-work and, obeying the natural law of gravitation, have wedged themselves deep into the ground. Moss and lichen have clothed all in green, and here and there some water-cress puts forth its sickly green, sodden growth. From a half-broken pipe the water runs slowly down, trickles in sleepy monotony onto the spokes and breaks there, filling the surrounding air with fine, drizzling spray. Under a gray thicket of alders the little rivulet lies hidden in malodorous slothfulness, washed full of water-weeds and frog-spawn, choked up with mare's tail and flowering rushes.