diff options
Diffstat (limited to '5406.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | 5406.txt | 7757 |
1 files changed, 7757 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/5406.txt b/5406.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3a30cf9 --- /dev/null +++ b/5406.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7757 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Afoot in England, by W.H. Hudson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Afoot in England + +Author: W.H. Hudson + +Release Date: April, 2004 [EBook #5406] +Posting Date: March 28, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AFOOT IN ENGLAND *** + + + + +Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer + + + + + + + +AFOOT IN ENGLAND + + +By W.H. Hudson + + + +Contents + + I. Guide Books: An Introduction, + II. On Going Back, + III. Walking and Cycling, + IV. Seeking a Shelter, + V. Wind, Wave, and Spirit, + VI. By Swallowfield, + VII. Roman Calleva, + VIII. A Cold Day at Silchester, + IX. Rural Rides, + X. The Last of his Name, + XI. Salisbury and its Doves, + XII. Whitesheet Hill, + XIII. Bath and Wells Revisited, + XIV. The Return of the Native, + XV. Summer Days on the Otter, + XVI. In Praise of the Cow, + XVII. An Old Road Leading Nowhere, + XVIII. Branscombe, + XIX. A Abbotsbury, + XX. Salisbury Revisited, + XXI. Stonehenge, + XXII. The Tillage and "The Stones," + XXIII. Following a River, + XXIV. Troston, + XXV. My Friend Jack, + + + + +Chapter One: Guide-Books: An Introduction + +Guide-books are so many that it seems probable we have more than any +other country--possibly more than all the rest of the universe together. +Every county has a little library of its own--guides to its towns, +churches, abbeys, castles, rivers, mountains; finally, to the county +as a whole. They are of all prices and all sizes, from the diminutive +paper-covered booklet, worth a penny, to the stout cloth-bound octavo +volume which costs eight or ten or twelve shillings, or to the gigantic +folio county history, the huge repository from which the guide-book +maker gets his materials. For these great works are also guide-books, +containing everything we want to learn, only made on so huge a scale +as to be suited to the coat pockets of Brobdingnagians rather than of +little ordinary men. The wonder of it all comes in when we find that +these books, however old and comparatively worthless they may be, are +practically never wholly out of date. When a new work is brought out +(dozens appear annually) and, say, five thousand copies sold, it +does not throw as many, or indeed any, copies of the old book out of +circulation: it supersedes nothing. If any man can indulge in the luxury +of a new up-to-date guide to any place, and gets rid of his old one +(a rare thing to do), this will be snapped up by poorer men, who will +treasure it and hand it down or on to others. Editions of 1860-50-40, +and older, are still prized, not merely as keepsakes but for study +or reference. Any one can prove this by going the round of a dozen +second-hand booksellers in his own district in London. There will +be tons of literary rubbish, and good stuff old and new, but few +guidebooks--in some cases not one. If you ask your man at a venture for, +say, a guide to Hampshire, he will most probably tell you that he has +not one in stock; then, in his anxiety to do business, he will, perhaps, +fish out a guide to Derbyshire, dated 1854--a shabby old book--and offer +it for four or five shillings, the price of a Crabbe in eight volumes, +or of Gibbon's Decline and Fall in six volumes, bound in calf. Talk to +this man, and to the other eleven, and they will tell you that there is +always a sale for guide-books--that the supply does not keep pace with +the demand. It may be taken as a fact that most of the books of this +kind published during the last half-century--many millions of copies in +the aggregate--are still in existence and are valued possessions. + +There is nothing to quarrel with in all this. As a people we run about a +great deal; and having curious minds we naturally wish to know all there +is to be known, or all that is interesting to know, about the places we +visit. Then, again, our time as a rule being limited, we want the whole +matter--history, antiquities, places of interest in the neighbourhood, +etc. in a nutshell. The brief book serves its purpose well enough; but +it is not thrown away like the newspaper and the magazines; however +cheap and badly got up it may be, it is taken home to serve another +purpose, to be a help to memory, and nobody can have it until its owner +removes himself (but not his possessions) from this planet; or until +the broker seizes his belongings, and guide-books, together with other +books, are disposed of in packages by the auctioneer. + +In all this we see that guide-books are very important to us, and that +there is little or no fault to be found with them, since even the worst +give some guidance and enable us in after times mentally to revisit +distant places. It may then be said that there are really no bad +guide-books, and that those that are good in the highest sense are +beyond praise. A reverential sentiment, which is almost religious in +character, connects itself in our minds with the very name of Murray. It +is, however, possible to make an injudicious use of these books, and by +so doing to miss the fine point of many a pleasure. The very fact that +these books are guides to us and invaluable, and that we readily acquire +the habit of taking them about with us and consulting them at frequent +intervals, comes between us and that rarest and most exquisite enjoyment +to be experienced amidst novel scenes. He that visits a place new to him +for some special object rightly informs himself of all that the book can +tell him. The knowledge may be useful; pleasure is with him a secondary +object. But if pleasure be the main object, it will only be experienced +in the highest degree by him who goes without book and discovers what +old Fuller called the "observables" for himself. There will be no +mental pictures previously formed; consequently what is found will not +disappoint. When the mind has been permitted to dwell beforehand on +any scene, then, however beautiful or grand it may be, the element +of surprise is wanting and admiration is weak. The delight has been +discounted. + +My own plan, which may be recommended only to those who go out +for pleasure--who value happiness above useless (otherwise useful) +knowledge, and the pictures that live and glow in memory above albums +and collections of photographs--is not to look at a guide-book until the +place it treats of has been explored and left behind. + +The practical person, to whom this may come as a new idea and who wishes +not to waste any time in experiments, would doubtless like to hear how +the plan works. He will say that he certainly wants all the happiness to +be got out of his rambles, but it is clear that without the book in his +pocket he would miss many interesting things: Would the greater degree +of pleasure experienced in the others be a sufficient compensation? +I should say that he would gain more than he would lose; that vivid +interest and pleasure in a few things is preferable to that fainter, +more diffused feeling experienced in the other case. Again, we have to +take into account the value to us of the mental pictures gathered in our +wanderings. For we know that only when a scene is viewed emotionally, +when it produces in us a shock of pleasure, does it become a permanent +possession of the mind; in other words, it registers an image which, +when called up before the inner eye, is capable of reproducing a measure +of the original delight. + +In recalling those scenes which have given me the greatest happiness, +the images of which are most vivid and lasting, I find that most of them +are of scenes or objects which were discovered, as it were, by chance, +which I had not heard of, or else had heard of and forgotten, or which +I had not expected to see. They came as a surprise, and in the following +instance one may see that it makes a vast difference whether we do or do +not experience such a sensation. + +In the course of a ramble on foot in a remote district I came to a small +ancient town, set in a cuplike depression amidst high wood-grown hills. +The woods were of oak in spring foliage, and against that vivid green +I saw the many-gabled tiled roofs and tall chimneys of the old timbered +houses, glowing red and warm brown in the brilliant sunshine--a scene of +rare beauty, and yet it produced no shock of pleasure; never, in fact, +had I looked on a lovely scene for the first time so unemotionally. +It seemed to be no new scene, but an old familiar one; and that it had +certain degrading associations which took away all delight. + +The reason of this was that a great railway company had long been +"booming" this romantic spot, and large photographs, plain and coloured, +of the town and its quaint buildings had for years been staring at me +in every station and every railway carriage which I had entered on that +line. Photography degrades most things, especially open-air things; +and in this case, not only had its poor presentments made the scene too +familiar, but something of the degradation in the advertising pictures +seemed to attach itself to the very scene. Yet even here, after some +pleasureless days spent in vain endeavours to shake off these vulgar +associations, I was to experience one of the sweetest surprises and +delights of my life. + +The church of this village-like town is one of its chief attractions; it +is a very old and stately building, and its perpendicular tower, +nearly a hundred feet high, is one of the noblest in England. It has a +magnificent peal of bells, and on a Sunday afternoon they were ringing, +filling and flooding that hollow in the hills, seeming to make the +houses and trees and the very earth to tremble with the glorious storm +of sound. Walking past the church, I followed the streamlet that runs +through the town and out by a cleft between the hills to a narrow marshy +valley, on the other side of which are precipitous hills, clothed from +base to summit in oak woods. As I walked through the cleft the musical +roar of the bells followed, and was like a mighty current flowing +through and over me; but as I came out the sound from behind ceased +suddenly and was now in front, coming back from the hills before me. A +sound, but not the same--not a mere echo; and yet an echo it was, the +most wonderful I had ever heard. For now that great tempest of musical +noise, composed of a multitude of clanging notes with long vibrations, +overlapping and mingling and clashing together, seemed at the same time +one and many--that tempest from the tower which had mysteriously ceased +to be audible came back in strokes or notes distinct and separate and +multiplied many times. The sound, the echo, was distributed over the +whole face of the steep hill before me, and was changed in character, +and it was as if every one of those thousands of oak trees had a peal +of bells in it, and that they were raining that far-up bright spiritual +tree music down into the valley below. As I stood listening it seemed +to me that I had never heard anything so beautiful, nor had any man--not +the monk of Eynsham in that vision when he heard the Easter bells on +the holy Saturday evening, and described the sound as "a ringing of a +marvellous sweetness, as if all the bells in the world, or whatsoever is +of sounding, had been rung together at once." + +Here, then, I had found and had become the possessor of something +priceless, since in that moment of surprise and delight the mysterious +beautiful sound, with the whole scene, had registered an impression +which would outlast all others received at that place, where I had +viewed all things with but languid interest. Had it not come as a +complete surprise, the emotion experienced and the resultant mental +image would not have been so vivid; as it is, I can mentally stand in +that valley when I will, seeing that green-wooded hill in front of me +and listen to that unearthly music. + +Naturally, after quitting the spot, I looked at the first opportunity +into a guide-book of the district, only to find that it contained not +one word about those wonderful illusive sounds! The book-makers had not +done their work well, since it is a pleasure after having discovered +something delightful for ourselves to know how others have been affected +by it and how they describe it. + +Of many other incidents of the kind I will, in this chapter, relate one +more, which has a historical or legendary interest. I was staying with +the companion of my walks at a village in Southern England in a district +new to us. We arrived on a Saturday, and next morning after breakfast +went out for a long walk. Turning into the first path across the fields +on leaving the village, we came eventually to an oak wood, which was +like an open forest, very wild and solitary. In half an hour's walk +among the old oaks and underwood we saw no sign of human occupancy, and +heard nothing but the woodland birds. We heard, and then saw, the cuckoo +for the first time that season, though it was but April the fourth. But +the cuckoo was early that spring and had been heard by some from the +middle of March. At length, about half-past ten o'clock, we caught sight +of a number of people walking in a kind of straggling procession by a +path which crossed ours at right angles, headed by a stout old man in +a black smock frock and brown leggings, who carried a big book in one +hand. One of the processionists we spoke to told us they came from a +hamlet a mile away on the borders of the wood and were on their way to +church. We elected to follow them, thinking that the church was at some +neighbouring village; to our surprise we found it was in the wood, with +no other building in sight--a small ancient-looking church built on a +raised mound, surrounded by a wide shallow grass-grown trench, on the +border of a marshy stream. The people went in and took their seats, +while we remained standing just by the door. Then the priest came from +the vestry, and seizing the rope vigorously, pulled at it for five +minutes, after which he showed us where to sit and the service began. It +was very pleasant there, with the door open to the sunlit forest and +the little green churchyard without, with a willow wren, the first I had +heard, singing his delicate little strain at intervals. + +The service over, we rambled an hour longer in the wood, then returned +to our village, which had a church of its own, and our landlady, hearing +where we had been, told us the story, or tradition, of the little church +in the wood. Its origin goes very far back to early Norman times, when +all the land in this part was owned by one of William's followers on +whom it had been bestowed. He built himself a house or castle on +the edge of the forest, where he lived with his wife and two little +daughters who were his chief delight. It happened that one day when he +was absent the two little girls with their female attendant went into +the wood in search of flowers, and that meeting a wild boar they turned +and fled, screaming for help. The savage beast pursued, and, quickly +overtaking them, attacked the hindermost, the youngest of the two little +girls, anal killed her, the others escaping in the meantime. On the +following day the father returned, and was mad with grief and rage on +hearing of the tragedy, and in his madness resolved to go alone on foot +to the forest and search for the beast and taste no food or drink until +he had slain it. Accordingly to the forest he went, and roamed through +it by day and night, and towards the end of the following day he +actually found and roused the dreadful animal, and although weakened by +his long fast and fatigue, his fury gave him force to fight and conquer +it, or else the powers above came to his aid; for when he stood spear +in hand to wait the charge of the furious beast he vowed that if he +overcame it on that spot he would build a chapel, where God would be +worshipped for ever. And there it was raised and has stood to this day, +its doors open every Sunday to worshippers, with but one break, some +time in the sixteenth century to the third year of Elizabeth, since when +there has been no suspension of the weekly service. + +That the tradition is not true no one can say. We know that the memory +of an action or tragedy of a character to stir the feelings and impress +the imagination may live unrecorded in any locality for long centuries. +And more, we know or suppose, from at least one quite familiar instance +from Flintshire, that a tradition may even take us back to prehistoric +times and find corroboration in our own day. + +But of this story what corroboration is there, and what do the books +say? I have consulted the county history, and no mention is made of +such a tradition, and can only assume that the author had never heard +it--that he had not the curious Aubrey mind. He only says that it is +a very early church--how early he does not know--and adds that it was +built "for the convenience of the inhabitants of the place." An odd +statement, seeing that the place has every appearance of having always +been what it is, a forest, and that the inhabitants thereof are weasels, +foxes, jays and such-like, and doubtless in former days included wolves, +boars, roe-deer and stags, beings which, as Walt Whitman truly remarks, +do not worry themselves about their souls. + +With this question, however, we need not concern ourselves. To me, +after stumbling by chance on the little church in that solitary woodland +place, the story of its origin was accepted as true; no doubt it had +come down unaltered from generation to generation through all those +centuries, and it moved my pity yet was a delight to hear, as great +perhaps as it had been to listen to the beautiful chimes many times +multiplied from the wooded hill. And if I have a purpose in this book, +which is without a purpose, a message to deliver and a lesson to teach, +it is only this--the charm of the unknown, and the infinitely greater +pleasure in discovering the interesting things for ourselves than in +informing ourselves of them by reading. It is like the difference in +flavour in wild fruits and all wild meats found and gathered by our own +hands in wild places and that of the same prepared and put on the table +for us. The ever-varying aspects of nature, of earth and sea and cloud, +are a perpetual joy to the artist, who waits and watches for their +appearance, who knows that sun and atmosphere have for him revelations +without end. They come and go and mock his best efforts; he knows that +his striving is in vain--that his weak hands and earthy pigments cannot +reproduce these effects or express his feeling--that, as Leighton said, +"every picture is a subject thrown away." But he has his joy none the +less; it is in the pursuit and in the dream of capturing something +illusive, mysterious, and inexpressibly beautiful. + + + + +Chapter Two: On Going Back + + +In looking over the preceding chapter it occurred to me that I had +omitted something, or rather that it would have been well to drop a word +of warning to those who have the desire to revisit a place where they +have experienced a delightful surprise. Alas! they cannot have that +sensation a second time, and on this account alone the mental image +must always be better than its reality. Let the image--the first sharp +impression--content us. Many a beautiful picture is spoilt by the artist +who cannot be satisfied that he has made the best of his subject, and +retouching his canvas to bring out some subtle charm which made the +work a success loses it altogether. So in going back, the result of +the inevitable disillusionment is that the early mental picture loses +something of its original freshness. The very fact that the delightful +place or scene was discovered by us made it the shining place it is in +memory. And again, the charm we found in it may have been in a measure +due to the mood we were in, or to the peculiar aspect in which it came +before us at the first, due to the season, to atmospheric and sunlight +effects, to some human interest, or to a conjunction of several +favourable circumstances; we know we can never see it again in that +aspect and with that precise feeling. + +On this account I am shy of revisiting the places where I have +experienced the keenest delight. For example, I have no desire to +revisit that small ancient town among the hills, described in the last +chapter; to go on a Sunday evening through that narrow gorge, filled +with the musical roar of the church bells; to leave that great sound +behind and stand again listening to the marvellous echo from the wooded +hill on the other side of the valley. Nor would I care to go again in +search of that small ancient lost church in the forest. It would not +be early April with the clear sunbeams shining through the old leafless +oaks on the floor of fallen yellow leaves with the cuckoo fluting before +his time; nor would that straggling procession of villagers appear, +headed by an old man in a smock frock with a big book in his hand; nor +would I hear for the first time the strange history of the church which +so enchanted me. + +I will here give an account of yet another of the many well-remembered +delightful spots which I would not revisit, nor even look upon again if +I could avoid doing so by going several miles out of my way. + +It was green open country in the west of England--very far west, +although on the east side of the Tamar--in a beautiful spot remote from +railroads and large towns, and the road by which I was travelling (on +this occasion on a bicycle) ran or serpentined along the foot of a range +of low round hills on my right hand, while on my left I had a green +valley with other low round green hills beyond it. The valley had a +marshy stream with sedgy margins and occasional clumps of alder and +willow trees. It was the end of a hot midsummer day; the sun went down +a vast globe of crimson fire in a crystal clear sky; and as I was going +east I was obliged to dismount and stand still to watch its setting. +When the great red disc had gone down behind the green world I resumed +my way but went slowly, then slower still, the better to enjoy the +delicious coolness which came from the moist valley and the beauty of +the evening in that solitary place which I had never looked on before. +Nor was there any need to hurry; I had but three or four miles to go +to the small old town where I intended passing the night. By and by +the winding road led me down close to the stream at a point where it +broadened to a large still pool. This was the ford, and on the other +side was a small rustic village, consisting of a church, two or three +farm-houses with their barns and outbuildings, and a few ancient-looking +stone cottages with thatched roofs. But the church was the main thing; +it was a noble building with a very fine tower, and from its size and +beauty I concluded that it was an ancient church dating back to the +time when there was a passion in the West Country and in many parts +of England of building these great fanes even in the remotest and most +thinly populated parishes. In this I was mistaken through having seen it +at a distance from the other side of the ford after the sun had set. + +Never, I thought, had I seen a lovelier village with its old picturesque +cottages shaded by ancient oaks and elms, and the great church with its +stately tower looking dark against the luminous western sky. Dismounting +again I stood for some time admiring the scene, wishing that I could +make that village my home for the rest of my life, conscious at the same +time that is was the mood, the season, the magical hour which made it +seem so enchanting. Presently a young man, the first human figure that +presented itself to my sight, appeared, mounted on a big carthorse and +leading a second horse by a halter, and rode down into the pool to bathe +the animals' legs and give them a drink. He was a sturdy-looking young +fellow with a sun-browned face, in earth-coloured, working clothes, +with a small cap stuck on the back of his round curly head; he probably +imagined himself not a bad-looking young man, for while his horses were +drinking he laid over on the broad bare backs and bending down studied +his own reflection in the bright water. Then an old woman came out of a +cottage close by, and began talking to him in her West Country dialect +in a thin high-pitched cracked voice. Their talking was the only sound +in the village; so silent was it that all the rest of its inhabitants +might have been in bed and fast asleep; then, the conversation ended, +the young man rode out with a great splashing and the old woman turned +into her cottage again, and I was left in solitude. + +Still I lingered: I could not go just yet; the chances were that I +should never again see that sweet village in that beautiful aspect at +the twilight hour. + +For now it came into my mind that I could not very well settle there +for the rest of my life; I could not, in fact, tie myself to any place +without sacrificing certain other advantages I possessed; and the main +thing was that by taking root I should deprive myself of the chance of +looking on still other beautiful scenes and experiencing other sweet +surprises. I was wishing that I had come a little earlier on the scene +to have had time to borrow the key of the church and get a sight of the +interior, when all at once I heard a shrill voice and a boy appeared +running across the wide green space of the churchyard. A second boy +followed, then another, then still others, and I saw that they were +going into the church by the side door. They were choir-boys going to +practice. The church was open then, and late as it was I could have +half an hour inside before it was dark! The stream was spanned by an old +stone bridge above the ford, and going over it I at once made my way +to the great building, but even before entering it I discovered that +it possessed an organ of extraordinary power and that someone was +performing on it with a vengeance. Inside the noise was tremendous--a +bigger noise from an organ, it seemed to me, than I had ever heard +before, even at the Albert Hall and the Crystal Palace, but even more +astonishing than the uproar was the sight that met my eyes. The boys, +nine or ten sturdy little rustics with round sunburnt West Country +faces, were playing the roughest game ever witnessed in a church. Some +were engaged in a sort of flying fight, madly pursuing one another up +and down the aisles and over the pews, and whenever one overtook another +he would seize hold of him and they would struggle together until +one was thrown and received a vigorous pommelling. Those who were not +fighting were dancing to the music. It was great fun to them, and they +were shouting and laughing their loudest only not a sound of it all +could be heard on account of the thunderous roar of the organ which +filled and seemed to make the whole building tremble. The boys took no +notice of me, and seeing that there was a singularly fine west window, I +went to it and stood there some time with my back to the game which +was going on at the other end of the building, admiring the beautiful +colours and trying to make out the subjects depicted. In the centre +part, lit by the after-glow in the sky to a wonderful brilliance, was +the figure of a saint, a lovely young woman in a blue robe with an +abundance of loose golden-red hair and an aureole about her head. Her +pale face wore a sweet and placid expression, and her eyes of a pure +forget-me-not blue were looking straight into mine. As I stood there +the music, or noise, ceased and a very profound silence followed--not +a giggle, not a whisper from the outrageous young barbarians, and not a +sound of the organist or of anyone speaking to them. Presently I became +conscious of some person standing almost but not quite abreast of me, +and turning sharply I found a clergyman at my side. He was the vicar, +the person who had been letting himself go on the organ; a slight man +with a handsome, pale, ascetic face, clean-shaven, very dark-eyed, +looking more like an Italian monk or priest than an English clergyman. +But although rigidly ecclesiastic in his appearance and dress, there was +something curiously engaging in him, along with a subtle look which +it was not easy to fathom. There was a light in his dark eyes which +reminded me of a flame seen through a smoked glass or a thin black veil, +and a slight restless movement about the corners of his mouth as if a +smile was just on the point of breaking out. But it never quite came; +he kept his gravity even when he said things which would have gone very +well with a smile. + +"I see," he spoke, and his penetrating musical voice had, too, like his +eyes and mouth, an expression of mystery in it, "that you are admiring +our beautiful west window, especially the figure in the centre. It is +quite new--everything is new here--the church itself was only built a +few years ago. This window is its chief glory: it was done by a good +artist--he has done some of the most admired windows of recent years; +and the centre figure is supposed to be a portrait of our generous +patroness. At all events she sat for it to him. You have probably heard +of Lady Y--?" + +"What!" I exclaimed. "Lady Y--: that funny old woman!" + +"No--middle-aged," he corrected, a little frigidly and perhaps a little +mockingly at the same time. + +"Very well, middle-aged if you like; I don't know her personally. One +hears about her; but I did not know she had a place in these parts." + +"She owns most of this parish and has done so much for us that we can +very well look leniently on a little weakness--her wish that the future +inhabitants of the place shall not remember her as a middle-aged woman +not remarkable for good looks--'funny,' as you just now said." + +He was wonderfully candid, I thought. But what extraordinary benefits +had she bestowed on them, I asked, to enable them to regard, or to say, +that this picture of a very beautiful young female was her likeness! + +"Why," he said, "the church would not have been built but for her. We +were astonished at the sum she offered to contribute towards the work, +and at once set about pulling the small old church down so as to rebuild +on the exact site." + +"Do you know," I returned, "I can't help saying something you will not +like to hear. It is a very fine church, no doubt, but it always angers +me to hear of a case like this where some ancient church is pulled down +and a grand new one raised in its place to the honour and glory of some +rich parvenu with or without a brand new title." + +"You are not hurting me in the least," he replied, with that change +which came from time to time in his eyes as if the flame behind the +screen had suddenly grown brighter. "I agree with every word you say; +the meanest church in the land should be cherished as long as it will +hold together. But unfortunately ours had to come down. It was very old +and decayed past mending. The floor was six feet below the level of the +surrounding ground and frightfully damp. It had been examined over and +over again by experts during the past forty or fifty years, and from the +first they pronounced it a hopeless case, so that it was never restored. +The interior, right down to the time of demolition, was like that of +most country churches of a century ago, with the old black worm-eaten +pews, in which the worshippers shut themselves up as if in their own +houses or castles. On account of the damp we were haunted by toads. You +smile, sir, but it was no smiling matter for me during my first year as +vicar, when I discovered that it was the custom here to keep pet toads +in the church. It sounds strange and funny, no doubt, but it is a fact +that all the best people in the parish had one of these creatures, +and it was customary for the ladies to bring it a weekly supply of +provisions--bits of meat, hard-boiled eggs chopped up, and earth-worms, +and whatever else they fancied it would like--in their reticules. The +toads, I suppose, knew when it was Sunday--their feeding day; at all +events they would crawl out of their holes in the floor under the pews +to receive their rations--and caresses. The toads got on my nerves with +rather unpleasant consequences. I preached in a way which my listeners +did not appreciate or properly understand, particularly when I took for +my subject our duty towards the lower animals, including reptiles." + +"Batrachians," I interposed, echoing as well as I could the tone in +which he had rebuked me before. + +"Very well, batrachians--I am not a naturalist. But the impression +created on their minds appeared to be that I was rather an odd person +in the pulpit. When the time came to pull the old church down the +toad-keepers were bidden to remove their pets, which they did with +considerable reluctance. What became of them I do not know--I never +inquired. I used to have a careful inspection made of the floor to make +sure that these creatures were not put back in the new building, and I +am happy to think it is not suited to their habits. The floors are very +well cemented, and are dry and clean." + +Having finished his story he invited me to go to the parsonage and get +some refreshment. "I daresay you are thirsty," he said. + +But it was getting late; it was almost dark in the church by now, +although the figure of the golden-haired saint still glowed in the +window and gazed at us out of her blue eyes. "I must not waste more of +your time," I added. "There are your boys still patiently waiting to +begin their practice--such nice quiet fellows!" + +"Yes, they are," he returned a little bitterly, a sudden accent of +weariness in his voice and no trace now of what I had seen in his +countenance a little while ago--the light that shone and brightened +behind the dark eye and the little play about the corners of the mouth +as of dimpling motions on the surface of a pool. + +And in that new guise, or disguise, I left him, the austere priest with +nothing to suggest the whimsical or grotesque in his cold ascetic face. +Recrossing the bridge I stood a little time and looked once more at the +noble church tower standing dark against the clear amber-coloured sky, +and said to myself: "Why, this is one of the oddest incidents of my +life! Not that I have seen or heard anything very wonderful--just a +small rustic village, one of a thousand in the land; a big new church in +which some person was playing rather madly on the organ, a set of unruly +choir-boys; a handsome stained-glass west window, and, finally, a nice +little chat with the vicar." It was not in these things; it was a sense +of something strange in the mind, of something in some way unlike all +other places and people and experiences. The sensation was like that of +the reader who becomes absorbed in Henry Newbolt's romance of The Old +Country, who identifies himself with the hero and unconsciously, or +without quite knowing how, slips back out of this modern world into +that of half a thousand years ago. It is the same familiar green land in +which he finds himself--the same old country and the same sort of people +with feelings and habits of life and thought unchangeable as the colour +of grass and flowers, the songs of birds and the smell of the earth, yet +with a difference. I recognized it chiefly in the parish priest I had +been conversing with; for one thing, his mediaeval mind evidently did +not regard a sense of humour and of the grotesque as out of place in or +on a sacred building. If it had been lighter I should have looked at +the roof for an effigy of a semi-human toad-like creature smiling down +mockingly at the worshippers as they came and went. + +On departing it struck me that it would assuredly be a mistake to return +to this village and look at it again by the common lights of day. No, +it was better to keep the impressions I had gathered unspoilt; even to +believe, if I could, that no such place existed, but that it had +existed exactly as I had found it, even to the unruly choir-boys, +the ascetic-looking priest with a strange light in his eyes, and the +worshippers who kept pet toads in the church. They were not precisely +like people of the twentieth century. As for the eccentric middle-aged +or elderly person whose portrait adorned the west window, she was +not the lady I knew something about, but another older Lady Y--, who +flourished some six or seven centuries ago. + + + + +Chapter Three: Walking and Cycling + + +We know that there cannot be progression without retrogression, or gain +with no corresponding loss; and often on my wheel, when flying along +the roads at a reckless rate of very nearly nine miles an hour, I have +regretted that time of limitations, galling to me then, when I was +compelled to go on foot. I am a walker still, but with other means of +getting about I do not feel so native to the earth as formerly. That is +a loss. Yet a poorer walker it would have been hard to find, and on even +my most prolonged wanderings the end of each day usually brought extreme +fatigue. This, too, although my only companion was slow--slower than the +poor proverbial snail or tortoise--and I would leave her half a mile +or so behind to force my way through unkept hedges, climb hills, and +explore woods and thickets to converse with every bird and shy little +beast and scaly creature I could discover. But mark what follows. In the +late afternoon I would be back in the road or footpath, satisfied to +go slow, then slower still, until--the snail in woman shape would be +obliged to slacken her pace to keep me company, and even to stand still +at intervals to give me needful rest. + +But there were compensations, and one, perhaps the best of all, was that +this method of seeing the country made us more intimate with the people +we met and stayed with. They were mostly poor people, cottagers in small +remote villages; and we, too, were poor, often footsore, in need of +their ministrations, and nearer to them on that account than if we +had travelled in a more comfortable way. I can recall a hundred little +adventures we met with during those wanderings, when we walked day after +day, without map or guide-book as our custom was, not knowing where the +evening would find us, but always confident that the people to whom it +would fall in the end to shelter us would prove interesting to know and +would show us a kindness that money could not pay for. Of these hundred +little incidents let me relate one. + +It was near the end of a long summer day when we arrived at a small +hamlet of about a dozen cottages on the edge of an extensive wood--a +forest it is called; and, coming to it, we said that here we must stay, +even if we had to spend the night sitting in a porch. The men and women +we talked to all assured us that they did not know of anyone who could +take us in, but there was Mr. Brownjohn, who kept the shop, and was the +right person to apply to. Accordingly we went to the little general shop +and heard that Mr. Brownjohn was not at home. His housekeeper, a fat, +dark, voluble woman with prominent black eyes, who minded the shop +in the master's absence, told us that Mr. Brownjohn had gone to a +neighbouring farm-house on important business, but was expected back +shortly. We waited, and by and by he returned, a shabbily dressed, +weak-looking little old man, with pale blue eyes and thin yellowish +white hair. He could not put us up, he said, he had no room in his +cottage; there was nothing for us but to go on to the next place, a +village three miles distant, on the chance of finding a bed there. We +assured him that we could go no further, and after revolving the matter +a while longer he again said that we could not stay, as there was not a +room to be had in the place since poor Mrs. Flowerdew had her trouble. +She had a spare room and used to take in a lodger occasionally, and a +good handy woman she was too; but now--no, Mrs. Flowerdew could not take +us in. We questioned him, and he said that no one had died there and +there had been no illness. They were all quite well at Mrs. Flowerdew's; +the trouble was of another kind. There was no more to be said about it. + +As nothing further could be got out of him we went in search of Mrs. +Flowerdew herself, and found her in a pretty vine-clad cottage. She was +a young woman, very poorly dressed, with a pleasing but careworn face, +and she had four small, bright, healthy, happy-faced children. They were +all grouped round her as she stood in the doorway to speak to us, and +they too were poorly dressed and poorly shod. When we told our tale she +appeared ready to burst into tears. Oh, how unfortunate it was that +she could not take us in! It would have made her so happy, and the +few shillings would have been such a blessing! But what could she do +now--the landlord's agent had put in a distress and carried off and sold +all her best things. Every stick out of her nice spare room had been +taken from them! Oh, it was cruel! + +As we wished to hear more she told us the whole story. They had got +behindhand with the rent, but that had often been the case, only this +time it happened that the agent wanted a cottage for a person he wished +to befriend, and so gave them notice to quit. But her husband was a +high-spirited man and determined to stick to his rights, so he informed +the agent that he refused to move until he received compensation for his +improvements. + +Questioned about these improvements, she led us through to the back to +show us the ground, about half an acre in extent, part of which was used +as a paddock for the donkey, and on the other part there were about a +dozen rather sickly-looking young fruit trees. Her husband, she said, +had planted the orchard and kept the fence of the paddock in order, and +they refused to compensate him! Then she took us up to the spare room, +empty of furniture, the floor thick with dust. The bed, table, +chairs, washhandstand, toilet service--the things she had been so long +struggling to get together, saving her money for months and months, and +making so many journeys to the town to buy--all, all he had taken away +and sold for almost nothing! + +Then, actually with tears in her eyes, she said that now we knew why she +couldn't take us in--why she had to seem so unkind. + +But we are going to stay, we told her. It was a very good room; she +could surely get a few things to put in it, and in the meantime we would +go and forage for provisions to last us till Monday. + +It is odd to find how easy it is to get what one wants by simply taking +it! At first she was amazed at our decision, then she was delighted and +said she would go out to her neighbours and try to borrow all that was +wanted in the way of furniture and bedding. Then we returned to Mr. +Brownjohn's to buy bread, bacon, and groceries, and he in turn sent us +to Mr. Marling for vegetables. Mr. Marling heard us, and soberly taking +up a spade and other implements led us out to his garden and dug us a +mess of potatoes while we waited. In the meantime good Mrs. Flowerdew +had not been idle, and we formed the idea that her neighbours must have +been her debtors for unnumbered little kindnesses, so eager did they now +appear to do her a good turn. Out of one cottage a woman was seen coming +burdened with a big roll of bedding; from others children issued bearing +cane chairs, basin and ewer, and so on, and when we next looked into +our room we found it swept and scrubbed, mats on the floor, and quite +comfortably furnished. + +After our meal in the small parlour, which had been given up to us, the +family having migrated into the kitchen, we sat for an hour by the open +window looking out on the dim forest and saw the moon rise--a great +golden globe above the trees--and listened to the reeling of the +nightjars. So many were the birds, reeling on all sides, at various +distances, that the evening air seemed full of their sounds, far and +near, like many low, tremulous, sustained notes blown on reeds, rising +and falling, overlapping and mingling. And presently from the bushes +close by, just beyond the weedy, forlorn little "orchard," sounded +the rich, full, throbbing prelude to the nightingale's song, and that +powerful melody that in its purity and brilliance invariably strikes us +with surprise seemed to shine out, as it were, against the background of +that diffused, mysterious purring of the nightjars, even as the golden +disc of the moon shone against and above the darkening skies and dusky +woods. + +And as we sat there, gazing and listening, a human voice came out of the +night--a call prolonged and modulated like the coo-ee of the Australian +bush, far off and faint; but the children in the kitchen heard it at the +same time, for they too had been listening, and instantly went mad with +excitement. + +"Father!" they all screamed together. "Father's coming!" and out they +rushed and away they fled down the darkening road, exerting their full +voices in shrill answering cries. + +We were anxious to see this unfortunate man, who was yet happy in a +loving family. He had gone early in the morning in his donkey-cart to +the little market town, fourteen miles away, to get the few necessaries +they could afford to buy. Doubtless they would be very few. We had +not long to wait, as the white donkey that drew the cart had put on a +tremendous spurt at the end, notwithstanding that the four youngsters +had climbed in to add to his burden. But what was our surprise to behold +in the charioteer a tall, gaunt, grey-faced old man with long white hair +and beard! He must have been seventy, that old man with a young wife and +four happy bright-eyed little children! + +We could understand it better when he finally settled down in his corner +in the kitchen and began to relate the events of the day, addressing his +poor little wife, now busy darning or patching an old garment, while the +children, clustered at his knee, listened as to a fairy tale. Certainly +this white-haired man had not grown old in mind; he was keenly +interested in all he saw and heard, and he had seen and heard much in +the little market town that day. Cattle and pigs and sheep and shepherds +and sheepdogs; farmers, shopkeepers, dealers, publicans, tramps, and +gentlefolks in carriages and on horseback; shops, too, with beautiful +new things in the windows; millinery, agricultural implements, flowers +and fruit and vegetables; toys and books and sweeties of all colours. +And the people he had met on the road and at market, and what they had +said to him about the weather and their business and the prospects of +the year, how their wives and children were, and the clever jokes they +had made, and his own jokes, which were the cleverest of all. If he had +just returned from Central Africa or from Thibet he could not have had +more to tell them nor told it with greater zest. + +We went to our room, but until the small hours the wind of the old +traveller's talk could still be heard at intervals from the kitchen, +mingled with occasional shrill explosions of laughter from the listening +children. + +It happened that on the following day, spent in idling in the forest and +about the hamlet, conversing with the cottagers, we were told that +our old man was a bit of a humbug; that he was a great talker, with a +hundred schemes for the improvement of his fortunes, and, incidently, +for the benefit of his neighbours and the world at large; but nothing +came of it all and he was now fast sinking into the lowest depths of +poverty. Yet who would blame him? 'Tis the nature of the gorse to be +"unprofitably gay." All that, however, is a question for the moralist; +the point now is that in walking, even in that poor way, when, on +account of physical weakness, it was often a pain and weariness, there +are alleviations which may be more to us than positive pleasures, and +scenes to delight the eye that are missed by the wheelman in his haste, +or but dimly seen or vaguely surmised in passing--green refreshing nooks +and crystal streamlets, and shadowy woodland depths with glimpses of a +blue sky beyond--all in the wilderness of the human heart. + + + + +Chapter Four: Seeking a Shelter + + +The "walks" already spoken of, at a time when life had little or no +other pleasure for us on account of poverty and ill-health, were taken +at pretty regular intervals two or three times a year. It all depended +on our means; in very lean years there was but one outing. It was +impossible to escape altogether from the immense unfriendly wilderness +of London simply because, albeit "unfriendly," it yet appeared to be the +only place in the wide world where our poor little talents could earn us +a few shillings a week to live on. Music and literature! but I fancy the +nearest crossing-sweeper did better, and could afford to give himself a +more generous dinner every day. It occasionally happened that an +article sent to some magazine was not returned, and always after so many +rejections to have one accepted and paid for with a cheque worth several +pounds was a cause of astonishment, and was as truly a miracle as if the +angel of the sun had compassionately thrown us down a handful of gold. +And out of these little handfuls enough was sometimes saved for the +country rambles at Easter and Whitsuntide and in the autumn. It was +during one of these Easter walks, when seeking for a resting-place for +the night, that we met with another adventure worth telling. + +We had got to that best part of Surrey not yet colonized by wealthy men +from the City, but where all things are as they were of old, when, late +in the day, we came to a pleasant straggling village with one street a +mile long. Here we resolved to stay, and walked the length of the street +making inquiries, but were told by every person we spoke to that the +only place we could stay at was the inn--the "White Hart." When we said +we preferred to stay at a cottage they smiled a pitying smile. No, there +was no such place. But we were determined not to go to the inn, although +it had a very inviting look, and was well placed with no other house +near it, looking on the wide village green with ancient trees shading +the road on either side. + +Having passed it and got to the end of the village, we turned and walked +back, still making vain inquiries, passing it again, and when once more +at the starting-point we were in despair when we spied a man coming +along the middle of the road and went out to meet him to ask the weary +question for the last time. His appearance was rather odd as he came +towards us on that blowy March evening with dust and straws flying past +and the level sun shining full on him. He was tall and slim, with a +large round smooth face and big pale-blue innocent-looking eyes, and he +walked rapidly but in a peculiar jerky yet shambling manner, swinging +and tossing his legs and arms about. Moving along in this disjointed +manner in his loose fluttering clothes he put one in mind of a +big flimsy newspaper blown along the road by the wind. This +unpromising-looking person at once told us that there was a place where +we could stay; he knew it well, for it happened to be his father's +house and his own home. It was away at the other end of the village. His +people had given accommodation to strangers before, and would be glad to +receive us and make us comfortable. + +Surprised, and a little doubtful of our good fortune, I asked my young +man if he could explain the fact that so many of his neighbours had +assured us that no accommodation was to be had in the village except at +the inn. He did not make a direct reply. He said that the ways of +the villagers were not the ways of his people. He and all his house +cherished only kind feelings towards their neighbours; whether those +feelings were returned or not, it was not for him to say. And there was +something else. A small appointment which would keep a man from want for +the term of his natural life, without absorbing all his time, had +become vacant in the village. Several of the young men in the place were +anxious to have it; then he, too, came forward as a candidate, and all +the others jeered at him and tried to laugh him out of it. He cared +nothing for that, and when the examination came off he proved the best +man and got the place. He had fought his fight and had overcome all his +enemies; if they did not like him any the better for his victory, and +did and said little things to injure him, he did not mind much, he could +afford to forgive them. + +Having finished his story, he said good-bye, and went his way, blown, as +it were, along the road by the wind. + +We were now very curious to see the other members of his family; they +would, we imagined, prove amusing, if nothing better. They proved a good +deal better. The house we sought, for a house it was, stood a little way +back from the street in a large garden. It had in former times been an +inn, or farm-house, possibly a manor-house, and was large, with many +small rooms, and short, narrow, crooked staircases, half-landings and +narrow passages, and a few large rooms, their low ceilings resting on +old oak beams, black as ebony. Outside, it was the most picturesque and +doubtless the oldest house in the village; many-gabled, with very tall +ancient chimneys, the roofs of red tiles mottled grey and yellow with +age and lichen. It was a surprise to find a woodman--for that was +what the man was--living in such a big place. The woodman himself, his +appearance and character, gave us a second and greater surprise. He was +a well-shaped man of medium height; although past middle life he looked +young, and had no white thread in his raven-black hair and beard. His +teeth were white and even, and his features as perfect as I have seen in +any man. His eyes were pure dark blue, contrasting rather strangely with +his pale olive skin and intense black hair. Only a woodman, but he might +have come of one of the oldest and best families in the country, if +there is any connection between good blood and fine features and a noble +expression. Oddly enough, his surname was an uncommon and aristocratic +one. His wife, on the other hand, although a very good woman as we +found, had a distinctly plebeian countenance. One day she informed us +that she came of a different and better class than her husband's. +She was the daughter of a small tradesman, and had begun life as a +lady's-maid: her husband was nothing but a labourer; his people had been +labourers for generations, consequently her marriage to him had involved +a considerable descent in the social scale. Hearing this, it was hard to +repress a smile. + +The contrast between this man and the ordinary villager of his class was +as great in manners and conversation as in features and expression. His +combined dignity and gentleness, and apparent unconsciousness of any +caste difference between man and man, were astonishing in one who had +been a simple toiler all his life. + +There were some grown-up children, others growing up, with others that +were still quite small. The boys, I noticed, favoured their mother, and +had commonplace faces; the girls took after their father, and though +their features were not so perfect they were exceptionally good-looking. +The eldest son--the disjointed, fly-away-looking young man who had +conquered all his enemies--had a wife and child. The eldest daughter was +also married, and had one child. Altogether the three families numbered +about sixteen persons, each family having its separate set of rooms, but +all dining at one table. How did they do it? It seemed easy enough to +them. They were serious people in a sense, although always cheerful and +sometimes hilarious when together of an evening, or at their meals. But +they regarded life as a serious matter, a state of probation; they +were non-smokers, total abstainers, diligent at their work, united, +profoundly religious. A fresh wonder came to light when I found that +this poor woodman, with so large a family to support, who spent ten or +twelve hours every day at his outdoor work, had yet been able out of his +small earnings to buy bricks and other materials, and, assisted by his +sons, to build a chapel adjoining his house. Here he held religious +services on Sundays, and once or twice of an evening during the week. +These services consisted of extempore prayers, a short address, and +hymns accompanied by a harmonium, which they all appeared able to play. + +What his particular doctrine was I did not inquire, nor did I wish for +any information on that point. Doubtless he was a Dissenter of some kind +living in a village where there was no chapel; the services were for +the family, but were also attended by a few of the villagers and some +persons from neighbouring farms who preferred a simpler form of worship +to that of the Church. + +It was not strange that this little community should have been regarded +with something like disfavour by the other villagers. For these others, +man for man, made just as much money, and paid less rent for their +small cottages, and, furthermore, received doles from the vicar and his +well-to-do parishioners, yet they could not better their position, much +less afford the good clothing, books, music, and other pleasant things +which the independent woodman bestowed on his family. And they knew why. +The woodman's very presence in their midst was a continual reproach, +a sermon on improvidence and intemperance, which they could not avoid +hearing by thrusting their fingers into their ears. + +During my stay with these people something occurred to cause them a very +deep disquiet. The reader will probably smile when I tell them what +it was. Awaking one night after midnight I heard the unusual sound of +voices in earnest conversation in the room below; this went on until +I fell asleep again. In the morning we noticed that our landlady had a +somewhat haggard face, and that the daughters also had pale faces, with +purple marks under the eyes, as if they had kept their mother company in +some sorrowful vigil. We were not left long in ignorance of the cause +of this cloud. The good woman asked if we had been much disturbed by +the talking. I answered that I had heard voices and had supposed that +friends from a distance had arrived overnight and that they had sat up +talking to a late hour. No--that was not it, she said; but someone had +arrived late, a son who was sixteen years old, and who had been absent +for some days on a visit to relations in another county. When they +gathered round him to hear his news he confessed that while away he +had learnt to smoke, and he now wished them to know that he had well +considered the matter, and was convinced that it was not wrong nor +harmful to smoke, and was determined not to give up his tobacco. They +had talked to him--father, mother, brothers, and sisters--using every +argument they could find or invent to move him, until it was day and +time for the woodman to go to his woods, and the others to their several +occupations. But their "all-night sitting" had been wasted; the stubborn +youth had not been convinced nor shaken. When, after morning prayers, +they got up from their knees, the sunlight shining in upon them, they +had made a last appeal with tears in their eyes, and he had refused to +give the promise they asked. The poor woman was greatly distressed. This +young fellow, I thought, favours his mother in features, but mentally he +is perhaps more like his father. Being a smoker myself I ventured to +put in a word for him. They were distressing themselves too much, I told +her; smoking in moderation was not only harmless, especially to those +who worked out of doors, but it was a well-nigh universal habit, and +many leading men in the religious world, both churchmen and dissenters, +were known to be smokers. + +Her answer, which came quickly enough, was that they did not regard +the practice of smoking as in itself bad, but they knew that in some +circumstances it was inexpedient; and in the case of her son they +were troubled at the thought of what smoking would ultimately lead to. +People, she continued, did not care to smoke, any more than they did to +eat and drink, in solitude. It was a social habit, and it was inevitable +that her boy should look for others to keep him company in smoking. +There would be no harm in that in the summer-time when young people like +to keep out of doors until bedtime; but during the long winter +evenings he would have to look for his companions in the parlour of the +public-house. And it would not be easy, scarcely possible, to sit long +among the others without drinking a little beer. It is really no more +wrong to drink a little beer than to smoke, he would say; and it would +be true. One pipe would lead to another and one glass of beer to +another. The habit would be formed and at last all his evenings and all +his earnings would be spent in the public-house. + +She was right, and I had nothing more to say except to wish her success +in her efforts. + +It is curious that the strongest protests against the evils of the +village pubic, which one hears from village women, come from those who +are not themselves sufferers. Perhaps it is not curious. Instinctively +we hide our sores, bodily and mental, from the public gaze. + +Not long ago I was in a small rustic village in Wiltshire, perhaps the +most charming village I have seen in that country. There was no inn +or ale-house, and feeling very thirsty after my long walk I went to a +cottage and asked the woman I saw there for a drink of milk. She invited +me in, and spreading a clean cloth on the table, placed a jug of new +milk, a loaf, and butter before me. For these good things she proudly +refused to accept payment. As she was a handsome young woman, with a +clear, pleasant voice, I was glad to have her sit there and talk to me +while I refreshed myself. Besides, I was in search of information and +got it from her during our talk. My object in going to the village was +to see a woman who, I had been told, was living there. I now heard that +her cottage was close by, but unfortunately, while anxious to see her, I +had no excuse for calling. + +"Do you think," said I to my young hostess, "that it would do to tell +her that I had heard something of her strange history and misfortunes, +and wished to offer her a little help? Is she very poor?" + +"Oh, no," she replied. "Please do not offer her money, if you see her. +She would be offended. There is no one in this village who would take a +shilling as a gift from a stranger. We all have enough; there is not a +poor person among us." + +"What a happy village!" I exclaimed. "Perhaps you are all total +abstainers." + +She laughed, and said that they all brewed their own beer--there was not +a total abstainer among them. Every cottager made from fifty to eighty +gallons, or more, and they drank beer every day, but very moderately, +while it lasted. They were all very sober; their children would have to +go to some neighbouring village to see a tipsy man. + +I remarked that at the next village, which had three public-houses, +there were a good marry persons so poor that they would gladly at any +time take a shilling from any one. + +It was the same everywhere in the district, she said, except in that +village which had no public-house. Not only were they better off, and +independent of blanket societies and charity in all forms, but they were +infinitely happier. And after the day's work the men came home to spend +the evening with their wives and children. + +At this stage I was surprised by a sudden burst of passion on her part. +She stood up, her face flushing red, and solemnly declared that if +ever a public-house was opened in that village, and if the men took +to spending their evenings in it, her husband with them, she would +not endure such a condition of things--she wondered that so many women +endured it--but would take her little ones and go away to earn her own +living under some other roof! + + + + +Chapter Five: Wind, Wave, and Spirit + + +The rambles I have described were mostly inland: when by chance they +took us down to the sea our impressions and adventures appeared less +interesting. Looking back on the holiday, it would seem to us a somewhat +vacant time compared to one spent in wandering from village to village. +I mean if we do not take into account that first impression which the +sea invariably makes on us on returning to it after a long absence--the +shock of recognition and wonder and joy as if we had been suffering +from loss of memory and it had now suddenly come back to us. That brief +moving experience over, there is little the sea can give us to compare +with the land. How could it be otherwise in our case, seeing that we +were by it in a crowd, our movements and way of life regulated for us in +places which appear like overgrown and ill-organized convalescent homes? +There was always a secret intense dislike of all parasitic and holiday +places, an uncomfortable feeling which made the pleasure seem poor and +the remembrance of days so spent hardly worth dwelling on. And as we +are able to keep in or throw out of our minds whatever we please, being +autocrats in our own little kingdom, I elected to cast away most of the +memories of these comparatively insipid holidays. But not all, and of +those I retain I will describe at least two, one in the present chapter +on the East Anglian coast, the other later on. + +It was cold, though the month was August; it blew and the sky was grey +and rain beginning to fall when we came down about noon to a small town +on the Norfolk coast, where we hoped to find lodging and such comforts +as could be purchased out of a slender purse. It was a small modern +pleasure town of an almost startling appearance owing to the material +used in building its straight rows of cottages and its ugly square +houses and villas. This was an orange-brown stone found in the +neighbourhood, the roofs being all of hard, black slate. I had never +seen houses of such a colour, it was stronger, more glaring and +aggressive than the reddest brick, and there was not a green thing to +partially screen or soften it, nor did the darkness of the wet weather +have any mitigating effect on it. The town was built on high ground, +with an open grassy space before it sloping down to the cliff in which +steps had been cut to give access to the beach, and beyond the cliff +we caught sight of the grey, desolate, wind-vexed sea. But the rain was +coming down more and more heavily, turning the streets into torrents, +so that we began to envy those who had found a shelter even in so ugly a +place. No one would take us in. House after house, street after street, +we tried, and at every door with "Apartments to Let" over it where we +knocked the same hateful landlady-face appeared with the same triumphant +gleam in the fish-eyes and the same smile on the mouth that opened to +tell us delightedly that she and the town were "full up"; that never had +there been known such a rush of visitors; applicants were being turned +away every hour from every door! + +After three miserable hours spent in this way we began inquiring at all +the shops, and eventually at one were told of a poor woman in a small +house in a street a good way back from the front who would perhaps be +able to taken us in. To this place we went and knocked at a low door in +a long blank wall in a narrow street; it was opened to us by a pale +thin sad-looking woman in a rusty black gown, who asked us into a shabby +parlour, and agreed to take us in until we could find something better. +She had a gentle voice and was full of sympathy, and seeing our plight +took us into the kitchen behind the parlour, which was living- and +working-room as well, to dry ourselves by the fire. + +"The greatest pleasure in life," said once a magnificent young athlete, +a great pedestrian, to me, "is to rest when you are tired." And, I +should add, to dry and warm yourself by a big fire when wet and +cold, and to eat and drink when you are hungry and thirsty. All these +pleasures were now ours, for very soon tea and chops were ready for us; +and so strangely human, so sister-like did this quiet helpful woman +seem after our harsh experiences on that rough rainy day--that we +congratulated ourselves on our good fortune in having found such a +haven, and soon informed her that we wanted no "better place." + +She worked with her needle to support herself and her one child, a +little boy of ten; and by and by when he came in pretty wet from some +outdoor occupation we made his acquaintance and the discovery that he +was a little boy of an original character. He was so much to his mother, +who, poor soul, had nobody else in the world to love, that she was +always haunted by the fear of losing him. He was her boy, the child of +her body, exclusively her own, unlike all other boys, and her wise heart +told her that if she put him in a school he would be changed so that she +would no longer know him for her boy. For it is true that our schools +are factories, with a machinery to unmake and remake, or fabricate, the +souls of children much in the way in which shoddy is manufactured. You +may see a thousand rags or garments of a thousand shapes and colours +cast in to be boiled, bleached, pulled to pieces, combed and woven, and +finally come out as a piece of cloth a thousand yards long of a uniform +harmonious pattern, smooth, glossy, and respectable. His individuality +gone, he would in a sense be lost to her; and although by nature a +weak timid woman, though poor, and a stranger in a strange place, this +thought, or feeling, or "ridiculous delusion" as most people would call +it, had made her strong, and she had succeeded in keeping her boy out of +school. + +Hers was an interesting story. Left alone in the world she had married +one in her own class, very happily as she imagined. He was in some +business in a country town, well off enough to provide a comfortable +home, and he was very good; in fact, his one fault was that he was too +good, too open-hearted and fond of associating with other good fellows +like himself, and of pledging them in the cup that cheers and at the +same time inebriates. Nevertheless, things went very well for a time, +until the child was born, the business declined, and they began to be a +little pinched. Then it occurred to her that she, too, might be able to +do something. She started dressmaking, and as she had good taste and +was clever and quick, her business soon prospered. This pleased him; it +relieved him from the necessity of providing for the home, and enabled +him to follow his own inclination, which was to take things easily--to +be an idle man, with a little ready money in his pocket for betting and +other pleasures. The money was now provided out of "our business." This +state of things continued without any change, except that process of +degeneration which continued in him, until the child was about four +years old, when all at once one day he told her they were not doing +as well as they might. She was giving far too much of her time and +attention to domestic matters--to the child especially. Business was +business--a thing it was hard for a woman to understand--and it was +impossible for her to give her mind properly to it with her thoughts +occupied with the child. It couldn't be done. Let the child be put away, +he said, and the receipts would probably be doubled. He had been making +inquiries and found that for a modest annual payment the boy could be +taken proper care of at a distance by good decent people he had heard +of. + +She had never suspected such a thought in his mind, and this proposal +had the effect of a stunning blow. She answered not one word: he said +his say and went out, and she knew she would not see him again for many +hours, perhaps not for some days; she knew, too, that he would say no +more to her on the subject, that it would all be arranged about the +child with or without her consent. His will was law, her wishes nothing. +For she was his wife and humble obedient slave; never had she pleaded +with or admonished him and never complained, even when, after her long +day of hard work, he came in at ten or eleven o'clock at night with +several of his pals, all excited with drink and noisy as himself, to +call for supper. Nevertheless she had been happy--intensely happy, +because of the child. The love for the man she had married, wondering +how one so bright and handsome and universally admired and liked +could stoop to her, who had nothing but love and worship to give in +return--that love was now gone and was not missed, so much greater and +more satisfying was the love for her boy. And now she must lose him. +Two or three silent miserable days passed by while she waited for the +dreadful separation, until the thought of it became unendurable and she +resolved to keep her child and sacrifice everything else. Secretly she +prepared for flight, getting together the few necessary things she could +carry; then, with the child in her arms, she stole out one evening and +began her flight, which took her all across England at its widest part, +and ended at this small coast town, the best hiding-place she could +think of. + +The boy was a queer little fellow, healthy but colourless, with +strangely beautiful grey eyes which, on first seeing them, almost +startled one with their intelligence. He was shy and almost obstinately +silent, but when I talked to him on certain subjects the intense +suppressed interest he felt would show itself in his face, and by and +by it would burst out in speech--an impetuous torrent of words in a high +shrill voice. He reminded me of a lark in a cage. Watch it in its prison +when the sun shines forth--when, like the captive falcon in Dante, it is +"cheated by a gleam"--its wing-tremblings, and all its little tentative +motions, how the excitement grows and grows in it, until, although shut +up and flight denied it, the passion can no longer be contained and it +bursts out in a torrent of shrill and guttural sounds, which, if it were +free and soaring, would be its song. His passion was all for nature, and +his mother out of her small earnings had managed to get quite a number +of volumes together for him. These he read and re-read until he knew +them by heart; and on Sundays, or any other day they could take, those +two lonely ones would take a basket containing their luncheon, her work +and a book or two, and set out on a long ramble along the coast to pass +the day in some solitary spot among the sandhills. + +With these two, the gentle woman and her quiet boy over his book, and +the kitchen fire to warm and dry us after each wetting, the bad weather +became quite bearable although it lasted many days. And it was amazingly +bad. The wind blew with a fury from the sea; it was hard to walk against +it. The people in hundreds waited in their dull apartments for a lull, +and when it came they poured out like hungry sheep from the fold, or +like children from a school, swarming over the green slope down to the +beach, to scatter far and wide over the sands. Then, in a little while; +a new menacing blackness would come up out of the sea, and by and by a +fresh storm of wind would send the people scuttling back into shelter. +So it went on day after day, and when night came the sound of the +ever-troubled sea grew louder, so that, shut up in our little rooms in +that back street, we had it in our ears, except at intervals, when the +wind howled loud enough to drown its great voice, and hurled tempests of +rain and hail against the roofs and windows. + +To me the most amazing thing was the spectacle of the swifts. It was +late for them, near the end of August; they should now have been far +away on their flight to Africa; yet here they were, delaying on that +desolate east coast in wind and wet, more than a hundred of them. It was +strange to see so many at one spot, and I could only suppose that they +had congregated previous to migration at that unsuitable place, and were +being kept back by the late breeders, who had not yet been wrought up +to the point of abandoning their broods. They haunted a vast ruinous +old barn-like building near the front, which was probably old a century +before the town was built, and about fifteen to twenty pairs had their +nests under the eaves. Over this building they hung all day in a crowd, +rising high to come down again at a frantic speed, and at each descent +a few birds could be seen to enter the holes, while others rushed out to +join the throng, and then all rose and came down again and swept round +and round in a furious chase, shrieking as if mad. At all hours they +drew me to that spot, and standing there, marvelling at their swaying +power and the fury that possessed them, they appeared to me like +tormented beings, and were like those doomed wretches in the halls of +Eblis whose hearts were in a blaze of unquenchable fire, and who, +every one with hands pressed to his breast, went spinning round in an +everlasting agonized dance. They were tormented and crazed by the two +most powerful instincts of birds pulling in opposite directions--the +parental instinct and the passion of migration which called them to the +south. + +In such weather, especially on that naked desolate coast, exposed to +the fury of the winds, one marvels at our modern craze for the sea; not +merely to come and gaze upon and listen to it, to renew our youth in its +salt, exhilarating waters and to lie in delicious idleness on the warm +shingle or mossy cliff; but to be always, for days and weeks and even +for months, at all hours, in all weathers, close to it, with its murmur, +"as of one in pain," for ever in our ears. + +Undoubtedly it is an unnatural, a diseased, want in us, the result of a +life too confined and artificial in close dirty overcrowded cities. It +is to satisfy this craving that towns have sprung up everywhere on our +coasts and extended their ugly fronts for miles and leagues, with their +tens of thousands of windows from which the city-sickened wretches may +gaze and gaze and listen and feed their sick souls with the ocean. That +is to say, during their indoor hours; at other times they walk or sit +or lie as close as they can to it, following the water as it ebbs and +reluctantly retiring before it when it returns. It was not so formerly, +before the discovery was made that the sea could cure us. Probably our +great-grandfathers didn't even know they were sick; at all events, those +who had to live in the vicinity of the sea were satisfied to be a little +distance from it, out of sight of its grey desolation and, if possible, +out of hearing of its "accents disconsolate." This may be seen anywhere +on our coasts; excepting the seaports and fishing settlements, the towns +and villages are almost always some distance from the sea, often in a +hollow or at all events screened by rising ground and woods from it. The +modern seaside place has, in most cases, its old town or village not far +away but quite as near as the healthy ancients wished to be. + +The old village nearest to our little naked and ugly modern town was +discovered at a distance of about two miles, but it might have been two +hundred, so great was the change to its sheltered atmosphere. Loitering +in its quiet streets among the old picturesque brick houses with tiled +or thatched roofs and tall chimneys--ivy and rose and creeper-covered, +with a background of old oaks and elms--I had the sensation of having +come back to my own home. In that still air you could hear men and women +talking fifty or a hundred yards away, the cry or laugh of a child and +the clear crowing of a cock, also the smaller aerial sounds of nature, +the tinkling notes of tits and other birdlings in the trees, the twitter +of swallows and martins, and the "lisp of leaves and ripple of rain." It +was sweet and restful in that home-like place, and hard to leave it to +go back to the front to face the furious blasts once more. Rut there +were compensations. + +The little town, we have seen, was overcrowded with late summer +visitors, all eager for the sea yet compelled to waste so much precious +time shut up in apartments, and at every appearance of a slight +improvement in the weather they would pour out of the houses and the +green slope would be covered with a crowd of many hundreds, all hurrying +down to the beach. The crowd was composed mostly of women--about three +to every man, I should say--and their children; and it was one of the +most interesting crowds I had ever come across on account of the large +number of persons in it of a peculiarly fine type, which chance had +brought together at that spot. It was the large English blonde, and +there were so many individuals of this type that they gave a character +to the crowd so that those of a different physique and colour appeared +to be fewer than they were and were almost overlooked. They came from +various places about the country, in the north and the Midlands, and +appeared to be of the well-to-do classes; they, or many of them, were +with their families but without their lords. They were mostly tall and +large in every way, very white-skinned, with light or golden hair and +large light blue eyes. A common character of these women was their quiet +reposeful manner; they walked and talked and rose up and sat down and +did everything, in fact, with an air of deliberation; they gazed in a +slow steady way at you, and were dignified, some even majestic, and were +like a herd of large beautiful white cows. The children, too, especially +the girls, some almost as tall as their large mothers, though still in +short frocks, were very fine. The one pastime of these was paddling, and +it was a delight to see their bare feet and legs. The legs of those +who had been longest on the spot--probably several weeks in some +instances--were of a deep nutty brown hue suffused with pink; after +these a gradation of colour, light brown tinged with buff, pinkish buff +and cream, like the Gloire de Dijon rose; and so on to the delicate +tender pink of the clover blossom; and, finally, the purest ivory +white of the latest arrivals whose skins had not yet been caressed and +coloured by sun and wind. + +How beautiful are the feet of these girls by the sea who bring us glad +tidings of a better time to come and the day of a nobler courage, a +freer larger life when garments which have long oppressed and hindered +shall have been cast away! It was, as I have said, mere chance which had +brought so many persons of a particular type together on this occasion, +and I thought I might go there year after year and never see the like +again. As a fact I did return when August came round and found a crowd +of a different character. The type was there but did not predominate: +it was no longer the herd of beautiful white and strawberry cows with +golden horns and large placid eyes. Nothing in fact was the same, for +when I looked for the swifts there were no more than about twenty birds +instead of over a hundred, and although just on the eve of departure +they were not behaving in the same excited manner. + +Probably I should not have thought so much about that particular crowd +in that tempestuous August, and remembered it so vividly, but for the +presence of three persons in it and the strange contrast they made to +the large white type I have described. These were a woman and her two +little girls, aged about eight and ten respectively, but very small for +their years. She was a little black haired and black-eyed woman with a +pale sad dark face, on which some great grief or tragedy had left its +shadow; very quiet and subdued in her manner; she would sit on a chair +on the beach when the weather permitted, a book on her knees, while her +two little ones played about, chasing and flying from the waves, or +with the aid of their long poles vaulting from rock to rock. They +were dressed in black frocks and scarlet blouses, which set off their +beautiful small dark faces; their eyes sparkled like black diamonds, and +their loose hair was a wonder to see, a black mist or cloud about their +heads and necks composed of threads fine as gossamer, blacker than jet +and shining like spun glass-hair that looked as if no comb or brush +could ever tame its beautiful wildness. And in spirit they were what +they seemed: such a wild, joyous, frolicsome spirit with such grace and +fleetness one does not look for in human beings, but only in birds or +in some small bird-like volatile mammal--a squirrel or a marmoset of the +tropical forest, or the chinchilla of the desolate mountain slopes, +the swiftest, wildest, loveliest, most airy and most vocal of small +beasties. Occasionally to watch their wonderful motions more closely and +have speech with them, I followed when they raced over the sands or flew +about over the slippery rocks, and felt like a cochin-china fowl, or +muscovy duck, or dodo, trying to keep pace with a humming-bird. Their +voices were well suited to their small brilliant forms; not loud, though +high-pitched and singularly musical and penetrative, like the high +clear notes of a skylark at a distance. They also reminded me of +certain notes, which have a human quality, in some of our songsters--the +swallow, redstart, pied wagtail, whinchat, and two or three others. Such +pure and beautiful sounds are sometimes heard in human voices, chiefly +in children, when they are talking and laughing in joyous excitement. +But for any sort of conversation they were too volatile; before I could +get a dozen words from them they would be off again, flying and +flitting along the margin, like sandpipers, and beating the clear-voiced +sandpiper at his own aerial graceful game. + +By and by I was favoured with a fine exhibition of the spirit animating +these two little things. The weather had made it possible for the crowd +of visitors to go down and scatter itself over the beach, when the usual +black cloud sprang up and soon burst on us in a furious tempest of +wind and rain, sending the people flying back to the shelter of a large +structure erected for such purposes against the cliff. It was a vast +barn-like place, open to the front, the roof supported by wooden +columns, and here in a few minutes some three or four hundred persons +were gathered, mostly women and their girls, white and blue-eyed with +long wet golden hair hanging down their backs. Finding a vacant place +on the bench, I sat down next to a large motherly-looking woman with a +robust or dumpy blue-eyed girl about four or five years old on her lap. +Most of the people were standing about in groups waiting for the storm +to blow over, and presently I noticed my two wild-haired dark little +girls moving about in the crowd. It was impossible not to seen them, +for they could not keep still a moment. They were here, there, and +everywhere, playing hide-and-seek and skipping and racing wherever they +could find an opening, and by and by, taking hold of each other, they +started dancing. It was a pretty spectacle, but most interesting to see +was the effect produced on the other children, the hundred girls, big +and little, the little ones especially, who had been standing there +tired and impatient to get out to the sea, and who were now becoming +more and more excited as they gazed, until, like children when listening +to lively music, they began moving feet and hands and soon their whole +bodies in time to the swift movements of the little dancers. At last, +plucking up courage, first one, then another, joined them, and were +caught as they came and whirled round and round in a manner quite new +to them and which they appeared to find very delightful. By and by I +observed that the little rosy-faced dumpy girl on my neighbour's knees +was taking the infection; she was staring, her blue eyes opened to their +widest in wonder and delight. Then suddenly she began pleading, "Oh, +mummy, do let me go to the little girls--oh, do let me!" And her mother +said "No," because she was so little, and could never fly round like +that, and so would fall and hurt herself and cry. But she pleaded still, +and was ready to cry if refused, until the good anxious mother was +compelled to release her; and down she slipped, and after standing still +with her little arms and closed hands held up as if to collect herself +before plunging into the new tremendous adventure, she rushed out +towards the dancers. One of them saw her coming, and instantly quitting +the child she was waltzing with flew to meet her, and catching her round +the middle began spinning her about as if the solid little thing weighed +no more than a feather. But it proved too much for her; very soon she +came down and broke into a loud cry, which brought her mother instantly +to her, and she was picked up and taken back to the seat and held to the +broad bosom and soothed with caresses and tender words until the sobs +began to subside. Then, even before the tears were dry, her eyes were +once more gazing at the tireless little dancers, taking on child after +child as they came timidly forward to have a share in the fun, and once +more she began to plead with her "mummy," and would not be denied, for +she was a most determined little Saxon, until getting her way she rushed +out for a second trial. Again the little dancer saw her coming and +flew to her like a bird to its mate, and clasping her laughed her merry +musical little laugh. It was her "sudden glory," an expression of pure +delight in her power to infuse her own fire and boundless gaiety of soul +into all these little blue-eyed rosy phlegmatic lumps of humanity. + +What was it in these human mites, these fantastic Brownies, which, in +that crowd of Rowenas and their children, made them seem like beings not +only of another race, but of another species? How came they alone to be +distinguished among so many by that irresponsible gaiety, as of the +most volatile of wild creatures, that quickness of sense and mind and +sympathy, that variety and grace and swiftness--all these brilliant +exotic qualities harmoniously housed in their small beautiful elastic +and vigorous frames? It was their genius, their character--something +derived from their race. But what race? Looking at their mother watching +her little ones at their frolics with dark shining eyes--the small +oval-faced brown-skinned woman with blackest hair--I could but say that +she was an Iberian, pure and simple, and that her children were like +her. In Southern Europe that type abounds; it is also to be met with +throughout Britain, perhaps most common in the southern counties, and it +is not uncommon in East Anglia. Indeed, I think it is in Norfolk +where we may best see the two most marked sub-types in which it is +divided--the two extremes. The small stature, narrow head, dark skin, +black hair and eyes are common to both, and in both these physical +characters are correlated with certain mental traits, as, for instance, +a peculiar vivacity and warmth of disposition; but they are high and +low. In the latter sub-division the skin is coarse in texture, brown or +old parchment in colour, with little red in it; the black hair is also +coarse, the forehead small, the nose projecting, and the facial angle +indicative of a more primitive race. One might imagine that these people +had been interred, along with specimens of rude pottery and bone and +flint implements, a long time back, about the beginning of the Bronze +Age perhaps, and had now come out of their graves and put on modern +clothes. At all events I don't think a resident in Norfolk would +have much difficulty in picking out the portraits of some of his +fellow-villagers in Mr. Reed's Prehistoric Peeps. + +The mother and her little ones were of the higher sub-type: they +had delicate skins, beautiful faces, clear musical voices. They were +Iberians in blood, but improved; purified and refined as by fire; +gentleized and spiritualized, and to the lower types down to the +aboriginals, as is the bright consummate flower to leaf and stem and +root. + +Often and often we are teased and tantalized and mocked by that old +question: + + Oh! so old-- + Thousands of years, thousands of years, + If all were told-- + +of black and blue eyes; blue versus black and black versus blue, to put +it both ways. And by black we mean black with orange-brown lights in +it--the eye called tortoise-shell; and velvety browns with other browns, +also hazels. Blue includes all blues, from ultramarine, or violet, to +the palest blue of a pale sky; and all greys down to the grey that is +almost white. Our preference for this or that colour is supposed to +depend on nothing but individual taste, or fancy, and association. I +believe it is something more, but I do find that we are very apt to be +swayed this way and that by the colour of the eyes of the people we meet +in life, according as they (the people) attract or repel us. The eyes of +the two little girls were black as polished black diamonds until looked +at closely, when they appeared a beautiful deep brown on which the black +pupils were seen distinctly; they were so lovely that I, predisposed to +prefer dark to light, felt that this question was now definitely settled +for me--that black was best. That irresistible charm, the flame-like +spirit which raised these two so much above the others--how could it go +with anything but the darkest eyes! + +But no sooner was the question thus settled definitely and for all time, +to my very great satisfaction, than it was unsettled again. I do not +know how this came about; it may have been the sight of some small +child's blue eyes looking up at me, like the arch blue eyes of a kitten, +full of wonder at the world and everything in it; + + "Where did you get those eyes so blue?" + "Out of the sky as I came through"; + +or it may have been the sight of a harebell; and perhaps it came from +nothing but the "waste shining of the sky." At all events, there they +were, remembered again, looking at me from the past, blue eyes that were +beautiful and dear to me, whose blue colour was associated with every +sweetness and charm in child and woman and with all that is best and +highest in human souls; and I could not and had no wish to resist their +appeal. + +Then came a new experience of the eye that is blue--a meeting with one +who almost seemed to be less flesh than spirit. A middle-aged lady, +frail, very frail; exceedingly pale from long ill-health, prematurely +white-haired, with beautiful grey eyes, gentle but wonderfully bright. +Altogether she was like a being compounded as to her grosser part of +foam and mist and gossamer and thistledown, and was swayed by every +breath of air, and who, should she venture abroad in rough weather, +would be lifted and blown away by the gale and scattered like mist +over the earth. Yet she, so frail, so timid, was the one member of +the community who had set herself to do the work of a giant--that of +championing all ill-used and suffering creatures, wild or tame, holding +a protecting shield over them against the innate brutality of the +people. She had been abused and mocked and jeered at by many, while +others had regarded her action with an amused smile or else with a cold +indifference. But eventually some, for very shame, had been drawn to her +side, and a change in the feeling of the people had resulted; domestic +animals were treated better, and it was no longer universally believed +that all wild animals, especially those with wings, existed only that +men might amuse themselves by killing and wounding and trapping and +caging and persecuting them in various other ways. + +The sight of that burning and shining spirit in its frail tenement--for +did I not actually see her spirit and the very soul of her in those +eyes?--was the last of the unforgotten experiences I had at that place +which had startled and repelled me with its ugliness. + +But, no, there was one more, marvellous as any--the experience of a day +of days, one of those rare days when nature appears to us spiritualized +and is no longer nature, when that which had transfigured this visible +world is in us too, and it becomes possible to believe--it is almost a +conviction--that the burning and shining spirit seen and recognized in +one among a thousand we have known is in all of us and in all things. In +such moments it is possible to go beyond even the most advanced of the +modern physicists who hold that force alone exists, that matter is but a +disguise, a shadow and delusion; for we may add that force itself--that +which we call force or energy--is but a semblance and shadow of the +universal soul. + +The change in the weather was not sudden; the furious winds dropped +gradually; the clouds floated higher in the heavens, and were of a +lighter grey; there were wider breaks in them, showing the lucid blue +beyond; and the sea grew quieter. It had raved and roared too long, +beating against the iron walls that held it back, and was now spent +and fallen into an uneasy sleep, but still moved uneasily and moaned +a little. Then all at once summer returned, coming like a thief in the +night, for when it was morning the sun rose in splendour and power in +a sky without a cloud on its vast azure expanse, on a calm sea with +no motion but that scarcely perceptible rise and fall as of one that +sleeps. As the sun rose higher the air grew warmer until it was full +summer heat, but although a "visible heat," it was never oppressive; for +all that day we were abroad, and as the tide ebbed a new country that +was neither earth nor sea was disclosed, an infinite expanse of pale +yellow sand stretching away on either side, and further and further out +until it mingled and melted into the sparkling water and faintly seen +line of foam on the horizon. And over all--the distant sea, the ridge +of low dunes marking where the earth ended and the flat, yellow expanse +between--there brooded a soft bluish silvery haze. A haze that blotted +nothing out, but blended and interfused them all until earth and air +and sea and sands were scarcely distinguishable. The effect, delicate, +mysterious, unearthly, cannot be described. + + Ethereal gauze... + Visible heat, air-water, and dry sea, + Last conquest of the eye... + + Sun dust, + Aerial surf upon the shores of earth, + Ethereal estuary, frith of light.... + Bird of the sun, transparent winged. + +Do we not see that words fail as pigments do--that the effect is too +coarse, since in describing it we put it before the mental eye as +something distinctly visible, a thing of itself and separate. But it is +not so in nature; the effect is of something almost invisible and is +yet a part of all and makes all things--sky and sea and land--as +unsubstantial as itself. Even living, moving things had that aspect. Far +out on the lowest further strip of sand, which appeared to be on a level +with the sea, gulls were seen standing in twos and threes and small +groups and in rows; but they did not look like gulls--familiar birds, +gull-shaped with grey and white plumage. They appeared twice as big as +gulls, and were of a dazzling whiteness and of no definite shape: though +standing still they had motion, an effect of the quivering dancing air, +the "visible heat"; at rest, they were seen now as separate objects; +then as one with the silver sparkle on the sea; and when they rose +and floated away they were no longer shining and white, but like pale +shadows of winged forms faintly visible in the haze. + +They were not birds but spirits--beings that lived in or were passing +through the world and now, like the heat, made visible; and I, standing +far out on the sparkling sands, with the sparkling sea on one side and +the line of dunes, indistinctly seen as land, on the other, was one of +them; and if any person had looked at me from a distance he would have +seen me as a formless shining white being standing by the sea, and then +perhaps as a winged shadow floating in the haze. It was only necessary +to put out one's arms to float. That was the effect on my mind: this +natural world was changed to a supernatural, and there was no more +matter nor force in sea or land nor in the heavens above, but only +spirit. + + + + +Chapter Six: By Swallowfield + + +One of the most attractive bits of green and wooded country near London +I know lies between Reading and Basingstoke and includes Aldermaston +with its immemorial oaks in Berkshire and Silchester with Pamber Forest +in Hampshire. It has long been one of my favourite haunts, summer and +winter, and it is perhaps the only wooded place in England where I have +a home feeling as strong as that which I experience in certain places +among the South Wiltshire downs and in the absolutely flat country on +the Severn, in Somerset, and the flat country in Cambridgeshire and East +Anglia, especially at Lynn and about Ely. + +I am now going back to my first visit to this green retreat; it was in +the course of one of those Easter walks I have spoken of, and the way +was through Reading and by Three Mile Cross and Swallowfield. On this +occasion I conceived a dislike to Reading which I have never quite got +over, for it seemed an unconscionably big place for two slow pedestrians +to leave behind. Worse still, when we did leave it we found that Reading +would not leave us. It was like a stupendous octopus in red brick +which threw out red tentacles, miles and miles long in various +directions--little rows and single and double cottages and villas, all +in red, red brick and its weary accompaniment, the everlasting hard +slate roof. These square red brick boxes with sloping slate tops are +built as close as possible to the public road, so that the passer-by +looking in at the windows may see the whole interior--wall-papers, +pictures, furniture, and oftentimes the dull expressionless face of the +woman of the house, staring back at you out of her shallow blue eyes. +The weather too was against us; a grey hard sky, like the slate roofs, +and a cold strong east wind to make the road dusty all day long. + +Arrived at Three Mile Cross, it was no surprise to find it no longer +recognizable as the hamlet described in Our Village, but it was +saddening to look at the cottage in which Mary Russell Mitford lived and +was on the whole very happy with her flowers and work for thirty years +of her life, in its present degraded state. It has a sign now and calls +itself the "Mitford Arms" and a "Temperance Hotel," and we were told +that you could get tea and bread and butter there but nothing else. The +cottage has been much altered since Miss Mitford's time, and the open +space once occupied by the beloved garden is now filled with buildings, +including a corrugated-iron dissenting chapel. + +From Three Mile Cross we walked on to Swallowfield, still by those +never-ending roadside red-brick cottages and villas, for we were not yet +properly out of the hated biscuit metropolis. It was a big village with +the houses scattered far and wide over several square miles of country, +but just where the church stands it is shady and pleasant. The pretty +church yard too is very deeply shaded and occupies a small hill with the +Loddon flowing partly round it, then taking its swift way through the +village. Miss Mitford's monument is a plain, almost an ugly, granite +cross, standing close to the wall, shaded by yew, elm, and beech trees, +and one is grateful to think that if she never had her reward when +living she has found at any rate a very peaceful resting-place. + +The sexton was there and told us that he was but ten years old when +Miss Mitford died, but that he remembered her well and she was a very +pleasant little woman. Others in the place who remembered her said the +same--that she was very pleasant and sweet. We know that she was sweet +and charming, but unfortunately the portraits we have of her do not +give that impression. They represent her as a fat common-place looking +person, a little vulgar perhaps. I fancy the artists were bunglers. I +possess a copy of a very small pencil sketch made of her face by a dear +old lady friend of mine, now dead, about the year 1851 or 2. My friend +had a gift for portraiture in a peculiar way. When she saw a face that +greatly interested her, in a drawing-room, on a platform, in the street, +anywhere, it remained very vividly in her mind and on going home she +would sketch it, and some of these sketches of well known persons are +wonderfully good. She was staying in the country with a friend who drove +with her to Swallowfield to call on Miss Mitford, and on her return to +her friend's house she made the little sketch, and in this tiny portrait +I can see the refinement, the sweetness, the animation and charm which +she undoubtedly possessed. + +But let me now venture to step a little outside of my own province, my +small plot--a poor pedestrian's unimportant impressions of places and +faces; all these p's come by accident; and this I put in parenthetically +just because an editor solemnly told me a while ago that he couldn't +abide and wouldn't have alliteration's artful aid in his periodical. Let +us leave the subject of what Miss Mitford was to those of her day who +knew her; a thousand lovely personalities pass away every year and in a +little while are no more remembered than the bright-plumaged bird that +falls in the tropical forest, or the vanished orchid bloom of which some +one has said that the angels in heaven can look on no more beautiful +thing. Leaving all that, let us ask what remains to us of another +generation of all she was and did? + +She was a prolific writer, both prose and verse, and, as we know, had an +extraordinary vogue in her own time. Anything that came from her pen had +an immediate success; indeed, so highly was she regarded that nothing +she chose to write, however poor, could fail. And she certainly did +write a good deal of poor stuff: it was all in a sense poor, but books +and books, poor soul, she had to write. It was in a sense poor because +it was mostly ambitious stuff, and, as the proverb says, "You cannot fly +like an eagle with the wings of a wren." She was driven to fly, and gave +her little wings too much to do, and her flights were apt to be mere +little weak flutterings over the surface of the ground. A wren, and +she had not a cuckoo but a devouring cormorant to sustain--that dear, +beautiful father of hers, who was more to her than any reprobate son to +his devoted mother, and who day after day, year after year, gobbled up +her earnings, and then would hungrily go on squawking for more until he +stumbled into the grave. Alas! he was too long in dying; she was worn +out by then, the little heart beating not so fast, and the bright little +brain growing dim and very tired. + +Now all the ambitious stuff she wrote to keep the cormorant and, +incidentally, to immortalize herself, has fallen deservedly into +oblivion. But we--some of us--do not forget and never want to forget +Mary Russell Mitford. Her letters remain--the little friendly letters +which came from her pen like balls of silvery down from a sun-ripened +plant, and were wafted far and wide over the land to those she loved. +There is a wonderful charm in them; they are so spontaneous, so natural, +so perfectly reflect her humour and vivacity, her overflowing sweetness, +her beautiful spirit. And one book too remains--the series of sketches +about the poor little hamlet, in which she lived so long and laboured +so hard to support herself and her parents, the turtledove mated with a +cormorant. Driven to produce work and hard up for a subject, in a happy +moment she took up this humble one lying at her own door and allowed her +self to write naturally even as in her most intimate letters. This is +the reason of the vitality of Our Tillage; it was simple, natural, and +reflected the author herself, her tender human heart, her impulsive +nature, her bright playful humorous spirit. There is no thought, no mind +stuff in it, and it is a classic! It is about the country, and she has +so little observation that it might have been written in a town, out of +a book, away from nature's sights and sounds. Her rustic characters +are not comparable to those of a score or perhaps two or three score of +other writers who treat of such subjects. The dialogue, when she makes +them talk, is unnatural, and her invention so poor that when she puts in +a little romance of her own making one regrets it. And so one might go +on picking it all to pieces like a dandelion blossom. Nevertheless it +endures, outliving scores of in a way better books on the same themes, +because her own delightful personality manifests itself and shines in +all these little pictures. This short passage describing how she took +Lizzie, the little village child she loved, to gather cowslips in the +meadows, will serve as an illustration. + + They who know these feelings (and who is so happy as not to +have known some of them) will understand why Alfieri became powerless, +and Froissart dull; and why even needlework, the most effective +sedative, that grand soother and composer of women's distress, fails +to comfort me today. I will go out into the air this cool, pleasant +afternoon, and try what that will do.... I will go to the meadows, the +beautiful meadows and I will have my materials of happiness, Lizzie and +May, and a basket for flowers, and we will make a cowslip ball. "Did +you ever see a cowslip ball, Lizzie?" "No." "Come away then; make haste! +run, Lizzie!" + + And on we go, fast, fast! down the road, across the lea, +past the workhouse, along by the great pond, till we slide into the deep +narrow lane, whose hedges seem to meet over the water, and win our way +to the little farmhouse at the end. "Through the farmyard, Lizzie; over +the gate; never mind the cows; they are quiet enough." "I don't mind +'em," said Miss Lizzie, boldly and' truly, and with a proud affronted +air, displeased at being thought to mind anything, and showing by her +attitude and manner some design of proving her courage by an attack on +the largest of the herd, in the shape of a pull by the tail. "I don't +mind 'em." "I know you don't, Lizzie; but let them, alone and don't +chase the turkey-cock. Come to me, my dear!" and, for wonder, Lizzie +came. + +In the meantime my other pet, Mayflower, had also gotten into a scrape. +She had driven about a huge unwieldy sow, till the animal's grunting +had disturbed the repose of a still more enormous Newfoundland dog, the +guardian of the yard. + +The beautiful white greyhound's mocking treatment of the surly dog on +the chain then follows, and other pretty scenes and adventures, until +after some mishaps and much trouble the cowslip ball is at length +completed. + +What a concentration of fragrance and beauty it was! Golden and sweet to +satiety! rich in sight, and touch, and smell! Lizzie was enchanted, and +ran off with her prize, hiding amongst the trees in the very coyness +of ecstasy, as if any human eye, even mine, would be a restraint on her +innocent raptures. + +Here the very woman is revealed to us, her tender and lively +disposition, her impulsiveness and childlike love of fun and delight in +everything on earth. We see in such a passage what her merit really +is, the reason of our liking or "partiality" for her. Her pleasure in +everything makes everything interesting, and in displaying her feeling +without art or disguise she succeeds in giving what we may call a +literary expression to personal charm--that quality which is almost +untranslatable into written words. Many women possess it; it is in them +and issues from them, and is like an essential oil in a flower, but too +volatile to be captured and made use of. Furthermore, women when they +write are as a rule even more conventional than men, more artificial and +out of and away from themselves. + +I do not know that any literary person will agree with me; I have +gone aside to write about Miss Mitford mainly for my own satisfaction. +Frequently when I have wanted to waste half an hour pleasantly with +a book I have found myself picking up "Our Village" from among many +others, some waiting for a first perusal, and I wanted to know why this +was so--to find out, if not to invent, some reason for my liking which +would not make me ashamed. + +At Swallowfield we failed to find a place to stay at; there was no +such place; and of the inns, named, I think, the "Crown," "Cricketers," +"Bird-in-the-Hand," and "George and Dragon," only one, was said to +provide accommodation for travellers as the law orders, but on going to +the house we were informed that the landlord or his wife was just dead, +or dangerously ill, I forget which, and they could take no one in. +Accordingly, we had to trudge back to Three Mile Cross and the old +ramshackle, well-nigh ruinous inn there. It was a wretched place, +smelling of mould and dry-rot; however, it was not so bad after a fire +had been lighted in the grate, but first the young girl who waited on us +brought in a bundle of newspapers, which she proceeded to thrust up the +chimney-flue and kindle, "to warm the flue and make the fire burn," she +explained. + +On the following day, the weather being milder, we rambled on through +woods and lanes, visiting several villages, and arrived in the afternoon +at Silchester, where we had resolved to put up for the night. By a happy +chance we found a pleasant cottage on the common to stay at and pleasant +people in it, so that we were glad to sit down for a week there, to +loiter about the furzy waste, or prowl in the forest and haunt the old +walls; but it was pleasant even indoors with that wide prospect before +the window, the wooded country stretching many miles away to the hills +of Kingsclere, blue in the distance and crowned with their beechen rings +and groves. Of Roman Calleva itself and the thoughts I had there I will +write in the following chapter; here I will only relate how on Easter +Sunday, two days after arriving, we went to morning service in the old +church standing on a mound inside the walls, a mile from the village and +common. + +It came to pass that during the service the sun began to shine very +brightly after several days of cloud and misty windy wet weather, and +that brilliance and the warmth in it served to bring a butterfly out of +hiding; then another; then a third; red admirals all; and they were seen +through all the prayers, and psalms, and hymns, and lessons, and the +sermon preached by the white-haired Rector, fluttering against the +translucent glass, wanting to be out in that splendour and renew their +life after so long a period of suspension. But the glass was between +them and their world of blue heavens and woods and meadow flowers; then +I thought that after the service I would make an attempt to get them +out; but soon reflected that to release them it would be necessary to +capture them first, and that that could not be done without a ladder and +butterfly net. Among the women (ladies) on either side of and before +me there were no fewer than five wearing aigrettes of egret and +bird-of-paradise plumes in their hats or bonnets, and these five all +remained to take part in that ceremony of eating bread and drinking wine +in remembrance of an event supposed to be of importance to their souls, +here and hereafter. It saddened me to leave my poor red admirals in +their prison, beating their red wings against the coloured glass--to +leave them too in such company, where the aigrette wearers were +worshipping a little god of their own little imaginations, who did not +create and does not regard the swallow and dove and white egret and +bird-of-paradise, and who was therefore not my god and whose will as +they understood it was nothing to me. + +It was a consolation when I went out, still thinking of the butterflies +in their prison, and stood by the old ruined walls grown over with +ivy and crowned with oak and holly trees, to think that in another two +thousand years there will be no archaeologist and no soul in Silchester, +or anywhere else in Britain, or in the world, who would take the trouble +to dig up the remains of aigrette-wearers and their works, and who would +care what had become of their pitiful little souls--their immortal part. + + + + +Chapter Seven: Roman Calleva + + +An afternoon in the late November of 1903. Frost, gales, and abundant +rains have more than half stripped the oaks of their yellow leaves. But +the rain is over now, the sky once more a pure lucid blue above me--all +around me, in fact, since I am standing high on the top of the ancient +stupendous earthwork, grown over with oak wood and underwood of holly +and thorn and hazel with tangle of ivy and bramble and briar. It is +marvellously still; no sound from the village reaches me; I only hear +the faint rustle of the dead leaves as they fall, and the robin, for one +spied me here and has come to keep me company. At intervals he spurts +out his brilliant little fountain of sound; and that sudden bright +melody and the bright colour of the sunlit translucent leaves seem like +one thing. Nature is still, and I am still, standing concealed among +trees, or moving cautiously through the dead russet bracken. Not that +I am expecting to get a glimpse of the badger who has his hermitage in +this solitary place, but I am on forbidden ground, in the heart of a +sacred pheasant preserve, where one must do one's prowling warily. Hard +by, almost within a stone's-throw of the wood-grown earthwork on which I +stand, are the ruinous walls of Roman Calleva--the Silchester which +the antiquarians have been occupied in uncovering these dozen years +or longer. The stone walls, too, like the more ancient earthwork, are +overgrown with trees and brambles and ivy. The trees have grown upon the +wall, sending roots deep down between the stones, through the crumbling +cement; and so fast are they anchored that never a tree falls but it +brings down huge masses of masonry with it. This slow levelling process +has been going on for centuries, and it was doubtless in this way that +the buildings within the walls were pulled down long ages ago. Then the +action of the earth-worms began, and floors and foundations, with fallen +stones and tiles, were gradually buried in the soil, and what was once +a city was a dense thicket of oak and holly and thorn. Finally the wood +was cleared, and the city was a walled wheat field--so far as we know, +the ground has been cultivated since the days of King John. But the +entire history of this green walled space before me--less than twenty +centuries in duration--does not seem so very long compared with that of +the huge earthen wall I am standing on, which dates back to prehistoric +times. + +Standing here, knee-deep in the dead ruddy bracken, in the "coloured +shade" of the oaks, idly watching the leaves fall fluttering to the +ground, thinking in an aimless way of the remains of the two ancient +cities before me, the British and the Roman, and of their comparative +antiquity, I am struck with the thought that the sweet sensations +produced in me by the scene differ in character from the feeling I have +had in other solitary places. The peculiar sense of satisfaction, of +restfulness, of peace, experienced here is very perfect; but in the +wilderness, where man has never been, or has at all events left no trace +of his former presence, there is ever a mysterious sense of loneliness, +of desolation, underlying our pleasure in nature. Here it seems good +to know, or to imagine, that the men I occasionally meet in my solitary +rambles, and those I see in the scattered rustic village hard by, are of +the same race, and possibly the descendants, of the people who occupied +this spot in the remote past--Iberian and Celt, and Roman and Saxon and +Dane. If that hard-featured and sour-visaged old gamekeeper, with the +cold blue unfriendly eyes, should come upon me here in my hiding-place, +and scowl as he is accustomed to do, standing silent before me, gun in +hand, to hear my excuses for trespassing in his preserves, I should say +(mentally): This man is distinctly English, and his far-off progenitors, +somewhere about sixteen hundred years ago, probably assisted at the +massacre of the inhabitants of the pleasant little city at my feet. By +and by, leaving the ruins, I may meet with other villagers of different +features and different colour in hair, skin, and eyes, and of a +pleasanter expression; and in them I may see the remote descendants of +other older races of men, some who were lords here before the Romans +came, and of others before them, even back to Neolithic times. + +This, I take it, is a satisfaction, a sweetness and peace to the soul +in nature, because it carries with it a sense of the continuity of +the human race, its undying vigour, its everlastingness. After all the +tempests that have overcome it, through all mutations in such immense +stretches of time, how stable it is! + +I recall the time when I lived on a vast vacant level green plain, +an earth which to the eye, and to the mind which sees with the eye, +appeared illimitable, like the ocean; where the house I was born in was +the oldest in the district--a century old, it was said; where the people +were the children's children of emigrants from Europe who had conquered +and colonized the country, and had enjoyed but half a century of +national life. But the people who had possessed the land before these +emigrants--what of them? They, were but a memory, a tradition, a story +told in books and hardly more to us than a fable; perhaps they had dwelt +there for long centuries, or for thousands of years; perhaps they had +come, a wandering horde, to pass quickly away like a flight of migrating +locusts; for no memorial existed, no work of their hands, not the +faintest trace of their occupancy. + +Walking one day at the side of a ditch, which had been newly cut through +a meadow at the end of our plantation, I caught sight of a small black +object protruding from the side of the cutting, which turned out to be +a fragment of Indian pottery made of coarse clay, very black, and rudely +ornamented on one side. On searching further a few more pieces were +found. I took them home and preserved them carefully, experiencing +a novel and keen sense of pleasure in their possession; for though +worthless, they were man's handiwork, the only real evidence I had come +upon of that vanished people who had been before us; and it was as if +those bits of baked clay, with a pattern incised on them by a man's +finger-nail, had in them some magical property which enabled me to +realize the past, and to see that vacant plain repeopled with long dead +and forgotten men. + +Doubtless we all possess the feeling in some degree--the sense of +loneliness and desolation and dismay at the thought of an uninhabited +world, and of long periods when man was not. Is it not the absence of +human life or remains rather than the illimitable wastes of thick-ribbed +ice and snow which daunts us at the thought of Arctic and Antarctic +regions? Again, in the story of the earth, as told by geology, do we not +also experience the same sense of dismay, and the soul shrinking back +on itself, when we come in imagination to those deserts desolate in time +when the continuity of the race was broken and the world dispeopled? +The doctrine of evolution has made us tolerant of the thought of human +animals,--our progenitors as we must believe--who were of brutish +aspect, and whose period on this planet was so long that, compared +with it, the historic and prehistoric periods are but as the life of an +individual. A quarter of a million years has perhaps elapsed since the +beginning of that cold period which, at all events in this part of the +earth, killed Palaeolithic man; yet how small a part of his racial life +even that time would seem if, as some believe, his remains may be traced +as far back as the Eocene! But after this rude man of the Quaternary and +Tertiary epochs had passed away there is a void, a period which to the +imagination seems measureless, when sun and moon and stars looked on a +waste and mindless world. When man once more reappears he seems to have +been re-created on somewhat different lines. + +It is this break in the history of the human race which amazes and +daunts us, which "shadows forth the heartless voids and immensities +of the universe, and thus stabs us from behind with the thought of +annihilation." + +Here, in these words of Hermann Melville, we are let all at once into +the true meaning of those disquieting and seemingly indefinable emotions +so often experienced, even by the most ardent lovers of nature and of +solitude, in uninhabited deserts, on great mountains, and on the sea. +We find here the origin of that horror of mountains which was so common +until recent times. A friend once confessed to me that he was always +profoundly unhappy at sea during long voyages, and the reason was that +his sustaining belief in a superintending Power and in immortality +left him when he was on that waste of waters, which have no human +associations. The feeling, so intense in his case, is known to most if +not all of us; but we feel it faintly as a disquieting element in nature +of which we may be but vaguely conscious. + +Most travelled Englishmen who have seen much of the world and resided +for long or short periods in many widely separated countries would +probably agree that there is a vast difference in the feeling of +strangeness, or want of harmony with our surroundings, experienced +in old and in new countries. It is a compound feeling and some of its +elements are the same in both cases; but in one there is a disquieting +element which the other is without. Thus, in Southern Europe, Egypt, +Syria, and in many countries of Asia, and some portions of Africa, the +wanderer from home might experience dissatisfaction and be ill at +ease and wish for old familiar sights and sounds; but in a colony +like Tasmania, and in any new country where there were no remains of +antiquity, no links with the past, the feeling would be very much more +poignant, and in some scenes and moods would be like that sense of +desolation which assails us at the thought of the heartless voids and +immensities of the universe. + +He recognizes that he is in a world on which we have but recently +entered, and in which our position is not yet assured. + +Here, standing on this mound, as on other occasions past counting, +I recognize and appreciate the enormous difference which human +associations make in the effect produced on us by visible nature. In +this silent solitary place, with the walled field which was once Calleva +Atrebatum at my feet, I yet have a sense of satisfaction, of security, +never felt in a land that had no historic past. The knowledge that my +individual life is but a span, a breath; that in a little while I too +must wither and mingle like one of those fallen yellow leaves with the +mould, does not grieve me. I know it and yet disbelieve it; for am I +not here alive, where men have inhabited for thousands of years, feeling +what I now feel--their oneness with everlasting nature and the undying +human family? The very soil and wet carpet of moss on which their +feet were set, the standing trees and leaves, green or yellow, the +rain-drops, the air they breathed, the sunshine in their eyes and +hearts, was part of them, not a garment, but of their very substance and +spirit. Feeling this, death becomes an illusion; and the illusion that +the continuous life of the species (its immortality) and the individual +life are one and the same is the reality and truth. An illusion, but, +as Mill says, deprive us of our illusions and life would be intolerable. +Happily we are not easily deprived of them, since they are of the nature +of instincts and ineradicable. And this very one which our reason +can prove to be the most childish, the absurdest of all, is yet the +greatest, the most fruitful of good for the race. To those who have +discarded supernatural religion, it may be a religion, or at all events +the foundation to build one on. For there is no comfort to the healthy +natural man in being told that the good he does will not be interred +with his bones, since he does not wish to think, and in fact refuses +to think, that his bones will ever be interred. Joy in the "choir +invisible" is to him a mere poetic fancy, or at best a rarefied +transcendentalism, which fails to sustain him. If altruism, or the +religion of humanity, is a living vigorous plant, and as some believe +flourishes more with the progress of the centuries, it must, like other +"soul-growths," have a deeper, tougher woodier root in our soil. + + + + +Chapter Eight: A Gold Day At Silchester + + +It is little to a man's profit to go far afield if his chief pleasure +be in wild life, his main object to get nearer to the creatures, to grow +day by day more intimate with them, and to see each day some new thing. +Yet the distance has the same fascination for him as for another--the +call is as sweet and persistent in his ears. If he is on a green level +country with blue hills on the horizon, then, especially in the early +morning, is the call sweetest, most irresistible. Come away--come away: +this blue world has better things than any in that green, too familiar +place. The startling scream of the jay--you have heard it a thousand +times. It is pretty to watch the squirrel in his chestnut-red coat among +the oaks in their fresh green foliage, full of fun as a bright child, +eating his apple like a child, only it is an oak-apple, shining white +or white and rosy-red, in his little paws; but you have seen it so many +times--come away: + +It was not this voice alone which made me forsake the green oaks of +Silchester and Pamber Forest, to ramble for a season hither and thither +in Wiltshire, Dorset, and Somerset; there was something for me to do +in those places, but the call made me glad to go. And long +weeks--months--went by in my wanderings, mostly in open downland +country, too often under gloomy skies, chilled by cold winds and wetted +by cold rains. Then, having accomplished my purpose and discovered +incidentally that the call had mocked me again, as on so many previous +occasions, I returned once more to the old familiar green place. + +Crossing the common, I found that where it had been dry in spring one +might now sink to his knees in the bog; also that the snipe which had +vanished for a season were back at the old spot where they used to +breed. It was a bitter day near the end of an unpleasant summer, with +the wind back in the old hateful north-east quarter; but the sun shone, +the sky was blue, and the flying clouds were of a dazzling whiteness. +Shivering, I remembered the south wall, and went there, since to escape +from the wind and bask like some half-frozen serpent or lizard in the +heat was the highest good one could look for in such weather. To see +anything new in wild life was not to be hoped for. + +That old grey, crumbling wall of ancient Calleva, crowned with big oak +and ash and thorn and holly, and draped with green bramble and trailing +ivy and creepers--how good a shelter it is on a cold, rough day! Moving +softly, so as not to disturb any creature, I yet disturbed a ring snake +lying close to the wall, into which it quickly vanished; and then from +their old place among the stones a pair of blue stock-doves rushed out +with clatter of wings. The same blue doves which I had known for three +years at that spot! A few more steps and I came upon as pretty a little +scene in bird life as one could wish for: twenty to twenty-five small +birds of different species--tits, wrens, dunnocks, thrushes, blackbirds, +chaffinches, yellowhammers--were congregated on the lower outside twigs +of a bramble bush and on the bare ground beside it close to the foot of +the wall. The sun shone full on that spot, and they had met for warmth +and for company. The tits and wrens were moving quietly about in the +bush; others were sitting idly or preening their feathers on the twigs +or the ground. Most of them were making some kind of small sound--little +exclamatory chirps, and a variety of chirrupings, producing the effect +of a pleasant conversation going on among them. This was suddenly +suspended on my appearance, but the alarm was soon over, and, seeing me +seated on a fallen stone and, motionless, they took no further notice +of me. Two blackbirds were there, sitting a little way apart on the bare +ground; these were silent, the raggedest, rustiest-looking members of +that little company; for they were moulting, and their drooping wings +and tails had many unsightly gaps in them where the old feathers had +dropped out before the new ones had grown. They were suffering from that +annual sickness with temporary loss of their brightest faculties which +all birds experience in some degree; the unseasonable rains and cold +winds had been bad for them, and now they were having their sun-bath, +their best medicine and cure. + +By and by a pert-looking, bright-feathered, dapper cock chaffinch +dropped down from the bush, and, advancing to one of the two, the +rustiest and most forlorn-looking, started running round and round him +as if to make a close inspection of his figure, then began to tease +him. At first I thought it was all in fun--merely animal spirit which +in birds often discharges itself in this way in little pretended attacks +and fights. But the blackbird had no play and no fight in him, no heart +to defend himself; all he did was to try to avoid the strokes aimed at +him, and he could not always escape them. His spiritlessness served to +inspire the chaffinch with greater boldness, and then it appeared that +the gay little creature was really and truly incensed, possibly because +the rusty, draggled, and listless appearance of the larger bird was +offensive to him. Anyhow, the persecutions continued, increasing in +fury until they could not be borne, and the blackbird tried to escape +by hiding in the bramble. But he was not permitted to rest there; out he +was soon driven and away into another bush, and again into still another +further away, and finally he was hunted over the sheltering wall into +the bleak wind on the other side. Then the persecutor came back and +settled himself on his old perch on the bramble, well satisfied at his +victory over a bird so much bigger than himself. All was again peace and +harmony in the little social gathering, and the pleasant talkee-talkee +went on as before. About five minutes passed, then the hunted blackbird +returned, and, going to the identical spot from which he had been +driven, composed himself to rest; only now he sat facing his lively +little enemy. + +I was astonished to see him back; so, apparently, was the chaffinch. He +started, craned his neck, and regarded his adversary first with one eye +then with the other. "What, rags and tatters, back again so soon!" I +seem to hear him say. "You miserable travesty of a bird, scarcely fit +for a weasel to dine on! Your presence is an insult to us, but I'll soon +settle you. You'll feel the cold on the other, side of the wall when +I've knocked off a few more of your rusty rags." + +Down from his perch he came, but no sooner had he touched his feet to +the ground than the blackbird went straight at him with extraordinary +fury. The chaffinch, taken by surprise, was buffeted and knocked over, +then, recovering himself, fled in consternation, hotly pursued by the +sick one. Into the bush they went, but in a moment they were out again, +darting this way and that, now high up in the trees, now down to the +ground, the blackbird always close behind; and no little bird flying +from a hawk could have exhibited a greater terror than that pert +chaffinch--that vivacious and most pugnacious little cock bantam. +At last they went quite away, and were lost to sight. By and by the +blackbird returned alone, and, going once more to his place near the +second bird, he settled down comfortably to finish his sunbath in peace +and quiet. + +I had assuredly witnessed a new thing on that unpromising day, something +quite different from anything witnessed in my wide rambles; and, though +a little thing, it had been a most entertaining comedy in bird life with +a very proper ending. It was clear that the sick blackbird had bitterly +resented the treatment he had received; that, brooding on it out in the +cold, his anger had made him strong, and that he came back determined +to fight, with his plan of action matured. He was not going to be made a +fool every time! + +The birds all gone their several ways at last, I got up from my stone +and wondered if the old Romans ever dreamed that this wall which +they made to endure would after seventeen hundred years have no more +important use than this--to afford shelter to a few little birds and to +the solitary man that watched them--from the bleak wind. Many a strange +Roman curse on this ungenial climate must these same stones have heard. +Looking through a gap in the wall I saw, close by, on the other side, a +dozen men at work with pick and shovel throwing up huge piles of earth. +They were uncovering a small portion of that ancient buried city and +were finding the foundations and floors and hypocausts of Silchester's +public baths; also some broken pottery and trifling ornaments of bronze +and bone. The workmen in that bitter wind were decidedly better off than +the gentlemen from Burlington House in charge of the excavations. +These stood with coats buttoned up and hands thrust deep down in their +pockets. It seemed to me that it was better to sit in the shelter of the +wall and watch the birds than to burrow in the crumbling dust for that +small harvest. Yet I could understand and even appreciate their +work, although it is probable that the glow I experienced was in part +reflected. Perhaps my mental attitude, when standing in that sheltered +place, and when getting on to the windy wall I looked down on the +workers and their work, was merely benevolent. I had pleasure in their +pleasure, and a vague desire for a better understanding, a closer +alliance and harmony. It was the desire that we might all see +nature--the globe with all it contains--as one harmonious whole, not as +groups of things, or phenomena, unrelated, cast there by chance or by +careless or contemptuous gods. This dust of past ages, dug out of a +wheat-field, with its fragments of men's work--its pottery and tiles and +stones--this is a part, too, even as the small birds, with their little +motives and passions, so like man's, are a part. I thought with self +shame of my own sins in this connection; then, considering the lesser +faults on the other side, I wished that Mr. St. John Hope would +experience a like softening mood and regret that he had abused the ivy. +It grieves me to hear it called a "noxious weed." That perished people, +whose remains in this land so deeply interest him, were the +mightiest "builders of ruins" the world has known; but who except +the archaeologist would wish to see these piled stones in their naked +harshness, striking the mind with dismay at the thought of Time and +its perpetual desolations! I like better the old Spanish poet who says, +"What of Rome; its world-conquering power, and majesty and glory--what +has it come to?" The ivy on the wall, the yellow wallflower, tell it. A +"deadly parasite" quotha! Is it not well that this plant, this evergreen +tapestry of innumerable leaves, should cover and partly hide and partly +reveal the "strange defeatures" the centuries have set on man's greatest +works? I would have no ruin nor no old and noble building without it; +for not only does it beautify decay, but from long association it has +come to be in the mind a very part of such scenes and so interwoven +with the human tragedy, that, like the churchyard yew, it seems the most +human of green things. + +Here in September great masses of the plant are already showing a +greenish cream-colour of the opening blossoms, which will be at their +perfection in October. Then, when the sun shines, there will be no +lingering red admiral, nor blue fly or fly of any colour, nor yellow +wasp, nor any honey-eating or late honey-gathering insect that will +not be here to feed on the ivy's sweetness. And behind the blossoming +curtain, alive with the minute, multitudinous, swift-moving, glittering +forms, some nobler form will be hidden in a hole or fissure in the wall. +Here on many a night I have listened to the sibilant screech of the +white owl and the brown owl's clear, long-drawn, quavering lamentation: + + "Good Ivy, what byrdys hast thou?" + "Non but the Howlet, that How! How!" + + + + +Chapter Nine: Rural Rides + + +"A-birding on a Broncho" is the title of a charming little book +published some years ago, and probably better known to readers on the +other side of the Atlantic than in England. I remember reading it with +pleasure and pride on account of the author's name, Florence Merriam, +seeing that, on my mother's side, I am partly a Merriam myself (of the +branch on the other side of the Atlantic), and having been informed that +all of that rare name are of one family, I took it that we were related, +though perhaps very distantly. "A-birding on a Broncho" suggested an +equally alliterative title for this chapter--"Birding on a Bike"; but +I will leave it to others, for those who go a-birding are now very +many and are hard put to find fresh titles to their books. For several +reasons it will suit me better to borrow from Cobbett and name this +chapter "Rural Rides." + +Sore of us do not go out on bicycles to observe the ways of birds. +Indeed, some of our common species have grown almost too familiar +with the wheel: it has become a positive danger to them. They not +infrequently mistake its rate of speed and injure themselves in +attempting to fly across it. Recently I had a thrush knock himself +senseless against the spokes of my forewheel, and cycling friends have +told me of similar experiences they have had, in some instances the +heedless birds getting killed. Chaffinches are like the children in +village streets--they will not get out of your way; by and by in rural +places the merciful man will have to ring his bell almost incessantly to +avoid running over them. As I do not travel at a furious speed I manage +to avoid most things, even the wandering loveless oil-beetle and the +small rose-beetle and that slow-moving insect tortoise the tumbledung. +Two or three seasons ago I was so unfortunate as to run over a large and +beautifully bright grass snake near Aldermaston, once a snake sanctuary. +He writhed and wriggled on the road as if I had broken his back, but on +picking him up I was pleased to find that my wind-inflated rubber tyre +had not, like the brazen chariot wheel, crushed his delicate vertebra; +he quickly recovered, and when released glided swiftly and easily away +into cover. Twice only have I deliberately tried to run down, to tread +on coat-tails so to speak, of any wild creature. One was a weasel, +the other a stoat, running along at a hedge-side before me. In both +instances, just as the front wheel was touching the tail, the little +flat-headed rascal swerved quickly aside and escaped. + +Even some of the less common and less tame birds care as little for a +man on a bicycle as they do for a cow. Not long ago a peewit trotted +leisurely across the road not more than ten yards from my front wheel; +and on the same day I came upon a green woodpecker enjoying a dust-bath +in the public road. He declined to stir until I stopped to watch him, +then merely flew about a dozen yards away and attached himself to the +trunk of a fir tree at the roadside and waited there for me to go. Never +in all my wanderings afoot had I seen a yaffingale dusting himself like +a barn-door fowl! + +It is not seriously contended that birds can be observed narrowly in +this easy way; but even for the most conscientious field naturalist the +wheel has its advantages. It carries him quickly over much barren ground +and gives him a better view of the country he traverses; finally, it +enables him to see more birds. He will sometimes see thousands in a day +where, walking, he would hardly have seen hundreds, and there is joy in +mere numbers. It was just to get this general rapid sight of the bird +life of the neighbouring hilly district of Hampshire that I was at +Newbury on the last day of October. The weather was bright though very +cold and windy, and towards evening I was surprised to see about twenty +swallows in Northbrook Street flying languidly to and fro in the shelter +of the houses, often fluttering under the eaves and at intervals sitting +on ledges and projections. These belated birds looked as if they wished +to hibernate, or find the most cosy holes to die in, rather than to +emigrate. On the following day at noon they came out again and flew up +and down in the same feeble aimless manner. + +Undoubtedly a few swallows of all three species, but mostly +house-martins, do "lie up" in England every winter, but probably very +few survive to the following spring. We should have said that it was +impossible that any should survive but for one authentic instance in +recent years, in which a barn-swallow lived through the winter in a +semi-torpid state in an outhouse at a country vicarage. What came of +the Newbury birds I do not know, as I left on the 2nd of November--tore +myself away, I may say, for, besides meeting with people I didn't know +who treated a stranger with sweet friendliness, it is a town which +quickly wins one's affections. It is built of bricks of a good deep rich +red--not the painfully bright red so much in use now--and no person has +had the bad taste to spoil the harmony by introducing stone and stucco. +Moreover, Newbury has, in Shaw House, an Elizabethan mansion of the +rarest beauty. Let him that is weary of the ugliness and discords in our +town buildings go and stand by the ancient cedar at the gate and look +across the wide green lawn at this restful house, subdued by time to +a tender rosy-red colour on its walls and a deep dark red on its roof, +clouded with grey of lichen. + +From Newbury and the green meadows of the Kennet the Hampshire hills may +be seen, looking like the South Down range at its highest point viewed +from the Sussex Weald. I made for Coombe Hill, the highest hill in +Hampshire, and found it a considerable labour to push my machine up from +the pretty tree-hidden village of East Woodhay at its foot. The top is a +league-long tableland, with stretches of green elastic turf, thickets +of furze and bramble, and clumps of ancient noble beeches--a beautiful +lonely wilderness with rabbits and birds for only inhabitants. From +the highest point where a famous gibbet stands for ever a thousand feet +above the sea and where there is a dew-pond, the highest in England, +which has never dried up although a large flock of sheep drink in it +every summer day, one looks down into an immense hollow, a Devil's Punch +Bowl very many times magnified,--and spies, far away and far below, +a few lonely houses half hidden by trees at the bottom. This is the +romantic village of Coombe, and hither I went and found the vicar busy +in the garden of the small old picturesque parsonage. Here a very pretty +little bird comedy was in progress: a pair of stock-doves which had been +taken from a rabbit-hole in the hill and reared by hand had just escaped +from the large cage where they had always lived, and all the family were +excitedly engaged in trying to recapture them. They were delightful to +see--those two pretty blue birds with red legs running busily about +on the green lawn, eagerly searching for something to eat and finding +nothing. They were quite tame and willing to be fed, so that anyone +could approach them and put as much salt on their tails as he liked, but +they refused to be touched or taken; they were too happy in their new +freedom, running and flying about in that brilliant sunshine, and when I +left towards the evening they were still at large. + +But before quitting that small isolated village in its green basin--a +human heart in a chalk hill, almost the highest in England--I wished the +hours I spent in it had been days, so much was there to see and hear. +There was the gibbet on the hill, for example, far up on the rim of the +green basin, four hundred feet above the village; why had that memorial, +that symbol of a dreadful past, been preserved for so many years and +generations? and why had it been raised so high--was it because the +crime of the person put to death there was of so monstrous a nature that +it was determined to suspend him, if not on a gibbet fifty cubits high, +at all events higher above the earth than Haman the son of Hammedatha +the Agagite? The gruesome story is as follows. + +Once upon a time there lived a poor widow woman in Coombe, with two +sons, aged fourteen and sixteen, who worked at a farm in the village. +She had a lover, a middle-aged man, living at Woodhay, a carrier who +used to go on two or three days each week with his cart to deliver +parcels at Coombe. But he was a married man, and as he could not marry +the widow while his wife remained alive, it came into his dull Berkshire +brain that the only way out of the difficulty was to murder her, and +to this course the widow probably consented. Accordingly, one day, he +invited or persuaded her to accompany him on his journey to the remote +village, and on the way he got her out of the cart and led her into a +close thicket to show her something he had discovered there. What +he wished to show her (according to one version of the story) was a +populous hornets' nest, and having got her there he suddenly flung her +against it and made off, leaving the cloud of infuriated hornets to +sting her to death. That night he slept at Coombe, or stayed till a +very late hour at the widow's cottage and told her what he had done. +In telling her he had spoken in his ordinary voice, but by and by it +occurred to him that the two boys, who were sleeping close by in the +living-room, might have been awake and listening. She assured him that +they were both fast asleep, but he was not satisfied, and said that if +they had heard him he would kill them both, as he had no wish to swing, +and he could not trust them to hold their tongues. Thereupon they got up +and examined the faces of the two boys, holding a candle over them, +and saw that they were in a deep sleep, as was natural after their long +day's hard work on the farm, and the murderer's fears were set at rest. +Yet one of the boys, the younger, had been wide awake all the time, +listening, trembling with terror, with wide eyes to the dreadful tale, +and only when they first became suspicious instinct came to his aid and +closed his eyes and stilled his tremors and gave him the appearance of +being asleep. Early next morning, with his terror still on him, he told +what he had heard to his brother, and by and by, unable to keep the +dreadful secret, they related it to someone--a carter or ploughman on +the farm. He in turn told the farmer, who at once gave information, and +in a short time the man and woman were arrested. In due time they were +tried, convicted, and sentenced to be hanged in the parish where the +crime had been committed. + +Everybody was delighted, and Coombe most delighted of all, for it +happened that some of their wise people had been diligently examining +into the matter and had made the discovery that the woman had been +murdered just outside their borders in the adjoining parish of Inkpen, +so that they were going to enjoy seeing the wicked punished at somebody +else's expense. Inkpen was furious and swore that it would not be +saddled with the cost of a great public double execution. The line +dividing the two parishes had always been a doubtful one; now they +were going to take the benefit of the doubt and let Coombe hang its own +miscreants! + +As neither side would yield, the higher authorities were compelled to +settle the matter for them, and ordered the cost to be divided between +the two parishes, the gibbet to be erected on the boundary line, as far +as it could be ascertained. This was accordingly done, the gibbet +being erected at the highest point crossed by the line, on a stretch +of beautiful smooth elastic turf, among prehistoric earthworks--a +spot commanding one of the finest and most extensive views in Southern +England. The day appointed for the execution brought the greatest +concourse of people ever witnessed at that lofty spot, at all events +since prehistoric times. If some of the ancient Britons had come out +of their graves to look on, seated on their earthworks, they would have +probably rubbed their ghostly hands together and remarked to each other +that it reminded them of old times. All classes were there, from the +nobility and gentry, on horseback and in great coaches in which they +carried their own provisions, to the meaner sort who had trudged from +all the country round on foot, and those who had not brought their own +food and beer were catered for by traders in carts. The crowd was a +hilarious one, and no doubt that grand picnic on the beacon was the talk +of they country for a generation or longer. The two wretches having been +hanged in chains on one gibbet were left to be eaten by ravens, crows, +and magpipes, and dried by sun and winds, until, after long years, the +swinging, creaking skeletons with their chains on fell to pieces and +were covered with the turf, but the gibbet itself was never removed. + +Then a strange thing happened. The sheep on a neighbouring farm became +thin and sickly and yielded little wool and died before their time. No +remedies availed and the secret of their malady could not be discovered; +but it went on so long that the farmer was threatened with utter +ruin. Then, by chance, it was discovered that the chains in which the +murderers had been hanged had been thrown by some evil-minded person +into a dew-pond on the farm. This was taken to be the cause of the +malady in the sheep; at all events, the chains having been taken out +of the pond and buried deep in the earth, the flock recovered: it was +supposed that the person who had thrown the chains in the water to +poison it had done so to ruin the farmer in revenge for some injustice +or grudge. But even now we are not quite done with the gibbet! Many, +many years had gone by when Inkpen discovered from old documents that +their little dishonest neighbour, Coombe, had taken more land than +she was entitled to, that not only a part but the whole of that noble +hill-top belonged to her! It was Inkpen's turn to chuckle now; but she +chuckled too soon, and Coombe, running out to look, found the old rotten +stump of the gibbet still in the ground. Hands off! she cried. Here +stands a post, which you set up yourself, or which we put up together +and agreed that this should be the boundary line for ever. Inkpen +sneaked off to hide herself in her village, and Coombe, determined to +keep the subject in mind, set up a brand-new stout gibbet in the place +of the old rotting one. That too decayed and fell to pieces in time, +and the present gibbet is therefore the third, and nobody has ever +been hanged on it. Coombe is rather proud of it, but I am not sure that +Inkpen is. + +That was one of three strange events in the life of the village which I +heard: the other two must be passed by; they would take long to tell and +require a good pen to do them justice. To me the best thing in or of the +village was the vicar himself, my put-upon host, a man of so blithe +a nature, so human and companionable, that when I, a perfect stranger +without an introduction or any excuse for such intrusion came down like +a wolf on his luncheon-table, he received me as if I had been an old +friend or one of his own kindred, and freely gave up his time to me for +the rest of that day. To count his years he was old: he had been vicar +of Coombe for half a century, but he was a young man still and had never +had a day's illness in his life--he did not know what a headache was. He +smoked with me, and to prove that he was not a total abstainer he drank +my health in a glass of port wine--very good wine. It was Coombe that +did it--its peaceful life, isolated from a distracting world in that +hollow hill, and the marvellous purity of its air. "Sitting there on my +lawn," he said, "you are six hundred feet above the sea, although in a +hollow four hundred feet deep." It was an ideal open-air room, round and +green, with the sky for a roof. In winter it was sometimes very cold, +and after a heavy fall of snow the scene was strange and impressive from +the tiny village set in its stupendous dazzling white bowl. Not only on +those rare arctic days, but at all times it was wonderfully quiet. The +shout of a child or the peaceful crow of a cock was the loudest sound +you heard. Once a gentleman from London town came down to spend a week +at the parsonage. Towards evening on the very first day he grew restless +and complained of the abnormal stillness. "I like a quiet place well +enough," he exclaimed, "but this tingling silence I can't stand!" And +stand it he wouldn't and didn't, for on the very next morning he took +himself off. Many years had gone by, but the vicar could not forget the +Londoner who had come down to invent a new way of describing the Coombe +silence. His tingling phrase was a joy for ever. + +He took me to the church--one of the tiniest churches in the country, +just the right size for a church in a tiny village and assured me that +he had never once locked the door in his fifty years--day and night it +was open to any one to enter. It was a refuge and shelter from the storm +and the Tempest, and many a poor homeless wretch had found a dry place +to sleep in that church during the last half a century. This man's +feeling of pity and tenderness for the very poor, even the outcast and +tramp, was a passion. But how strange all this would sound in the ears +of many country clergymen! How many have told me when I have gone to the +parsonage to "borrow the key" that it had been found necessary to keep +the church door locked, to prevent damage, thefts, etc. "Have you never +had anything stolen?" I asked him. Yes, once, a great many years ago, +the church plate had been taken away in the night. But it was recovered: +the thief had taken it to the top of the hill and thrown it into the +dewpond there, no doubt intending to take it out and dispose of it at +some more convenient time. But it was found, and had ever since then +been kept safe at the vicarage. Nothing of value to tempt a man to steal +was kept in the church. He had never locked it, but once in his fifty +years it had been locked against him by the churchwardens. This +happened in the days of the Joseph Arch agitation, when the agricultural +labourer's condition was being hotly discussed throughout the country. +The vicar's heart was stirred, for he knew better than most how hard +these conditions were at Coombe and in the surrounding parishes. He +took up the subject and preached on it in his own pulpit in a way that +offended the landowners and alarmed the farmers in the district. The +church wardens, who were farmers, then locked him out of his church, +and for two or three weeks there was no public worship in the parish of +Coombe. Doubtless their action was applauded by all the substantial +men in the neighbourhood; the others who lived in the cottages and were +unsubstantial didn't matter. That storm blew over, but its consequences +endured, one being that the inflammatory parson continued to be regarded +with cold disapproval by the squires and their larger tenants. But the +vicar himself was unrepentant and unashamed; on the contrary, he gloried +in what he had said and done, and was proud to be able to relate that a +quarter of a century later one of the two men who had taken that extreme +course said to him, "We locked you out of your own church, but years +have brought me to another mind about that question. I see it in a +different light now and know that you were right and we were wrong." + +Towards evening I said good-bye to my kind friend and entertainer and +continued my rural ride. From Coombe it is five miles to Hurstbourne +Tarrant, another charming "highland" village, and the road, sloping +down the entire distance, struck me as one of the best to be on I had +travelled in Hampshire, running along a narrow green valley, with oak +and birch and bramble and thorn in their late autumn colours growing +on the slopes on either hand. Probably the beauty of the scene, or the +swift succession of beautiful scenes, with the low sun flaming on the +"coloured shades," served to keep out of my mind something that should +have been in it. At all events, it was odd that I had more than once +promised myself a visit to the very village I was approaching solely +because William Cobbett had described and often stayed in it, and now no +thought of him and his ever-delightful Rural Rides was in my mind. + +Arrived at the village I went straight to the "George and Dragon," where +a friend had assured me I could always find good accommodations. But +he was wrong: there was no room for me, I was told by a weird-looking, +lean, white-haired old woman with whity-blue unfriendly eyes. She +appeared to resent it that any one should ask for accommodation at +such a time, when the "shooting gents" from town required all the rooms +available. Well, I had to sleep somewhere, I told her: couldn't she +direct me to a cottage where I could get a bed? No, she couldn't--it is +always so; but after the third time of asking she unfroze so far as to +say that perhaps they would take me in at a cottage close by. So I went, +and a poor kind widow who lived there with a son consented to put me +up. She made a nice fire in the sitting-room, and after warming myself +before it, while watching the firelight and shadows playing on the dim +walls and ceiling, it came to me that I was not in a cottage, but in +a large room with an oak floor and wainscoting. "Do you call this a +cottage?" I said to the woman when she came in with tea. "No, I have +it as a cottage, but it is an old farm-house called the Rookery," she +returned. Then, for the first time, I remembered Rural Rides. "This then +is the very house where William Cobbett used to stay seventy or eighty +years ago," I said. She had never heard of William Cobbett; she only +knew that at that date it had been tenanted by a farmer named Blount, a +Roman Catholic, who had some curious ideas about the land. + +That settled it. Blount was the name of Cobbett's friend, and I had come +to the very house where Cobbett was accustomed to stay. But how odd that +my first thought of the man should have come to me when sitting by the +fire where Cobbett himself had sat on many a cold evening! And this was +November the second, the very day eighty-odd years ago when he paid his +first visit to the Rookery; at all events, it is the first date he gives +in Rural Rides. And he too had been delighted with the place and the +beauty of the surrounding country with the trees in their late autumn +colours. Writing on November 2nd, 1821, he says: "The place is commonly +called Uphusband, which is, I think, as decent a corruption of names as +one could wish to meet with. However, Uphusband the people will have it, +and Uphusband it shall be for me." That is indeed how he names it all +through his book, after explaining that "husband" is a corruption of +Hurstbourne, and that there are two Hurstbournes, this being the upper +one. + +I congratulated myself on having been refused accommodation at the +"George and Dragon," and was more than satisfied to pass an evening +without a book, sitting there alone listening to an imaginary +conversation between those two curious friends. "Lord Carnarvon," says +Cobbett, "told a man, in 1820, that he did not like my politics. But +what did he mean by my politics? I have no politics but such as he ought +to like. To be sure I labour most assiduously to destroy a system of +distress and misery; but is that any reason why a Lord should dislike +my politics? However, dislike them or like them, to them, to those very +politics, the Lords themselves must come at last." + +Undoubtedly he talked like that, just as he wrote and as he spoke in +public, his style, if style it can be called, being the most simple, +direct, and colloquial ever written. And for this reason, when we are +aweary of the style of the stylist, where the living breathing body +becomes of less consequence than its beautiful clothing, it is a relief, +and refreshment, to turn from the precious and delicate expression, the +implicit word, sought for high and low and at last found, the balance of +every sentence and perfect harmony of the whole work--to go from it to +the simple vigorous unadorned talk of Rural Rides. A classic, and as +incongruous among classics as a farmer in his smock-frock, leggings, and +stout boots would appear in a company of fine gentlemen in fashionable +dress. The powerful face is the main thing, and we think little of the +frock and leggings and how the hair is parted or if parted at all. +Harsh and crabbed as his nature no doubt was, and bitter and spiteful at +times, his conversation must yet have seemed like a perpetual feast +of honeyed sweets to his farmer friend. Doubtless there was plenty of +variety in it: now he would expatiate on the beauty of the green downs +over which he had just ridden, the wooded slopes in their glorious +autumn colours, and the rich villages between; this would remind him of +Malthus, that blasphemous monster who had dared to say that the increase +in food production did not keep pace with increase of population; then +a quieting down, a breathing-space, all about the turnip crop, the +price of eggs at Weyhill Fair, and the delights of hare coursing, until +politics would come round again and a fresh outburst from the glorious +demagogue in his tantrums. + +At eight o'clock Cobbett would say good night and go to bed, and early +next morning write down what he had said to his friend, or some of it, +and send it off to be printed in his paper. That, I take it, is how +Rural Rides was written, and that is why it seems so fresh to us to this +day, and that to take it up after other books is like going out from a +luxurious room full of fine company into the open air to feel the wind +and rain on one's face and see the green grass. But I very much regret +that Cobbett tells us nothing of his farmer friend. Blount, I imagine, +must have been a man of a very fine character to have won the heart +and influenced such a person. Cobbett never loses an opportunity of +vilifying the parsons and expressing his hatred of the Established +Church; and yet, albeit a Protestant, he invariably softens down when he +refers to the Roman Catholic faith and appears quite capable of seeing +the good that is in it. + +It was Blount, I think, who had soothed the savage breast of the man +in this matter. The only thing I could hear about Blount and his "queer +notions" regarding the land was his idea that the soil could be improved +by taking the flints out. "The soil to look upon," Cobbett truly says, +"appears to be more than half flint, but is a very good quality." Blount +thought to make it better, and for many years employed all the aged poor +villagers and the children in picking the flints from the ploughed land +and gathering them in vast heaps. It does not appear that he made his +land more productive, but his hobby was a good one for the poor of the +village; the stones, too, proved useful afterwards to the road-makers, +who have been using them these many years. A few heaps almost clothed +over with a turf which had formed on them in the course of eighty years +were still to be seen on the land when I was there. + +The following day I took no ride. The weather was so beautiful it seemed +better to spend the time sitting or basking in the warmth and brightness +or strolling about. At all events, it was a perfect day at Hurstbourne +Tarrant, though not everywhere, for on that third of November the +greatest portion of Southern England was drowned in a cold dense white +fog. In London it was dark, I heard. Early in the morning I listened +to a cirl-bunting singing merrily from a bush close to the George and +Dragon Inn. This charming bird is quite common in the neighbourhood, +although, as elsewhere in England, the natives know it not by its book +name, nor by any other, and do not distinguish it from its less engaging +cousin, the yellowhammer. + +After breakfast I strolled about the common and in Doles Wood, on the +down above the village, listening to the birds, and on my way back +encountered a tramp whose singular appearance produced a deep impression +on my mind. We have heard of a work by some modest pressman entitled +"Monarchs I have met", and I sometimes think that one equally +interesting might be written on "Tramps I have met". As I have neither +time nor stomach for the task, I will make a present of the title to +any one of my fellow-travellers, curious in tramps, who cares to use +it. This makes two good titles I have given away in this chapter with a +borrowed one. + +But if it had been possible for me to write such a book, a prominent +place would be given in it to the one tramp I have met who could be +accurately described as gorgeous. I did not cultivate his acquaintance; +chance threw us together and we separated after exchanging a few polite +commonplaces, but his big flamboyant image remains vividly impressed on +my mind. + +At noon, in the brilliant sunshine, as I came loiteringly down the long +slope from Doles Wood to the village, he overtook me. He was a huge man, +over six feet high, nobly built, suggesting a Scandinavian origin, with +a broad blond face, good features, and prominent blue eyes, and his +hair was curly and shone like gold in the sunlight. Had he been a mere +labourer in a workman's rough clay-stained clothes, one would have stood +still to look at and admire him, and say perhaps what a magnificent +warrior he would have looked with sword and spear and plumed helmet, +mounted on a big horse! But alas! he had the stamp of the irreclaimable +blackguard on his face; and that same handsome face was just then +disfigured with several bruises in three colours--blue, black, and red. +Doubtless he had been in a drunken brawl on the previous evening and had +perhaps been thrown out of some low public-house and properly punished. + +In his dress he was as remarkable as in his figure. Bright blue trousers +much too small for his stout legs, once the property, no doubt, of +some sporting young gent of loud tastes in colours; a spotted fancy +waistcoat, not long enough to meet the trousers, a dirty scarlet tie, +long black frock-coat, shiny in places, and a small dirty grey cap which +only covered the topmost part of his head of golden hair. + +Walking by the hedge-side he picked and devoured the late blackberries, +which were still abundant. It was a beautiful unkept hedge with scarlet +and purple fruit among the many-coloured fading leaves and silver-grey +down of old-man's-beard. + +I too picked and ate a few berries and made the remark that it was late +to eat such fruit in November. The Devil in these parts, I told him, +flies abroad in October to spit on the bramble bushes and spoil the +fruit. It was even worse further north, in Norfolk and Suffolk, where +they say the Devil goes out at Michaelmas and shakes his verminous +trousers over the bushes. + +He didn't smile; he went on sternly eating blackberries, and then +remarked in a bitter tone, "That Devil they talk about must have a busy +time, to go messing about blackberry bushes in addition to all his other +important work." + +I was silent, and presently, after swallowing a few more berries, he +resumed in the same tone: "Very fine, very beautiful all this"--waving +his hand to indicate the hedge, its rich tangle of purple-red stems +and coloured leaves, and scarlet fruit and silvery oldman's-beard. "An +artist enjoys seeing this sort of thing, and it's nice for all those who +go about just for the pleasure of seeing things. But when it comes to a +man tramping twenty or thirty miles a day on an empty belly, looking for +work which he can't find, he doesn't see it quite in the same way." + +"True," I returned, with indifference. + +But he was not to be put off by my sudden coldness, and he proceeded to +inform me that he had just returned from Salisbury Plain, that it had +been noised abroad that ten thousand men were wanted by the War Office +to work in forming new camps. On arrival he found it was not so--it was +all a lie--men were not wanted--and he was now on his way to Andover, +penniless and hungry and-- + +By the time he had got to that part of his story we were some distance +apart, as I had remained standing still while he, thinking me still +close behind, had gone on picking blackberries and talking. He was soon +out of sight. + +At noon the following day, the weather still being bright and genial, +I went to Crux Easton, a hilltop village consisting of some low farm +buildings, cottages, and a church not much bigger than a cottage. A +great house probably once existed here, as the hill has a noble avenue +of limes, which it wears like a comb or crest. On the lower slope of the +hill, the old unkept hedges were richer in colour than in most places, +owing to the abundance of the spindle-wood tree, laden with its loose +clusters of flame-bright, purple-pink and orange berries. + +Here I saw a pretty thing: a cock cirl-bunting, his yellow breast +towards me, sitting quietly on a large bush of these same brilliant +berries, set amidst a mass of splendidly coloured hazel leaves, mixed +with bramble and tangled with ivy and silver-grey traveller's-joy. An +artist's heart would have leaped with joy at the sight, but all his +skill and oriental colours would have made nothing of it, for all +visible nature was part of the picture, the wide wooded earth and the +blue sky beyond and above the bird, and the sunshine that glorified all. + +On the other side of the hedge there were groups of fine old beech trees +and, strange to see, just beyond the green slope and coloured trees, +was the great whiteness of the fog which had advanced thus far and now +appeared motionless. I went down and walked by the side of the bank +of mist, feeling its clammy coldness on one cheek while the other was +fanned by the warm bright air. Seen at a distance of a couple of hundred +yards, the appearance was that of a beautiful pearly-white cloud resting +upon the earth. Many fogs had I seen, but never one like this, so +substantial-looking, so sharply defined, standing like a vast white wall +or flat-topped hill at the foot of the green sunlit slope! I had the +fancy that if I had been an artist in sculpture, and rapid modeller, by +using the edge of my hand as a knife I could have roughly carved out a +human figure, then drawing it gently out of the mass proceeded to press +and work it to a better shape, the shape, let us say, of a beautiful +woman. Then, if it were done excellently, and some man-mocking deity, or +power of the air, happened to be looking on, he would breathe life and +intelligence into it, and send it, or her, abroad to mix with human kind +and complicate their affairs. For she would seem a woman and would be +like some women we have known, beautiful with blue flower-like eyes, +pale gold or honey-coloured hair; very white of skin, Leightonian, +almost diaphanous, so delicate as to make all other skins appear coarse +and made of clay. And with her beauty and a mysterious sweetness not +of the heart, since no heart there would be in that mist-cold body, she +would draw all hearts, ever inspiring, but never satisfying passion, her +beauty and alluring smiles being but the brightness of a cloud on which +the sun is shining. + +Birds, driven by the fog to that sunlit spot, were all about me in +incredible numbers. Rooks and daws were congregating on the bushes, +where their black figures served to intensify the red-gold tints of the +foliage. At intervals the entire vast cawing multitude simultaneously +rose up with a sound as of many waters, and appeared now at last about +to mount up into the blue heavens, to float circling there far above the +world as they are accustomed to do on warm windless days in autumn. But +in a little while their brave note would change to one of trouble; the +sight of that immeasurable whiteness covering so much of the earth would +scare them, and led by hundreds of clamouring daws they would come down +again to settle once more in black masses on the shining yellow trees. + +Close by a ploughed field of about forty acres was the camping-ground +of an army of peewits; they were travellers from the north perhaps, and +were quietly resting, sprinkled over the whole area. More abundant were +the small birds in mixed flocks or hordes--finches, buntings, and larks +in thousands on thousands, with a sprinkling of pipits and pied and grey +wagtails, all busily feeding on the stubble and fresh ploughed land. +Thickly and evenly distributed, they appeared to the vision ranging +over the brown level expanse as minute animated and variously coloured +clods--black and brown and grey and yellow and olive-green. + +It was a rare pleasure to be in this company, to revel in their +astonishing numbers, to feast my soul on them as it were--little birds +in such multitudes that ten thousand Frenchmen and Italians might have +gorged to repletion on their small succulent bodies--and to reflect +that they were safe from persecution so long as they remained here in +England. This is something for an Englishman to be proud of. + +After spending two hours at Crux Easton, with that dense immovable +fog close by, I at length took the plunge to get to Highclere. What +a change! I was at once where all form and colour and melody had been +blotted out. My clothes were hoary with clinging mist, my fingers numb +with cold, and Highclere, its scattered cottages appearing like dim +smudges through the whiteness, was the dreariest village on earth. I +fled on to Newbury in quest of warmth and light, and found it indoors, +but the town was deep in the fog. + +The next day I ventured out again to look for the sun, and found it not, +but my ramble was not without its reward. In a pine wood three miles +from the town I stood awhile to listen to the sound as of copious rain +of the moisture dropping from the trees, when a sudden tempest of loud, +sharp metallic notes--a sound dear to the ornithologist's ears--made me +jump; and down into the very tree before which I was standing dropped a +flock of about twenty crossbills. So excited and noisy when coming +down, the instant they touched the tree they became perfectly silent and +motionless. Seven of their number had settled on the outside shoots, and +sat there within forty feet of me, looking like painted wooden images of +small green and greenish-yellow parrots; for a space of fifteen minutes +not the slightest movement did they make, and at length, before going, I +waved my arms about and shouted to frighten them, and still they refused +to stir. + +Next morning that memorable fog lifted, to England's joy, and quitting +my refuge I went out once more into the region of high sheep-walks, +adorned with beechen woods and traveller's-joy in the hedges, rambling +by Highclere, Burghclere, and Kingsclere. The last--Hampshire's little +Cuzco--is a small and village-like old red brick town, unapproached by +a railroad and unimproved, therefore still beautiful, as were all places +in other, better, less civilized days. Here in the late afternoon +a chilly grey haze crept over the country and set me wishing for a +fireside and the sound of friendly voices, and I turned my face towards +beloved Silchester. Leaving the hills behind me I got away from the haze +and went my devious way by serpentine roads through a beautiful, wooded, +undulating country. And I wish that for a hundred, nay, for a thousand +years to come, I could on each recurring November have such an afternoon +ride, with that autumnal glory in the trees. Sometimes, seeing the road +before me carpeted with pure yellow, I said to myself, now I am coming +to elms; but when the road shone red and russet-gold before me I knew it +was overhung by beeches. But the oak is the common tree in this place, +and from every high point on the road I saw far before me and on either +hand the woods and copses all a tawny yellow gold--the hue of the dying +oak leaf. The tall larches were lemon-yellow, and when growing among +tall pines produced a singular effect. Best of all was it where beeches +grew among the firs, and the low sun on my left hand shining through +the wood gave the coloured translucent leaves an unimaginable splendour. +This was the very effect which men, inspired by a sacred passion, had +sought to reproduce in their noblest work--the Gothic cathedral and +church, its dim interior lit by many-coloured stained glass. The only +choristers in these natural fanes were the robins and the small lyrical +wren; but on passing through the rustic village of Wolverton I +stopped for a couple of minutes to listen to the lively strains of a +cirl-bunting among some farm buildings. + +Then on to Silchester, its furzy common and scattered village and the +vast ruinous walls, overgrown with ivy, bramble, and thorn, of ancient +Roman Calleva. Inside the walls, at one spot, a dozen men were still at +work in the fading light; they were just finishing--shovelling earth +in to obliterate all that had been opened out during the year. The old +flint foundations that had been revealed; the houses with porches and +corridors and courtyards and pillared hypocausts; the winter room with +its wide beautiful floor--red and black and white and grey and yellow, +with geometric pattern and twist and scroll and flower and leaf and +quaint figures of man and beast and bird--all to be covered up with +earth so that the plough may be driven over it again, and the wheat grow +and ripen again as it has grown and ripened there above the dead city +for so many centuries. The very earth within those walls had a reddish +cast owing to the innumerable fragments of red tile and tessera mixed +with it. Larks and finches were busily searching for seeds in the +reddish-brown soil. They would soon be gone to their roosting-places +and the tired men to their cottages, and the white owl coming from his +hiding-place in the walls would have old Silchester to himself, as he +has had it since the cries and moans of the conquered died into silence +so long ago. + + + + +Chapter Ten: The Last of His Name + + +I came by chance to the village--Norton, we will call it, just to call +it something, but the county in which it is situated need not be named. +It happened that about noon that day I planned to pass the night at a +village where, as I was informed at a small country town I had rested +in, there was a nice inn--"The Fox and Grapes"--to put up at, but when +I arrived, tired and hungry, I was told that I could not have a bed and +that the only thing to do was to try Norton, which also boasted an inn. +It was hard to have to turn some two or three miles out of my road at +that late hour on a chance of a shelter for the night, but there was +nothing else to do, so on to Norton I went with heavy steps, and arrived +a little after sunset, more tired and hungry than ever, only to be told +at the inn that they had no accommodation for me, that their one spare +room had been engaged! "What am I to do, then?" I demanded of the +landlord. "Beyond this village I cannot go to-night--do you want me to +go out and sleep under a hedge?" He called his spouse, and after some +conversation they said the village baker might be able to put me up, as +he had a spare bedroom in his house. So to the baker's I went, and +found it a queer, ramshackle old place, standing a little back from the +village street in a garden and green plot with a few fruit trees +growing on it. To my knock the baker himself came out--a mild-looking, +flabby-faced man, with his mouth full, in a very loose suit of +pyjama-like garments of a bluish floury colour. I told him my story, and +he listened, swallowing his mouthful, then cast his eyes down and rubbed +his chin, which had a small tuft of hairs growing on it, and finally +said, "I don't know. I must ask my wife. But come in and have a cup of +tea--we're just having a cup ourselves, and perhaps you'd like one." + +I could have told him that I should like a dozen cups and a great many +slices of bread-and-butter, if there was nothing else more substantial +to be had. However, I only said, "Thank you," and followed him in to +where his wife, a nice-looking woman, with black hair and olive face, +was seated behind the teapot. Imagine my surprise when I found that +besides tea there was a big hot repast on the table--a ham, a roast +fowl, potatoes and cabbage, a rice pudding, a dish of stewed fruit, +bread-and-butter, and other things. + +"You call this a cup of tea!" I exclaimed delightedly. The woman +laughed, and he explained in an apologetic way that he had formerly +suffered grievously from indigestion, so that for many years his life +was a burden to him, until he discovered that if he took one big meal a +day, after the work was over, he could keep perfectly well. + +I was never hungrier than on this evening, and never, I think, ate a +bigger or more enjoyable meal; nor have I ever ceased to remember those +two with gratitude, and if I were to tell here what they told me--the +history of their two lives--I think it would be a more interesting +story than the one I am about to relate. I stayed a whole week in their +hospitable house; a week which passed only too quickly, for never had +I been in a sweeter haunt of peace than this village in a quiet, green +country remote from towns and stations. It was a small rustic place, a +few old houses and thatched cottages, and the ancient church with square +Norman tower hard to see amid the immense old oaks and elms that grew +all about it. At the end of the village were the park gates, and the +park, a solitary, green place with noble trees, was my favourite haunt; +for there was no one to forbid me, the squire being dead, the old red +Elizabethan house empty, with only a caretaker in the gardener's lodge +to mind it, and the estate for sale. Three years it had been in that +condition, but nobody seemed to want it; occasionally some important +person came rushing down in a motor-car, but after running over the +house he would come out and, remarking that it was a "rummy old place," +remount his car and vanish in a cloud of dust to be seen no more. + +The dead owner, I found, was much in the village mind; and no wonder, +since Norton had never been without a squire until he passed away, +leaving no one to succeed him. It was as if some ancient landmark, or an +immemorial oak tree on the green in whose shade the villagers had been +accustomed to sit for many generations, had been removed. There was a +sense of something wanting something gone out of their lives. Moreover, +he had been a man of a remarkable character, and though they never loved +him they yet reverenced his memory. + +So much was he in their minds that I could not be in the village and not +hear the story of his life--the story which, I said, interested me less +than that of the good baker and his wife. On his father's death at a +very advanced age he came, a comparative stranger, to Norton, the first +half of his life having been spent abroad. He was then a middle-aged +man, unmarried, and a bachelor he remained to the end. He was of a +reticent disposition and was said to be proud; formal, almost cold, in +manner; furthermore, he did not share his neighbours' love of sport of +any description, nor did he care for society, and because of all this +he was regarded as peculiar, not to say eccentric. But he was deeply +interested in agriculture, especially in cattle and their improvement, +and that object grew to be his master passion. It was a period of great +depression, and as his farms fell vacant he took them into his own +hands, increased his stock and built model cowhouses, and came at last +to be known throughout his own country, and eventually everywhere, as +one of the biggest cattle-breeders in England. But he was famous in +a peculiar way. Wise breeders and buyers shook their heads and even +touched their foreheads significantly, and predicted that the squire +of Norton would finish by ruining himself. They were right, he ruined +himself; not that he was mentally weaker than those who watched and +cunningly exploited him; he was ruined because his object was a higher +one than theirs. He saw clearly that the prize system is a vicious one +and that better results may be obtained without it. He proved this at +a heavy cost by breeding better beasts than his rivals, who were +all exhibitors and prizewinners, and who by this means got their +advertisements and secured the highest prices, while he, who disdained +prizes and looked with disgust at the overfed and polished animals at +shows, got no advertisements and was compelled to sell at unremunerative +prices. The buyers, it may be mentioned, were always the breeders for +shows, and they made a splendid profit out of it. + +He carried on the fight for a good many years, becoming more and more +involved, until his creditors took possession of the estate, sold off +the stock, let the farms, and succeeded in finding a tenant for the +furnished house. He went to a cottage in the village and there passed +his remaining years. To the world he appeared unmoved by his reverses. +The change from mansion and park to a small thatched cottage, with a +labourer's wife for attendant, made no change in the man, nor did he +resign his seat on the Bench of Magistrates or any other unpaid +office he held. To the last he was what he had always been, formal and +ceremonious, more gracious to those beneath him than to equals; strict +in the performance of his duties, living with extreme frugality and +giving freely to those in want, and very regular in his attendance +at church, where he would sit facing the tombs and memorials of his +ancestors, among the people but not of them--a man alone and apart, +respected by all but loved by none. + +Finally he died and was buried with the others, and one more memorial +with the old name, which he bore last was placed on the wall. That +was the story as it was told me, and as it was all about a man who was +without charm and had no love interest it did not greatly interest me, +and I soon dismissed it from my thoughts. Then one day coming through a +grove in the park and finding myself standing before the ancient, empty, +desolate house--for on the squire's death everything had been sold and +taken away--I remembered that the caretaker had begged me to let him +show me over the place. I had not felt inclined to gratify him, as I +had found him a young man of a too active mind whose only desire was +to capture some person to talk to and unfold his original ideas and +schemes, but now having come to the house I thought I would suffer him, +and soon found him at work in the vast old walled garden. He joyfully +threw down his spade and let me in and then up to the top floor, +determined that I should see everything. By the time we got down to +the ground floor I was pretty tired of empty rooms, oak panelled, and +passages and oak staircases, and of talk, and impatient to get away. But +no, I had not seen the housekeeper's room--I must see that!--and so +into another great vacant room I was dragged, and to keep me as long as +possible in that last room he began unlocking and flinging open all the +old oak cupboards and presses. Glancing round at the long array of empty +shelves, I noticed a small brown-paper parcel, thick with dust, in a +corner, and as it was the only movable thing I had seen in that vacant +house I asked him what the parcel contained. Books, he replied--they had +been left as of no value when the house was cleared of furniture. As I +wished to see the books he undid the parcel; it contained forty copies +of a small quarto-shaped book of sonnets, with the late squire's name as +author on the title page. I read a sonnet, and told him I should like to +read them all. "You can have a copy, of course," he exclaimed. "Put it +in your pocket and keep it." When I asked him if he had any right to +give one away he laughed and said that if any one had thought the whole +parcel worth twopence it would not have been left behind. He was quite +right; a cracked dinner--plate or a saucepan with a hole in it or an +earthenware teapot with a broken spout would not have been left, but the +line was drawn at a book of sonnets by the late squire. Nobody wanted +it, and so without more qualms I put it in my pocket, and have it before +me now, opened at page 63, on which appears, without a headline, the +sonnet I first read, and which I quote:-- + + How beautiful are birds, of God's sweet air + Free denizens; no ugly earthly spot + Their boundless happiness doth seem to blot. + The swallow, swiftly flying here and there, + Can it be true that dreary household care + Doth goad her to incessant flight? + If not How can it be that she doth cast her lot + Now there, now here, pursuing summer everywhere? + I sadly fear that shallow, tiny brain + Is not exempt from anxious cares and fears, + That mingled heritage of joy and pain + That for some reason everywhere appears; + And yet those birds, how beautiful they are! + Sure beauty is to happiness no bar. + +This has a fault that doth offend the reader of modern verse, and there +are many of the eighty sonnets in the book which do not equal it in +merit. He was manifestly an amateur; he sometimes writes with +labour, and he not infrequently ends with the unpardonable weak line. +Nevertheless he had rightly chosen this difficult form in which to +express his inner self. It suited his grave, concentrated thought, and +each little imperfect poem of fourteen lines gives us a glimpse into a +wise, beneficent mind. He had fought his fight and suffered defeat, and +had then withdrawn himself silently from the field to die. But if he +had been embittered he could have relieved himself in this little book. +There is no trace of such a feeling. He only asks, in one sonnet, where +can a balm be found for the heart fretted and torn with eternal cares; +when we have thought and striven for some great and good purpose, when +all our striving has ended in disaster? His plan, he concludes, is to go +out in the quiet night-time and look at the stars. + +Here let me quote two more sonnets written in contemplative mood, just +to give the reader a fuller idea not of the verse, as verse, but of the +spirit in the old squire. There is no title to these two:-- + + I like a fire of wood; there is a kind + Of artless poetry in all its ways: + When first 'tis lighted, how it roars and plays, + And sways to every breath its flames, refined + By fancy to some shape by life confined. + And then how touching are its latter days; + When, all its strength decayed, and spent the blaze + Of fiery youth, grey ash is all we find. + Perhaps we know the tree, of which the pile + Once formed a part, and oft beneath its shade + Have sported in our youth; or in quaint style + Have carved upon its rugged bark a name + Of which the memory doth alone remain + A memory doomed, alas! in turn to fade. + +Bad enough as verse, the critic will say; refined, confined, find--what +poor rhymes are these! and he will think me wrong to draw these +frailties from their forgotten abode. But I like to think of the +solitary old man sitting by his wood fire in the old house, not brooding +bitterly on his frustrate life, but putting his quiet thoughts into the +form of a sonnet. The other is equally good--or bad, if the critic will +have it so:-- + + The clock had just struck five, and all was still + Within my house, when straight I open threw + With eager hand the casement dim with dew. + Oh, what a glorious flush of light did fill + That old staircase! and then and there did kill + All those black doubts that ever do renew + Their civil war with all that's good and true + Within our hearts, when body and mind are ill + From this slight incident I would infer + A cheerful truth, that men without demur, + In times of stress and doubt, throw open wide + The windows of their breast; nor stung by pride + In stifling darkness gloomily abide; + But bid the light flow in on either side. + +A "slight incident" and a beautiful thought. But all I have so far said +about the little book is preliminary to what I wish to say about another +sonnet which must also be quoted. It is perhaps, as a sonnet, as ill +done as the others, but the subject of it specially attracted me, as it +happened to be one which was much in my mind during my week's stay at +Norton. That remote little village without a squire or any person +of means or education in or near it capable of feeling the slightest +interest in the people, except the parson, an old infirm man who was +never seen but once a week--how wanting in some essential thing it +appeared! It seemed to me that the one thing which might be done in +these small centres of rural life to brighten and beautify existence is +precisely the thing which is never done, also that what really is being +done is of doubtful value and sometimes actually harmful. + +Leaving Norton one day I visited other small villages in the +neighbourhood and found they were no better off. I had heard of the +rector of one of these villages as a rather original man, and went and +discussed the subject with him. "It is quite useless thinking about it," +he said. "The people here are clods, and will not respond to any effort +you can make to introduce a little light and sweetness into their +lives." There was no more to be said to him, but I knew he was wrong. I +found the villagers in that part of the country the most intelligent +and responsive people of their class I had ever encountered. It was +a delightful experience to go into their cottages, not to read them a +homily or to present them with a book or a shilling, nor to inquire into +their welfare, material and spiritual, but to converse intimately with +a human interest in them, as would be the case in a country where there +are no caste distinctions. It was delightful, because they were so +responsive, so sympathetic, so alive. Now it was just at this time, +when the subject was in my mind, that the book of sonnets came into my +hands--given to me by the generous caretaker--and I read in it this one +on "Innocent Amusements":-- + + There lacks a something to complete the round + Of our fair England's homely happiness + A something, yet how oft do trifles bless + When greater gifts by far redound + To honours lone, but no responsive sound + Of joy or mirth awake, nay, oft oppress, + While gifts of which we scarce the moment guess + In never-failing joys abound. + No nation can be truly great + That hath not something childlike in its life + Of every day; it should its youth renew + With simple joys that sweetly recreate + The jaded mind, conjoined in friendly strife + The pleasures of its childhood days pursue. + +What wise and kindly thoughts he had--the old squire of Norton! Surely, +when telling me the story of his life, they had omitted something! I +questioned them on the point. Did he not in all the years he was at +Norton House, and later when he lived among them in a cottage in the +village--did he not go into their homes and meet them as if he knew and +felt that they were all of the same flesh, children of one universal +Father, and did he not make them feel this about him--that the +differences in fortune and position and education were mere accidents? +And the answer was: No, certainly not! as if I had asked a preposterous +question. He was the squire, a gentleman--any one might understand that +he could not come among them like that! That is what a parson can do +because he is, so to speak, paid to keep an eye on them, and besides +it's religion there and a different thing. But the squire!--their +squire, that dignified old gentleman, so upright in his saddle, +so considerate and courteous to every one--but he never forgot his +position--never in that way! I also asked if he had never tried to +establish, or advocated, or suggested to them any kind of reunions to +take place from time to time, or an entertainment or festival to +get them to come pleasantly together, making a brightness in their +lives--something which would not be cricket or football, nor any form of +sport for a few of the men, all the others being mere lookers-on and the +women and children left out altogether; something which would be for and +include everyone, from the oldest grey labourer no longer able to work +to the toddling little ones; something of their own invention, peculiar +to Norton, which would be their pride and make their village dearer +to them? And the answer was still no, and no, and no. He had never +attempted, never suggested, anything of the sort. How could he--the +squire! Yet he wrote those wise words:-- + + No nation can be truly great + That hath not something childlike in its life + Of every day. + +Why are we lacking in that which others undoubtedly have, a something to +complete the round of homely happiness in our little rural centres; +how is it that we do not properly encourage the things which, albeit +childlike, are essential, which sweetly recreate? It is not merely +the selfishness of those who are well placed and prefer to live for +themselves, or who have light but care not to shed it on those who are +not of their class. Selfishness is common enough everywhere, in men of +all races. It is not selfishness, nor the growth of towns or decay of +agriculture, which as a fact does not decay, nor education, nor any of +the other causes usually given for the dullness, the greyness of village +life. The chief cause, I take it, is that gulf, or barrier, which +exists between men and men in different classes in our country, or +a considerable portion of it--the caste feeling which is becoming +increasingly rigid in the rural world, if my own observation, extending +over a period of twenty-five years, is not all wrong. + + + + +Chapter Eleven: Salisbury and Its Doves + + +Never in my experience has there been a worse spring season than that +of 1903 for the birds, more especially for the short-winged migrants. In +April I looked for the woodland warblers and found them not, or saw but +a few of the commonest kinds. It was only too easy to account for this +rarity. The bitter north-east wind had blown every day and all day long +during those weeks when birds are coming, and when nearing the end +of their journey, at its most perilous stage, the wind had been dead +against them; its coldness and force was too much for these delicate +travellers, and doubtless they were beaten down in thousands into the +grey waters of a bitter sea. The stronger-winged wheatear was more +fortunate, since he comes in March, and before that spell of deadly +weather he was already back in his breeding haunts on Salisbury Plain, +and, in fact, everywhere on that open down country. I was there to hear +him sing his wild notes to the listening waste--singing them, as his +pretty fashion is, up in the air, suspended on quickly vibrating wings +like a great black and white moth. But he was in no singing mood, and at +last, in desperation, I fled to Salisbury to wait for loitering spring +in that unattractive town. + +The streets were cold as the open plain, and there was no comfort +indoors; to haunt the cathedral during those vacant days was the only +occupation left to me. There was some shelter to be had under the walls, +and the empty, vast interior would seem almost cosy on coming in from +the wind. At service my due feet never failed, while morning, noon, +and evening I paced the smooth level green by the hour, standing at +intervals to gaze up at the immense pile with its central soaring spire, +asking myself why I had never greatly liked it in the past and did not +like it much better now when grown familiar with it. Undoubtedly it is +one of the noblest structures of its kind in England--even my eyes that +look coldly on most buildings could see it; and I could admire, even +reverence, but could not love. It suffers by comparison with other +temples into which my soul has wandered. It has not the majesty +and appearance of immemorial age, the dim religious richness of the +interior, with much else that goes to make up, without and within, the +expression which is so marked in other mediaeval fanes--Winchester, Ely, +York, Canterbury, Exeter, and Wells. To the dry, mechanical mind of the +architect these great cathedrals are in the highest degree imperfect, +according to the rules of his art: to all others this imperfectness is +their chief excellence and glory; for they are in a sense a growth, a +flower of many minds and many periods, and are imperfect even as Nature +is, in her rocks and trees; and, being in harmony with Nature and like +Nature, they are inexpressibly beautiful and satisfying beyond all +buildings to the aesthetic as well as to the religious sense. + +Occasionally I met and talked with an old man employed at the cathedral. +One day, closing one eye and shading the other with his hand, he gazed +up at the building for some time, and then remarked: "I'll tell you +what's wrong with Salisbury--it looks too noo." He was near the mark; +the fault is that to the professional eye it is faultless; the lack of +expression is due to the fact that it came complete from its maker's +brain, like a coin from the mint, and being all on one symmetrical plan +it has the trim, neat appearance of a toy cathedral carved out of wood +and set on a green-painted square. + +After all, my thoughts and criticisms on the cathedral, as a building, +were merely incidental; my serious business was with the feathered +people to be seen there. Few in the woods and fewer on the windy downs, +here birds were abundant, not only on the building, where they were like +seafowl congregated on a precipitous rock, but they were all about me. +The level green was the hunting ground of many thrushes--a dozen or +twenty could often be seen at one time--and it was easy to spot those +that had young. The worm they dragged out was not devoured; another was +looked for, then another; then all were cut up in proper lengths and +beaten and bruised, and finally packed into a bundle and carried off. +Rooks, too, were there, breeding on the cathedral elms, and had no time +and spirit to wrangle, but could only caw-caw distressfully at the wind, +which tossed them hither and thither in the air and lashed the tall +trees, threatening at each fresh gust to blow their nests to +pieces. Small birds of half a dozen kinds were also there, and one +tinkle-tinkled his spring song quite merrily in spite of the cold that +kept the others silent and made me blue. One day I spied a big queen +bumble-bee on the ground, looking extremely conspicuous in its black and +chestnut coat on the fresh green sward; and thinking it numbed by the +cold I picked it up. It moved its legs feebly, but alas! its enemy +had found and struck it down, and with its hard, sharp little beak had +drilled a hole in one of the upper plates of its abdomen, and from that +small opening had cunningly extracted all the meat. Though still alive +it was empty as a blown eggshell. Poor queen and mother, you survived +the winter in vain, and went abroad in vain in the bitter weather in +quest of bread to nourish your few first-born--the grubs that would +help you by and by; now there will be no bread for them, and for you no +populous city in the flowery earth and a great crowd of children to rise +up each day, when days are long, to call you blessed! And he who +did this thing, the unspeakable oxeye with his black and yellow +breast--"catanic black and amber"--even while I made my lamentation was +tinkling his merry song overhead in the windy elms. + +The birds that lived on the huge cathedral itself had the greatest +attraction for me; and here the daws, if not the most numerous, were the +most noticeable, as they ever are on account of their conspicuousness in +their black plumage, their loquacity and everlasting restlessness. Far +up on the ledge from which the spire rises a kestrel had found a cosy +corner in which to establish himself, and one day when I was there a +number of daws took it on themselves to eject him: they gathered near +and flew this way and that, and cawed and cawed in anger, and swooped at +him, until he could stand their insults no longer, and, suddenly dashing +out, he struck and buffeted them right and left and sent them screaming +with fear in all directions. After this they left him in peace: they +had forgotten that he was a hawk, and that even the gentle mousing +wind-hover has a nobler spirit than any crow of them all. + +On first coming to the cathedral I noticed a few pigeons sitting on the +roof and ledges very high up, and, not seeing them well, I assumed that +they were of the common or domestic kind. By and by one cooed, then +another; and recognizing the stock-dove note I began to look carefully, +and found that all the birds on the building--about thirty pairs--were +of this species. It was a great surprise, for though we occasionally +find a pair of stock-doves breeding on the ivied wall of some inhabited +mansion in the country, it was a new thing to find a considerable colony +of this shy woodland species established on a building in a town. +They lived and bred there just as the common pigeon--the vari-coloured +descendant of the blue rock--does on St. Paul's, the Law Courts, and the +British Museum in London. Only, unlike our metropolitan doves, both the +domestic kind and the ringdove in the parks, the Salisbury doves though +in the town are not of it. They come not down to mix with the currents +of human life in the streets and open spaces; they fly away to the +country to feed, and dwell on the cathedral above the houses and people +just as sea-birds--kittiwake and guillemot and gannet--dwell on the +ledges of some vast ocean-fronting cliff. + +The old man mentioned above told me that the birds were called "rocks" +by the townspeople, also that they had been there for as long as he +could remember. Six or seven years ago, he said, when the repairs to the +roof and spire were started, the pigeons began to go away until there +was not one left. The work lasted three years, and immediately on +its conclusion the doves began to return, and were now as numerous as +formerly. How, I inquired, did these innocent birds get on with their +black neighbours, seeing that the daw is a cunning creature much given +to persecution--a crow, in fact, as black as any of his family? They got +on badly, he said; the doves were early breeders, beginning in March, +and were allowed to have the use of the holes until the daws wanted them +at the end of April, when they forcibly ejected the young doves. He +said that in spring he always picked up a good many young doves, often +unfledged, thrown down by the dawn. I did not doubt his story. I had +just found a young bird myself--a little blue-skinned, yellow-mouthed +fledgling which had fallen sixty or seventy feet on to the gravel below. +But in June, he said, when the daws brought off their young, the doves +entered into possession once more, and were then permitted to rear their +young in peace. + +I returned to Salisbury about the middle of May in better weather, +when there were days that were almost genial, and found the cathedral a +greater "habitacle of birds" than ever: starlings, swifts, and swallows +were there, the lively little martins in hundreds, and the doves and +daws in their usual numbers. All appeared to be breeding, and for some +time I saw no quarreling. At length I spied a pair of doves with a +nest in a small cavity in the stone at the back of a narrow ledge about +seventy feet from the ground, and by standing back some distance I could +see the hen bird sitting on the nest, while the cock stood outside on +the ledge keeping guard. I watched this pair for some hours and saw +a jackdaw sweep down on them a dozen or more times at long intervals. +Sometimes after swooping down he would alight on the ledge a yard or +two away, and the male dove would then turn and face him, and if he then +began sidling up the dove would dash at and buffet him with his wings +with the greatest violence and throw him off. When he swooped closer the +dove would spring up and meet him in the air, striking him at the moment +of meeting, and again the daw would be beaten. When I left three days +after witnessing this contest, the doves were still in possession of +their nest, and I concluded that they were not so entirely at the mercy +of the jackdaw as the old man had led me to believe. + +It was, on this occasion, a great pleasure to listen to the doves. The +stock-dove has no set song, like the ringdove, but like all the other +species in the typical genus Columba it has the cooing or family note, +one of the most human-like sounds which birds emit. In the stock-dove +this is a better, more musical, and a more varied sound than in any +other Columba known to me. The pleasing quality of the sound as well as +the variety in it could be well noted here where the birds were many, +scattered about on ledges and projections high above the earth, and when +bird after bird uttered its plaint, each repeating his note half a dozen +to a dozen times, one in slow measured time, and deep-voiced like the +rock-dove, but more musical; another rapidly, with shorter, impetuous +notes in a higher key, as if carried away by excitement. There were not +two birds that cooed in precisely the same way, and the same bird would +often vary its manner of cooing. + +It was best to hear them during the afternoon service in the cathedral, +when the singing of the choir and throbbing and pealing of the organ +which filled the vast interior was heard outside, subdued by the walls +through which it passed, and was like a beautiful mist or atmosphere of +sound pervading and enveloping the great building; and when the plaining +of the doves, owing to the rhythmic flow of the notes and their human +characters, seemed to harmonize with and be a part of that sacred music. + + + + +Chapter Twelve: Whitesheet Hill + + +On Easter Saturday the roadsides and copses by the little river Nadder +were full of children gathering primroses; they might have filled a +thousand baskets without the flowers being missed, so abundant were +they in that place. Cold though it was the whole air was laden with the +delicious fragrance. It was pleasant to see and talk with the little +people occupied with the task they loved so well, and I made up my mind +to see the result of all this flower-gathering next day in some of the +village churches in the neighbourhood--Fovant, Teffant Evias, Chilmark, +Swallowcliffe, Tisbury, and Fonthill Bishop. I had counted on some +improvement in the weather--some bright sunshine to light up the +flower-decorated interiors; but Easter Sunday proved colder than ever, +with the bitter north-east still blowing, the grey travelling cloud +still covering the sky; and so to get the full benefit of the bitterness +I went instead to spend my day on the top of the biggest down above the +valley. That was Whitesheet Hill, and forms the highest part of the long +ridge dividing the valleys of the Ebble and Nadder. + +It was roughest and coldest up there, and suited my temper best, for +when the weather seems spiteful one finds a grim sort of satisfaction +in defying it. On a genial day it would have been very pleasant on +that lofty plain, for the flat top of the vast down is like a plain in +appearance, and the earthworks on it show that it was once a populous +habitation of man. Now because of the wind and cloud its aspect was bare +and bleak and desolate, and after roaming about for an hour, exploring +the thickest furze patches, I began to think that my day would have to +be spent in solitude, without a living creature to keep me company. The +birds had apparently all been blown away and the rabbits were staying +at home in their burrows. Not even an insect could I see, although +the furze was in full blossom; the honey-suckers were out of sight and +torpid, and the bloom itself could no longer look "unprofitably gay," as +the poet says it does. "Not even a wheatear!" I said, for I had counted +on that bird in the intervals between the storms, although I knew I +should not hear his wild delightful warble in such weather. + +Then, all at once, I beheld that very bird, a solitary female, +flittering on over the flat ground before me, perching on the little +green ant-mounds and flirting its tail and bobbing as if greatly excited +at my presence in that lonely place. I wondered where its mate was, +following it from place to place as it flew, determined now I had found +a bird to keep it in sight. Presently a great blackness appeared low +down in the cloudy sky, and rose and spread, travelling fast towards +me, and the little wheatear fled in fear from it and vanished from sight +over the rim of the down. But I was there to defy the weather, and so +instead of following the bird in search of shelter I sat down among some +low furze bushes and waited and watched. By and by I caught sight of +three magpies, rising one by one at long intervals from the furze and +flying laboriously towards a distant hill-top grove of pines. Then I +heard the wailing cry of a peewit, and caught sight of the bird at a +distance, and soon afterwards a sound of another character--the harsh +angry cry of a carrion crow, almost as deep as the raven's angry voice. +Before long I discovered the bird at a great height coming towards me +in hot pursuit of a kestrel. They passed directly over me so that I had +them a long time in sight, the kestrel travelling quietly on in the face +of the wind, the crow toiling after, and at intervals spurting till he +got near enough to hurl himself at his enemy, emitting his croaks of +rage. For invariably the kestrel with one of his sudden swallow-like +turns avoided the blow and went on as before. I watched them until +they were lost to sight in the coming blackness and wondered that so +intelligent a creature as a crow should waste his energies in that vain +chase. Still one could understand it and even sympathize with him. For +the kestrel is a most insulting creature towards the bigger birds. He +knows that they are incapable of paying him out, and when he finds them +off their guard he will drop down and inflict a blow just for the fun of +the thing. This outraged crow appeared determined to have his revenge. + +Then the storm broke on me, and so fiercely did the rain and sleet +thrash me that, fearing a cold soaking, I fled before it to the rim of +the plain, where the wheatear had vanished, and saw a couple of hundred +yards down on the smooth steep slope a thicket of dwarf trees. It was, +the only shelter in sight, and to it I went, to discover much to my +disgust that the trees were nothing but elders. For there is no tree +that affords so poor a shelter, especially on the high open downs, where +the foliage is scantier than in other situations and lets in the wind +and rain in full force upon you. + +But the elder affects me in two ways. I like it on account of early +associations, and because the birds delight in its fruit, though they +wisely refuse to build in its branches; and I dislike it because its +smell is offensive to me and its berries the least pleasant of all +wild fruits to my taste. I can eat ivy-berries in March, and yew in its +season, poison or not; and hips and haws and holly-berries and harsh +acorn, and the rowan, which some think acrid; but the elderberry I can't +stomach. + +How comes it, I have asked more than once, that this poor tree is so +often seen on the downs where it is so badly fitted to be and makes so +sorry an appearance with its weak branches broken and its soft leaves +torn by the winds? How badly it contrasts with the other trees and +bushes that flourish on the downs--furze, juniper, holly, blackthorn, +and hawthorn! + +Two years ago, one day in the early spring, I was walking on an +extensive down in another part of Wiltshire with the tenant of the land, +who began there as a large sheep-farmer, but eventually finding that +he could make more with rabbits than with sheep turned most of his land +into a warren. The higher part of this down was overgrown with furze, +mixed with holly and other bushes, but the slopes were mostly very bare. +At one spot on a wide bare slope where the rabbits had formed a big +group of burrows there was a close little thicket of young elder trees, +looking exceedingly conspicuous in the bright green of early April. +Calling my companion's attention to this little thicket I said something +about the elder growing on the open downs where it always appeared to +be out of harmony with its surroundings. "I don't suppose you planted +elders here," I said. + +"No, but I know who did," he returned, and he then gave me this curious +history of the trees. Five years before, the rabbits, finding it a +suitable spot to dig in, probably because of a softer chalk there, +made a number of deep burrows at that spot. When the wheatears, or +"horse-maggers" as he called them, returned in spring two or three pairs +attached themselves to this group of burrows and bred in them. There was +that season a solitary elder-bush higher up on the down among the furze +which bore a heavy crop of berries; and when the fruit was ripe he +watched the birds feeding on it, the wheatears among them. The following +spring seedlings came up out of the loose earth heaped about the rabbit +burrows, and as they were not cut down by the rabbits, for they dislike +the elder, they grew up, and now formed a clump of fifty or sixty little +trees of six feet to eight feet in height. + +Who would have thought to find a tree-planter in the wheatear, the bird +of the stony waste and open naked down, who does not even ask for a bush +to perch on? + +It then occurred to me that in every case where I had observed a +clump of elder bushes on the bare downside, it grew upon a village or +collection of rabbit burrows, and it is probable that in every case the +clump owed its existence to the wheatears who had dropped the seed about +their nesting-place. The clump where I had sought a shelter from the +storm was composed of large old dilapidated-looking half-dead elders; +perhaps their age was not above thirty or forty years, but they looked +older than hawthorns of one or two centuries; and under them the rabbits +had their diggings--huge old mounds and burrows that looked like a +badger's earth. Here, too, the burrows had probably existed first and +had attracted the wheatears, and the birds had brought the seed from +some distant bush. + +Crouching down in one of the big burrows at the roots of an old elder I +remained for half an hour, listening to the thump-thump of the alarmed +rabbits about me, and the accompanying hiss and swish of the wind and +sleet and rain in the ragged branches. + +The storm over I continued my rambles on Whitesheet Hill, and coming +back an hour or two later to the very spot where I had seen and followed +the wheatear, I all at once caught sight of a second bird, lying dead +on the turf close to my feet! The sudden sight gave me a shock of +astonishment, mingled with admiration and grief. For how pretty it +looked, though dead, lying on its back, the little black legs stuck +stiffly up, the long wings pressed against the sides, their black tips +touching together like the clasped hands of a corpse; and the fan-like +black and white tail, half open as in life, moved perpetually up and +down by the wind, as if that tail-flirting action of the bird had +continued after death. It was very beautiful in its delicate shape and +pale harmonious colouring, resting on the golden-green mossy turf. And +it was a male, undoubtedly the mate of the wheatear I had seen at the +spot, and its little mate, not knowing what death is, had probably been +keeping watch near it, wondering at its strange stillness and greatly +fearing for its safety when I came that way, and passed by without +seeing it. + +Poor little migrant, did you come back across half the world for +this--back to your home on Whitesheet Hill to grow cold and fail in the +cold April wind, and finally to look very pretty, lying stiff and cold, +to the one pair of human eyes that were destined to see you! The little +birds that come and go and return to us over such vast distances, they +perish like this in myriads annually; flying to and from us they are +blown away by death like sere autumn leaves, "the pestilence-stricken +multitudes" whirled away by the wind! They die in myriads: that is not +strange; the strange, the astonishing thing is the fact of death; what +can they tell us of it--the wise men who live or have ever lived on the +earth--what can they say now of the bright intelligent spirit, the dear +little emotional soul, that had so fit a tenement and so fitly expressed +itself in motions of such exquisite grace, in melody so sweet! Did it go +out like the glow-worm's lamp, the life and sweetness of the flower? +Was its destiny not like that of the soul, specialized in a different +direction, of the saint or poet or philosopher! Alas, they can tell us +nothing! + +I could not go away leaving it in that exposed place on the turf, to be +found a little later by a magpie or carrion crow or fox, and devoured. +Close by there was a small round hillock, an old forsaken nest of the +little brown ants, green and soft with moss and small creeping herbs--a +suitable grave for a wheatear. Cutting out a round piece of turf from +the side, I made a hole with my stick and put the dead bird in and +replacing the turf left it neatly buried. + +It was not that I had or have any quarrel with the creatures I have +named, or would have them other than they are--carrion-eaters and +scavengers, Nature's balance-keepers and purifiers. The only creatures +on earth I loathe and hate are the gourmets, the carrion-crows and foxes +of the human kind who devour wheatears and skylarks at their tables. + + + + +Chapter Thirteen: Bath and Wells Revisited + + +'Tis so easy to get from London to Bath, by merely stepping into a +railway carriage which takes you smoothly without a stop in two short +hours from Paddington, that I was amazed at myself in having allowed +five full years to pass since my previous visit. The question was +much in my mind as I strolled about noting the old-remembered names of +streets and squares and crescents. Quiet Street was the name inscribed +on one; it was, to me, the secret name of them all. The old impressions +were renewed, an old feeling partially recovered. The wide, clean ways; +the solid, stone-built houses with their dignified aspect; the large +distances, terrace beyond terrace; mansions and vast green lawns and +parks and gardens; avenues and groups of stately trees, especially that +unmatched clump of old planes in the Circus; the whole town, the design +in the classic style of one master mind, set by the Avon, amid green +hills, produced a sense of harmony and repose which cannot be equalled +by any other town in the kingdom. + +This idle time was delightful so long as I gave my attention exclusively +to houses from the outside, and to hills, rocks, trees, waters, and all +visible nature, which here harmonizes with man's works. To sit on some +high hill and look down on Bath, sun-flushed or half veiled in mist; to +lounge on Camden Crescent, or climb Sion Hill, or take my ease with the +water-drinkers in the spacious, comfortable Pump Room; or, better still, +to rest at noon in the ancient abbey--all this was pleasure pure and +simple, a quiet drifting back until I found myself younger by five years +than I had taken myself to be. + +I haunted the abbey, and the more I saw of it the more I loved it. The +impression it had made on me during my former visits had faded, or else +I had never properly seen it, or had not seen it in the right emotional +mood. Now I began to think it the best of all the great abbey churches +of England and the equal of the cathedrals in its effect on the mind. +How rich the interior is in its atmosphere of tempered light or tender +gloom! How tall and graceful the columns holding up the high roof of +white stone with its marvellous palm-leaf sculpture! What a vast expanse +of beautifully stained glass! I certainly gave myself plenty of time to +appreciate it on this occasion, as I visited it every day, sometimes +two or three times, and not infrequently I sat there for an hour at a +stretch. + +Sitting there one day, thinking of nothing, I was gradually awakened +to a feeling almost of astonishment at the sight of the extraordinary +number of memorial tablets of every imaginable shape and size which +crowd the walls. So numerous are they and so closely placed that you +could not find space anywhere to put your hand against the wall. We are +accustomed to think that in cathedrals and other great ecclesiastical +buildings the illustrious dead receive burial, and their names and +claims on our gratitude and reverence are recorded, but in no fane in +the land is there so numerous a gathering of the dead as in this place. +The inscription-covered walls were like the pages of an old black-letter +volume without margins. Yet when I came to think of it I could not +recall any Bath celebrity or great person associated with Bath except +Beau Nash, who was not perhaps a very great person. Probably Carlyle +would have described him as a "meeserable creature." + +Leaving my seat I began to examine the inscriptions, and found that they +had not been placed there in memory of men belonging to Bath or even +Somerset. These monuments were erected to persons from all counties in +the three kingdoms, and from all the big towns, those to Londoners being +most numerous. Nor were they of persons distinguished in any way. Here +you find John or Henry or Thomas Smith, or Brown, or Jones, or Robinson, +provision dealer, or merchant, of Clerkenwell, or Bermondsey, or +Bishopsgate Street Within or Without; also many retired captains, +majors, and colonels. There were hundreds more whose professions +or occupations in life were not stated. There were also hundreds of +memorials to ladies--widows and spinsters. They were all, in fact, +to persons who had come to die in Bath after "taking the waters," and +dying, they or their friends had purchased immortality on the walls +of the abbey with a handful or two of gold. Here is one of several +inscriptions of the kind I took the trouble to copy: "His early virtues, +his cultivated talents, his serious piety, inexpressibly endeared him to +his friends and opened to them many bright prospects of excellence and +happiness. These prospects have all faded," and so on for several long +lines in very big letters, occupying a good deal of space on the wall. +But what and who was he, and what connection had he with Bath? He was +a young man born in the West Indies who died in Scotland, and later his +mother, coming to Bath for her health, "caused this inscription to +be placed on the abbey walls"! If this policy or tradition is still +followed by the abbey authorities, it will be necessary for them to +build an annexe; if it be no longer followed, would it be going too far +to suggest that these mural tablets to a thousand obscurities, which +ought never to have been placed there, should now be removed and +placed in some vault where the relations or descendants of the persons +described could find, and if they wished it, have them removed? + +But it must be said that the abbey is not without a fair number of +memorials with which no one can quarrel; the one I admire most, to Quin, +the actor, has, I think, the best or the most appropriate epitaph ever +written. No, one, however familiar with the words, will find fault with +me for quoting them here: + + That tongue which set the table on a roar + And charmed the public ear is heard no more. + Closed are those eyes, the harbingers of wit, + Which spake before the tongue what Shakespeare writ. + Cold is that hand which living was stretched forth + At friendship's call to succor modest worth. + Here lies James Quin, deign readers to be taught + Whate'er thy strength of body, force of thought, + In Nature's happiest mood however cast, + To this complexion thou must come at last. + +Quin's monument strikes one as the greatest there because of Garrick's +living words, but there is another very much more beautiful. + +I first noticed this memorial on the wall at a distance of about three +yards, too far to read anything in the inscription except the name of +Sibthorpe, which was strange to me, but instead of going nearer to read +it I remained standing to admire it at that distance. The tablet was of +white marble, and on it was sculptured the figure of a young man with +curly head and classic profile. He was wearing sandals and a loose +mantle held to his breast with one hand, while in the other hand +he carried a bunch of leaves and flowers. He appeared in the act of +stepping ashore from a boat of antique shape, and the artist had been +singularly successful in producing the idea of free and vigorous motion +in the figure as well as of some absorbing object in his mind. The +figure was undoubtedly symbolical, and I began to amuse myself by trying +to guess its meaning. Then a curious thing happened. A person who had +been moving slowly along near me, apparently looking with no great +interest at the memorials, came past me and glanced first at the tablet +I was looking at, then at me. As our eyes met I remarked that I was +admiring the best memorial I had found in the abbey, and then added, +"I've been trying to make out its meaning. You see the man is a +traveller and is stepping ashore with a flowering spray in his hand. It +strikes me that it may have been erected to the memory of a person who +introduced some valuable plant into England." + +"Yes, perhaps," he said. "But who was he?" + +"I don't know yet," I returned. "I can only see that his name was +Sibthorpe." + +"Sibthorpe!" he exclaimed excitedly. "Why, this is the very memorial +I've been looking for all over the abbey and had pretty well given up +all hopes of finding it." With that he went to it and began studying +the inscription, which was in Latin. John Sibthorpe, I found, was a +distinguished botanist, author of the Flora Graeca, who died over a +century ago. + +I asked him why he was interested in Sibthorpe's memorial. + +"Well, you see, I'm a great botanist myself," he explained, "and have +been familiar with his name and work all my life. Of course," he added, +"I don't mean I'm great in the sense that Sibthorpe was. I'm only a +little local botanist, quite unknown outside my own circle; I only mean +that I'm a great lover of botany." + +I left him there, and had the curiosity to look up the great man's +life, and found some very curious things in it. He was a son of Humphrey +Sibthorpe, also a great botanist, who succeeded the still greater +Dillenius as Sherardian Professor of Botany at Oxford, a post which +he held for thirty-six years, and during that time he delivered one +lecture, which was a failure. John, if he did not suck in botany with +his mother's milk, took it quite early from his father, and on leaving +the University went abroad to continue his studies. Eventually he +went to Greece, inflamed with the ambition to identify all the plants +mentioned by Dioscorides. Then he set about writing his Flora Graeca; +but he had a rough time of it travelling about in that rude land, and +falling ill he had to leave his work undone. When nearing his end he +came to Bath, like so many other afflicted ones, only to die, and he +was very properly buried in the abbey. In his will he left an estate +the proceeds of which were to be devoted to the completion of his work, +which was to be in ten folio volumes, with one hundred plates in each. +This was done and the work finished forty-four years after his death, +when thirty copies were issued to the patient subscribers at two hundred +and forty guineas a copy. But the whole cost of the work was set down +at 30,000 pounds! A costlier work it would be hard to find; I wonder how +many of us have seen it? + +But I must go back to my subject. I was not in Bath just to die and lie +there, like poor Sibthorpe, with all those strange bedfellows of his, +nor was I in search of a vacant space the size of my hand on the walls +to bespeak it for my own memorial. On the contrary, I was there, as we +have seen, to knock five years off my age. And it was very pleasant, as +I have said, so long as I confined my attention to Bath, the stone-built +town of old memories and associations--so long as I was satisfied to +loiter in the streets and wide green places and in the Pump Room and the +abbey. The bitter came in only when, going from places to faces, I began +to seek out the friends and acquaintances of former days. The familiar +faces seemed not wholly familiar now. A change had been wrought; in some +cases a great change, as in that of some weedy girl who had blossomed +into fair womanhood. One could not grieve at that; but in the +middle-aged and those who were verging on or past that period, it was +impossible not to feel saddened at the difference. "I see no change in +you," is a lie ready to the lips which would speak some pleasing thing, +but it does not quite convince. Men are naturally brutal, and use no +compliments to one another; on the contrary, they do not hesitate to +make a joke of wrinkles and grey hairs--their own and yours. "But, oh, +the difference" when the familiar face, no longer familiar as of old, +is a woman's! This is no light thing to her, and her eyes, being +preternaturally keen in such matters, see not only the change in you, +but what is infinitely sadder, the changed reflection of herself. Your +eyes have revealed the shock you have experienced. You cannot hide it; +her heart is stabbed with a sudden pain, and she is filled with shame +and confusion; and the pain is but greater if her life has glided +smoothly--if she cannot appeal to your compassion, finding a melancholy +relief in that saddest cry:-- + + O Grief has changed me since you saw me last! + +For not grief, nor sickness, nor want, nor care, nor any misery or +calamity which men fear, is her chief enemy. Time alone she hates and +fears--insidious Time who has lulled her mind with pleasant flatteries +all these years while subtly taking away her most valued possessions, +the bloom and colour, the grace, the sparkle, the charm of other years. + +Here is a true and pretty little story, which may or may not exactly +fit the theme, but is very well worth telling. A lady of fashion, +middle-aged or thereabouts, good-looking but pale and with the marks +of care and disillusionment on her expressive face, accompanied by her +pretty sixteen-years-old daughter, one day called on an artist and asked +him to show her his studio. He was a very great artist, the greatest +portrait-painter we have ever had and he did not know who she was, but +with the sweet courtesy which distinguished him through all his long +life--he died recently at a very advanced age--he at once put his work +away and took her round his studio to show her everything he thought +would interest her. But she was restless and inattentive, and by and by +leaving the artist talking to her young daughter she began going round +by herself, moving constantly from picture to picture. Presently she +made an exclamation, and turning they saw her standing before a picture, +a portrait of a girl, staring fixedly at it. "Oh," she cried, and it was +a cry of pain, "was I once as beautiful as that?" and burst into tears. +She had found the picture she had been looking for, which she had come +to see; it had been there twenty to twenty-five years, and the story of +it was as follows. + +When she was a young girl her mother took her to the great artist to +have her portrait painted, and when the work was at length finished she +and her mother went to see it. The artist put it before them and the +mother looked at it, her face expressing displeasure, and said not one +word. Nor did the artist open his lips. And at last the girl, to break +the uncomfortable silence, said, "Where shall we hang it, mother?" and +the lady replied, "Just where you like, my dear, so long as you hang it +with the face to the wall." It was an insolent, a cruel thing to say, +but the artist did not answer her bitterly; he said gently that she need +not take the portrait as it failed to please her, and that in any case +he would decline to take the money she had agreed to pay him for the +work. She thanked him coldly and went her way, and he never saw her +again. And now Time, the humbler of proud beautiful women, had given +him his revenge: the portrait, scorned and rejected when the colour and +sparkle of life was in the face, had been looked on once more by its +subject and had caused her to weep at the change in herself. + +To return. One wishes in these moments of meeting, of surprise and +sudden revealings, that it were permissible to speak from the heart, +since then the very truth might have more balm than bitterness in +it. "Grieve not, dear friend of old days, that I have not escaped the +illusion common to all--the idea that those we have not looked on this +long time--full five years, let us say--have remained as they were while +we ourselves have been moving onwards and downwards in that path in +which our feet are set. No one, however hardened he may be, can escape +a shock of surprise and pain; but now the illusion I cherished has +gone--now I have seen with my physical eyes, and a new image, with +Time's writing on it, has taken the place of the old and brighter one, +I would not have it otherwise. No, not if I could would I call back the +vanished lustre, since all these changes, above all that wistful look +in the eyes, do but serve to make you dearer, my sister and friend +and fellow-traveller in a land where we cannot find a permanent +resting-place." + +Alas! it cannot be spoken, and we cannot comfort a sister if she cannot +divine the thought; but to brood over these inevitable changes is as +idle as it is to lament that we were born into this mutable world. After +all, it is because of the losses, the sadnesses, that the world is so +infinitely sweet to us. The thought is in Cory's Mimnernus in Church: + + All beauteous things for which we live + By laws of time and space decay. + But oh, the very reason why + I clasp them is because they die. + +From this sadness in Bath I went to a greater in Wells, where I had not +been for ten years, and timing my visit so as to have a Sunday service +at the cathedral of beautiful memories, I went on a Saturday to Shepton +Mallet. A small, squalid town, a "manufacturing town" the guide-book +calls it. Well, yes; it manufactures Anglo-Bavarian beer in a gigantic +brewery which looks bigger than all the other buildings together, the +church and a dozen or twenty public-houses included. To get some food I +went to the only eating-house in the place, and saw a pleasant-looking +woman, plump and high-coloured, with black hair, with an expression of +good humour and goodness of every description in her comely countenance. +She promised to have a chop ready by the time I had finished looking at +the church, and I said I would have it with a small Guinness. She could +not provide that, the house, she said, was strictly temperance. "My +doctor has ordered me to take it," said I, "and if you are religious, +remember that St. Paul tells us to take a little stout when we find it +beneficial." + +"Yes, I know that's what St. Paul says," she returned, with a heightened +colour and a vicious emphasis on the saint's name, "but we go on a +different principle." + +So I had to go for my lunch to one of the big public-houses, called +hotels; but whether it called itself a cow, or horse, or stag, or angel, +or a blue or green something, I cannot remember. They gave me what they +called a beefsteak pie--a tough crust and under it some blackish cubes +carved out of the muscle of an antediluvian ox-and for this delicious +fare and a glass of stout I paid three shillings and odd pence. + +As I came away Shepton Mallet was shaken to its foundations by a +tremendous and most diabolical sound, a prolonged lupine yell or yowl, +as if a stupendous wolf, as big, say, as the Anglo-Bavarian brewery, had +howled his loudest and longest. This infernal row, which makes Shepton +seem like a town or village gone raving mad, was merely to inform the +men, and, incidentally, the universe, that it was time for them to knock +off work. + +Turning my back on the place, I said to myself, "What a fool I am to be +sure! Why could I not have been satisfied for once with a cup of coffee +with my lunch? I should have saved a shilling, perhaps eighteen-pence, +to rejoice the soul of some poor tramp; and, better still, I could +have discussed some interesting questions with that charming rosy-faced +woman. What, for instance, was the reason of her quarrel with the +apostle; by the by, she never rebuked me for misquoting his words; and +what is the moral effect (as seen through her clear brown eyes) of +the Anglo-Bavarian brewery on the population of the small town and the +neighbouring villages?" + +The road I followed from Shepton to Wells winds by the water-side, a +tributary of the Brue, in a narrow valley with hills on either side. +It is a five-mile road through a beautiful country, where there is +practically no cultivation, and the green hills, with brown woods in +their hollows, and here and there huge masses of grey and reddish Bath +stone cropping out on their sides, resembling gigantic castles and +ramparts, long ruined and overgrown with ivy and bramble, produce the +effect of a land dispeopled and gone back to a state of wildness. + +A thaw had come that morning, ending the severest frost experienced this +winter anywhere in England, and the valley was alive with birds, happy +and tuneful at the end of January as in April. Looking down on the +stream the sudden glory of a kingfisher passed before me; but the +sooty-brown water-ouzel with his white bib, a haunter, too, of this +water, I did not see. Within a mile or so of Wells I overtook a small +boy who belonged there, and had been to Shepton like me, noticing the +birds. "I saw a kingfisher," I said. "So did I," he returned quickly, +with pride. He described it as a biggish bird with a long neck, but +its colour was not blue--oh, no! I suggested that it was a heron, a +long-necked creature under six feet high, of no particular colour. No, +it was not a heron; and after taking thought, he said, "I think it was a +wild duck." + +Bestowing a penny to encourage him in his promising researches into the +feathered world, I went on by a footpath over a hill, and as I mounted +to the higher ground there before me rose the noble tower of St. +Cuthbert's Church, and a little to the right of it, girt with high +trees, the magnificent pile of the cathedral, with green hills and the +pale sky beyond. O joy to look again on it, to add yet one more enduring +image of it to the number I had long treasured! For the others were +not exactly like this one; the building was not looked at from the same +point of view at the same season and late hour, with the green hills lit +by the departing sun and the clear pale winter sky beyond. + +Coming in by the moated palace I stood once more on the Green before +that west front, beautiful beyond all others, in spite of the strange +defeatures Time has written on it. I watched the daws, numerous as ever, +still at their old mad games, now springing into the air to scatter +abroad with ringing cries, only to return the next minute and fling +themselves back on their old perches on a hundred weather-stained broken +statues in the niches. And while I stood watching them from the palace +trees close by came the loud laugh of the green woodpecker. The same +wild, beautiful sound, uttered perhaps by the same bird, which I had +often heard at that spot ten years ago! "You will not hear that woodland +sound in any other city in the kingdom," I wrote in a book of sketches +entitled "Birds and Man", published in 1901. + +But of my soul's adventures in Wells on the two or three following days +I will say very little. That laugh of the woodpecker was an assurance +that Nature had suffered no change, and the town too, like the hills and +rocks and running waters, seemed unchanged; but how different and how +sad when I looked for those I once knew, whose hands I had hoped to +grasp again! Yes, some were living still; and a dog too, one I used +to take out for long walks and many a mad rabbit-hunt--a very handsome +white-and-liver coloured spaniel. I found him lying on a sofa, and down +he got and wagged his tail vigorously, pretending, with a pretty human +hypocrisy in his gentle yellow eyes, that he knew me perfectly well, +that I was not a bit changed, and that he was delighted to see me. + +On my way back to Bath I had a day at Bristol. It was cattle-market day, +and what with the bellowings, barkings, and shoutings, added to the buzz +and clang of innumerable electric tramcars and the usual din of street +traffic, one got the idea that the Bristolians had adopted a sort of +Salvation Army theory, and were endeavouring to conquer earth (it is +not heaven in this case) by making a tremendous noise. I amused myself +strolling about and watching the people, and as train after train came +in late in the day discharging loads of humanity, mostly young men and +women from the surrounding country coming in for an evening's amusement, +I noticed again the peculiarly Welsh character of the Somerset +peasant--the shape of the face, the colour of the skin, and, above all, +the expression. + +Freeman, when here below, proclaimed it his mission to prove that +"Englishmen were Englishmen, and not somebody else." It appeared to me +that any person, unbiassed by theories on such a subject, looking +at that crowd, would have come to the conclusion, sadly or gladly, +according to his nature, that we are, in fact, "somebody else." + + + + +Chapter Fourteen: The Return of the Native + + +That "going back" about which I wrote in the second chapter to a place +where an unexpected beauty or charm has revealed itself, and has made +its image a lasting and prized possession of the mind, is not the same +thing as the revisiting a famous town or city, rich in many beauties and +old memories, such as Bath or Wells, for instance. Such centres have a +permanent attraction, and one who is a rover in the land must return to +them again and again, nor does he fail on each successive visit to find +some fresh charm or interest. The sadness of such returns, after a long +interval, is only, as I have said, when we start "looking up" those with +whom we had formed pleasant friendly relations. And all because of the +illusion that we shall see them as they were--that Time has stood still +waiting for our return, and by and by, to our surprise and grief, we +discover that it is not so; that the dear friends of other days, long +unvisited but unforgotten, have become strangers. This human loss is +felt even more in the case of a return to some small centre, a village +or hamlet where we knew every one, and our intimacy with the people has +produced the sense of being one in blood with them. It is greatest of +all when we return to a childhood's or boyhood's home. Many writers +have occupied themselves with this mournful theme, and I imagine that a +person of the proper Amiel-like tender and melancholy moralizing type +of mind, by using his own and his friends' experiences, could write a +charmingly sad and pretty book on the subject. + +The really happy returns of this kind must be exceedingly rare. I am +almost surprised to think that I am able to recall as many as two, but +they hardly count, as in both instances the departure or exile from home +happens at so early a time of life that no recollections of the people +survived--nothing, in fact, but a vague mental picture of the place. +One was of a business man I knew in London, who lost his early home in a +village in the Midlands, as a boy of eight or nine years of age, through +the sale of the place by his father, who had become impoverished. The +boy was trained to business in London, and when a middle-aged man, +wishing to retire and spend the rest of his life in the country, he +revisited his native village for the first time, and discovered to his +joy that he could buy back the old home. He was, when I last saw him, +very happy in its possession. + +The other case I will relate more fully, as it is a very curious one, +and came to my knowledge in a singular way. + +At a small station near Eastleigh a man wearing a highly pleased +expression on his face entered the smoking-carriage in which I was +travelling to London. Putting his bag on the rack, he pulled out his +pipe and threw himself back in his seat with a satisfied air; then, +looking at me and catching my eye, he at once started talking. I had my +newspaper, but seeing him in that overflowing mood I responded readily +enough, for I was curious to know why he appeared so happy and who and +what he was. Not a tradesman nor a bagman, and not a farmer, though he +looked like an open-air man; nor could I form a guess from his speech +and manner as to his native place. A robust man of thirty-eight or +forty, with blue eyes and a Saxon face, he looked a thorough Englishman, +and yet he struck me as most un-English in his lively, almost eager +manner, his freedom with a stranger, and something, too, in his speech. +From time to time his face lighted up, when, looking to the window, his +eyes rested on some pretty scene--a glimpse of stately old elm trees in +a field where cattle were grazing, of the vivid green valley of a chalk +stream, the paler hills beyond, the grey church tower or spire of some +tree-hidden village. When he discovered that these hills and streams and +rustic villages had as great a charm for me as for himself, that I knew +and loved the two or three places he named in a questioning way, he +opened his heart and the secret of his present happiness. + +He was a native of the district, born at a farmhouse of which his father +in succession to his grandfather had been the tenant. It was a small +farm of only eighty-five acres, and as his father could make no more +than a bare livelihood out of it, he eventually gave it up when my +informant was but three years old, and selling all he had, emigrated to +Australia. Nine years later he died, leaving a numerous family poorly +provided for; the home was broken up and boys and girls had to go out +and face the world. They had somehow all got on very well, and his +brothers and sisters were happy enough out there, Australians in mind, +thoroughly persuaded that theirs was the better land, the best country +in the world, and with no desire to visit England. He had never felt +like that; somehow his father's feeling about the old country had taken +such a hold of him that he never outlived it--never felt at home in +Australia, however successful he was in his affairs. The home feeling +had been very strong in his father; his greatest delight was to sit of +an evening with his children round him and tell them of the farm and the +old farm-house where he was born and had lived so many years, and where +some of them too had been born. He was never tired of talking of it, +of taking them by the hand, as it were, and leading them from place to +place, to the stream, the village, the old stone church, the meadows and +fields and hedges, the deep shady lanes, and, above all, to the dear +old ivied house with its gables and tall chimneys. So many times had +his father described it that the old place was printed like a map on his +mind, and was like a picture which kept its brightness even after the +image of his boyhood's home in Australia had become faded and pale. With +that mental picture to guide him he believed that he could go to that +angle by the porch where the flycatchers bred every year and find their +nest; where in the hedge the blackberries were most abundant; where the +elders grew by the stream from which he could watch the moorhens and +watervoles; that he knew every fence, gate, and outhouse, every room and +passage in the old house. Through all his busy years that picture never +grew less beautiful, never ceased its call, and at last, possessed of +sufficient capital to yield him a modest income for the rest of his +life, he came home. What he was going to do in England he did not +consider. He only knew that until he had satisfied the chief desire of +his heart and had looked upon the original of the picture he had borne +so long in his mind he could not rest nor make any plans for the future. + +He came first to London and found, on examining the map of Hampshire, +that the village of Thorpe (I will call it), where he was born, is three +miles from the nearest station, in the southern part of the county. +Undoubtedly it was Thorpe; that was one of the few names of places his +father had mentioned which remained in his memory always associated +with that vivid image of the farm in his mind. To Thorpe he accordingly +went--as pretty a rustic village as he had hoped to find it. He took a +room at the inn and went out for a long walk--"just to see the place," +he said to the landlord. He would make no inquiries; he would find his +home for himself; how could he fail to recognize it? But he walked for +hours in a widening circle and saw no farm or other house, and no ground +that corresponded to the picture in his brain. + +Troubled at his failure, he went back and questioned his landlord, and, +naturally, was asked for the name of the farm he was seeking. He had +forgotten the name--he even doubted that he had ever heard it. But there +was his family name to go by--Dyson; did any one remember a farmer Dyson +in the village? He was told that it was not an uncommon name in that +part of the country. There were no Dysons now in Thorpe, but some +fifteen or twenty years ago one of that name had been the tenant of Long +Meadow Farm in the parish. The name of the farm was unfamiliar, and when +he visited the place he found it was not the one he sought. + +It was a grievous disappointment. A new sense of loneliness oppressed +him; for that bright image in his mind, with the feeling about his +home, had been a secret source of comfort and happiness, and was like a +companion, a dear human friend, and now he appeared to be on the point +of losing it. Could it be that all that mental picture, with the details +that seemed so true to life, was purely imaginary? He could not believe +it; the old house had probably been pulled down, the big trees felled, +orchard and hedges grabbed up--all the old features obliterated--and the +land thrown into some larger neighbouring farm. It was dreadful to +think that such devastating changes had been made, but it had certainly +existed as he saw it in his mind, and he would inquire of some of the +old men in the place, who would perhaps be able to tell him where his +home had stood thirty years ago. + +At once he set about interviewing all the old men he came upon in his +rounds, describing to them the farm tenanted by a man named Dyson about +forty years ago, and by and by he got hold of one who knew. He listened +for a few minutes to the oft-repeated story, then exclaimed, "Why, sir, +'tis surely Woodyates you be talking about!" + +"That's the name! That's the name," he cried. "Woodyyates-how did I ever +forget it! You knew it then--where was it?" + +"I'll just show you," said the old man, proud at having guessed rightly, +and turning started slowly hobbling along till he got to the end of the +lane. + +There was an opening there and a view of the valley with trees, blue in +the distance, at the furthest visible point. "Do you see them trees?" +he said. "That's where Harping is; 'tis two miles or, perhaps, a little +more from Thorpe. There's a church tower among them trees, but you +can't see it because 'tis hid. You go by the road till you comes to the +church, then you go on by the water, maybe a quarter of a mile, and you +comes to Woodyates. You won't see no difference in it; I've knowed it +since I were a boy, but 'tis in Harping parish, not in Thorpe." + +Now he remembered the name--Harping, near Thorpe--only Thorpe was the +more important village where the inn was and the shops. + +In less than an hour after leaving his informant he was at Woodyates, +feasting his eyes on the old house of his dreams and of his exiled +father's before him, inexpressibly glad to recognize it as the very +house he had loved so long--that he had been deceived by no false image. + +For some days he haunted the spot, then became a lodger at the +farm-house, and now after making some inquiries he had found that the +owner was willing to sell the place for something more than its market +value, and he was going up to London about it. + +At Waterloo I wished him happiness in his old home found again after +so many years, then watched him as he walked briskly away--as +commonplace-looking a man as could be seen on that busy crowded +platform, in his suit of rough grey tweeds, thick boots, and bowler +hat. Yet one whose fortune might be envied by many even among the +successful--one who had cherished a secret thought and feeling, which +had been to him like the shadow of a rock and like a cool spring in a +dry and thirsty land. + +And in that host of undistinguished Colonials and others of British +race from all regions of the earth, who annually visit these shores on +business or for pleasure or some other object, how many there must be +who come with some such memory or dream or aspiration in their hearts! +A greater number probably than we imagine. For most of them there is +doubtless disappointment and disillusion: it is a matter of the heart, +a sentiment about which some are not given to speak. He too, my +fellow-passenger, would no doubt have held his peace had his dream not +met with so perfect a fulfilment. As it was he had to tell his joy to +some one, though it were to a stranger. + + + + +Chapter Fifteen: Summer Days on the Otter + + +The most characteristic district of South Devon, the greenest, most +luxuriant in its vegetation, and perhaps the hottest in England, is +that bit of country between the Exe and the Axe which is watered by +the Clyst, the Otter, and the Sid. In any one of a dozen villages found +beside these pretty little rivers a man might spend a month, a year, +a lifetime, very agreeably, ceasing not to congratulate himself on the +good fortune which first led him into such a garden. Yet after a week +or two in this luxurious land I began to be dissatisfied with my +surroundings. It was June; the weather was exceptionally dry and sultry. +Vague thoughts, or "visitings" of mountains and moors and coasts would +intrude to make the confinement of deep lanes seem increasingly irksome. +Each day I wandered miles in some new direction, never knowing whither +the devious path would lead me, never inquiring of any person, nor +consulting map or guide, since to do that is to deprive oneself of the +pleasure of discovery; always with a secret wish to find some exit as +it were--some place beyond the everlasting wall of high hedges and green +trees, where there would be a wide horizon and wind blowing unobstructed +over leagues of open country to bring me back the sense of lost liberty. +I found only fresh woods and pastures new that were like the old; other +lanes leading to other farm-houses, each in its familiar pretty setting +of orchard and garden; and, finally, other ancient villages, each with +its ivy-grown grey church tower looking down on a green graveyard and +scattered cottages, mostly mud-built and thatched with straw. Finding no +outlook on any side I went back to the streams, oftenest to the Otter, +where, lying by the hour on the bank, I watched the speckled trout +below me and the dark-plumaged dipper with shining white breast standing +solitary and curtseying on a stone in the middle of the current. +Sometimes a kingfisher would flash by, and occasionally I came upon +a lonely grey heron; but no mammal bigger than a watervole appeared, +although I waited and watched for the much bigger beast that gives the +river its name. Still it was good to know that he was there, and had his +den somewhere in the steep rocky bank under the rough tangle of ivy and +bramble and roots of overhanging trees. One was shot by a farmer +during my stay, but my desire was for the living, not a dead otter. +Consequently, when the otter-hunt came with blaze of scarlet coats and +blowing of brass horns and noise of barking hounds and shouts of excited +people, it had no sooner got half a mile above Ottery St. Mary, where I +had joined the straggling procession, than, falling behind, the hunting +fury died out of me and I was relieved to hear that no quarry had been +found. The frightened moorhen stole back to her spotty eggs, the dipper +returned to his dipping and curtseying to his own image in the stream, +and I to my idle dreaming and watching. + +The watching was not wholly in vain, since there were here revealed to +me things, or aspects of things, that were new. A great deal depends on +atmosphere and the angle of vision. For instance, I have often looked +at swans at the hour of sunset, on the water and off it, or flying, and +have frequently had them between me and the level sun, yet never have +I been favoured with the sight of the rose-coloured, the red, and the +golden-yellow varieties of that majestic waterfowl, whose natural colour +is white. On the other hand, who ever saw a carrion-crow with crimson +eyes? Yet that was one of the strange things I witnessed on the Otter. + +Game is not everywhere strictly preserved in that part of Devon, and the +result is that the crow is not so abhorred and persecuted a fowl as +in many places, especially in the home counties, where the cult of the +sacred bird is almost universal. At one spot on the stream where my +rambles took me on most days a pair of crows invariably greeted my +approach with a loud harsh remonstrance, and would keep near me, flying +from tree to tree repeating their angry girdings until I left the place. +Their nest was in a large elm, and after some days I was pleased to see +that the young had been safely brought off. The old birds screamed at me +no more; then I came on one of their young in the meadow near the river. +His curious behaviour interested me so much that I stood and watched him +for half an hour or longer. It was a hot, windless day, and the bird +was by himself among the tall flowering grasses and buttercups of the +meadow--a queer gaunt unfinished hobbledehoy-looking fowl with a head +much too big for his body, a beak that resembled a huge nose, and a +very monstrous mouth. When I first noticed him he was amusing himself by +picking off the small insects from the flowers with his big beak, a most +unsuitable instrument, one would imagine, for so delicate a task. At the +same time he was hungering for more substantial fare, and every time a +rook flew by over him on its way to or from a neighbouring too populous +rookery, the young crow would open wide his immense red mouth and emit +his harsh, throaty hunger-call. The rook gone, he would drop once +more into his study of the buttercups, to pick from them whatever +unconsidered trifle in the way of provender he could find. Once a small +bird, a pied wagtail, flew near him, and he begged from it just as he +had done from the rooks: the little creature would have run the risk +of being itself swallowed had it attempted to deliver a packet of flies +into that cavernous mouth. I went nearer, moving cautiously, until I was +within about four yards of him, when, half turning, he opened his mouth +and squawked, actually asking me to feed him; then, growing suspicious, +he hopped awkwardly away in the grass. Eventually he permitted a nearer +approach, and slowly stooping I was just on the point of stroking his +back when, suddenly becoming alarmed, he swung himself into the air and +flapped laboriously off to a low hawthorn, twenty or thirty yards away, +into which he tumbled pell-mell like a bundle of old black rags. + +Then I left him and thought no more about the crows except that +their young have a good deal to learn upon first coming forth into an +unfriendly world. But there was a second nest and family close by all +the time. A day or two later I discovered it accidentally in a very +curious way. + +There was one spot where I was accustomed to linger for a few minutes, +sometimes for half an hour or so, during my daily walks. Here at the +foot of the low bank on the treeless side of the stream there was a +scanty patch of sedges, a most exposed and unsuitable place for any bird +to breed in, yet a venturesome moorhen had her nest there and was now +sitting on seven eggs. First I would take a peep at the eggs, for the +bird always quitted the nest on my approach; then I would gaze into the +dense tangle of tree, bramble, and ivy springing out of the mass 'of +black rock and red clay of the opposite bank. In the centre of this +rough tangle which overhung the stream there grew an old stunted and +crooked fir tree with its tufted top so shut out from the light by the +branches and foliage round it that it looked almost black. One evening I +sat down on the green bank opposite this tangle when the low sun behind +me shone level into the mass of rock and rough boles and branches, and +fixing my eyes on the black centre of the mass I encountered a pair of +crimson eyes staring back into mine. A level ray of light had lit up +that spot which I had always seen in deep shadow, revealing its secret. +After gazing steadily for some time I made out a crow's nest in the +dwarf pine top and the vague black forms of three young fully fledged +crows sitting or standing in it. The middle bird had the shining crimson +eyes; but in a few moments the illusory colour was gone and the eyes +were black. + +It was certainly an extraordinary thing: the ragged-looking +black-plumaged bird on its ragged nest of sticks in the deep shade, with +one ray of intense sunlight on its huge nose-like beak and blood-red +eyes, a sight to be remembered for a lifetime! It recalled Zurbaran's +picture of the "Kneeling Monk," in which the man with everything about +him is steeped in the deepest gloom except his nose, on which one ray of +strong light has fallen. The picture of the monk is gloomy and austere +in a wonderful degree: the crow in his interior with sunlit big beak and +crimson eyes looked nothing less than diabolical. + +I paid other visits to the spot at the same hour, and sat long and +watched the crows while they watched me, occasionally tossing pebbles on +to them to make them shift their positions, but the magical effect was +not produced again. + +As to the cause of that extraordinary colour in the crow's eyes, one +might say that it was merely the reflected red light of the level sun. +We are familiar with the effect when polished and wet surfaces, such as +glass, stone, and water, shine crimson in the light of a setting sun; +but there is also the fact, which is not well known, that the eye may +show its own hidden red--the crimson colour which is at the back of +the retina and which is commonly supposed to be seen only with the +ophthalmoscope. Nevertheless I find on inquiry among friends and +acquaintances that there are instances of persons in which the iris +when directly in front of the observer with the light behind him, always +looks crimson, and in several of these cases the persons exhibiting +this colour, or danger signal, as it may be called, were subject to +brain trouble. It is curious to find that the crimson colour or light +has also been observed in dogs: one friend has told me of a pet King +Charles, a lively good-tempered little dog with brown eyes like any +other dog, which yet when they looked up, into yours in a room always +shone ruby-red instead of hyaline blue, or green, as is usually the +case. From other friends I heard of many other cases: one was of a +child, an infant in arms, whose eyes sometimes appeared crimson, another +of a cat with yellow eyes which shone crimson-red in certain lights. +Of human adults, I heard of two men great in the world of science, both +dead now, in whose eyes the red light had been seen just before and +during attacks of nervous breakdown. I heard also of four other persons, +not distinguished in any way, two of them sisters, who showed the red +light in the eyes: all of them suffered, from brain trouble and two of +them ended their lives in asylums for the insane. + +Discussing these cases with my informants, we came to the conclusion +that the red light in the human eye is probably always a pathological +condition, a danger signal; but it is not perhaps safe to generalize +on these few instances, and I must add that all the medical men I +have spoken to on the subject shake their heads. One great man, an eye +specialist, went so far as to say that it is impossible, that the red +light in the eye was not seen by my informants but only imagined. The +ophthalmoscope, he said, will show you the crimson at the back of the +eye, but the colour is not and cannot be reflected on the surface of the +iris. + + + + +Chapter Sixteen: In Praise of the Cow + + +In spite of discontents I might have remained to this day by the Otter, +in the daily and hourly expectation of seeing some new and wonderful +thing in Nature in that place where a crimson-eyed carrion-crow had +been revealed to me, had not a storm of thunder and rain broken over +the country to shake me out of a growing disinclination to move. We are, +body and mind, very responsive to atmospheric changes; for every storm +in Nature there is a storm in us--a change physical and mental. We make +our own conditions, it is true, and these react and have a deadening +effect on us in the long run, but we are never wholly deadened by +them--if we be not indeed dead, if the life we live can be called life. +We are told that there are rainless zones on the earth and regions of +everlasting summer: it is hard to believe that the dwellers in such +places can ever think a new thought or do a new thing. The morning rain +did not last very long, and before it had quite ceased I took up my +knapsack and set off towards the sea, determined on this occasion to +make my escape. + +Three or four miles from Ottery St. Mary I overtook a cowman driving +nine milch cows along a deep lane and inquired my way of him. He gave me +many and minute directions, after which we got into conversation, and +I walked some distance with him. The cows he was driving were all pure +Devons, perfect beauties in their bright red coats in that greenest +place where every rain-wet leaf sparkled in the new sunlight. Naturally +we talked about the cows, and I soon found that they were his own and +the pride and joy of his life. We walked leisurely, and as the animals +went on, first one, then another would stay for a mouthful of grass, +or to pull down half a yard of green drapery from the hedge. It was so +lavishly decorated that the damage they did to it was not noticeable. +By and by we went on ahead of the cows, then, if one stayed too long or +strayed into some inviting side-lane, he would turn and utter a long, +soft call, whereupon the straggler would leave her browsing and hasten +after the others. + + +He was a big, strongly built man, a little past middle life and +grey-haired, with rough-hewn face--unprepossessing one would have +pronounced him until the intelligent, kindly expression of the eyes was +seen and the agreeable voice was heard. As our talk progressed and we +found how much in sympathy we were on the subject, I was reminded of +that Biblical expression about the shining of a man's face: "Wine that +maketh glad the heart of man"--I hope the total abstainers will pardon +me--"and oil that maketh his face to shine," we have in one passage. +This rather goes against our British ideas, since we rub no oil or +unguents on our skin, but only soap which deprives it of its natural +oil and too often imparts a dry and hard texture. Yet in that, to us, +disagreeable aspect of the skin caused by foreign fats, there is a +resemblance to the sudden brightening and glory of the countenance +in moments of blissful emotion or exaltation. No doubt the effect is +produced by the eyes, which are the mirrors of the mind, and as they are +turned full upon us they produce an illusion, seeming to make the whole +face shine. + +In our talk I told him of long rambles on the Mendips, along the valley +of the Somerset Axe, where I had lately been, and where of all places, +in this island, the cow should be most esteemed and loved by man. Yet +even there, where, standing on some elevation, cows beyond one's power +to number could be seen scattered far and wide in the green vales +beneath, it had saddened me to find them so silent. It is not natural +for them to be dumb; they have great emotions and mighty voices--the +cattle on a thousand hills. Their morning and evening lowing is more to +me than any other natural sound--the melody of birds, the springs and +dying gales of the pines, the wash of waves on the long shingled beach. +The hills and valleys of that pastoral country flowing with milk and +honey should be vocal with it, echoing and re-echoing the long call +made musical by distance. The cattle are comparatively silent in that +beautiful district, and indeed everywhere in England, because men have +made them so. They have, when deprived of their calves, no motive for +the exercise of their voices. For two or three days after their new-born +calves have been taken from them they call loudly and incessantly, +day and night, like Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be +comforted; grief and anxiety inspires that cry--they grow hoarse with +crying; it is a powerful, harsh, discordant sound, unlike the long +musical call of the cow that has a calf, and remembering it, and leaving +the pasture, goes lowing to give it suck. + +I also told him of the cows of a distant country where I had lived, that +had the maternal instinct so strong that they refused to yield their +milk when deprived of their young. They "held it back," as the saying +is, and were in a sullen rage, and in a few days their fountains dried +up, and there was no more milk until calving-time came round once more. + +He replied that cows of that temper were not unknown in South Devon. +Very proudly he pointed to one of the small herd that followed us as +an example. In most cases, he said, the calf was left from two or three +days to a week, or longer, with the mother to get strong, and then taken +away. This plan could not be always followed; some cows were so greatly +distressed at losing the young they had once suckled that precautions +had to be taken and the calf smuggled away as quietly as possible when +dropped--if possible before the mother had seen it. Then there were the +extreme cases in which the cow refused to be cheated. She knew that a +calf had been born; she had felt it within her, and had suffered pangs +in bringing it forth; if it appeared not on the grass or straw at her +side then it must have been snatched away by the human creatures that +hovered about her, like crows and ravens round a ewe in travail on some +lonely mountain side. + +That was the character of the cow he had pointed out; even when she had +not seen the calf of which she had been deprived she made so great an +outcry and was thrown into such a rage and fever, refusing to be milked +that, finally, to save her, it was thought necessary to give her back +the calf. Now, he concluded, it was not attempted to take it away: twice +a day she was allowed to have it with her and suckle it, and she was a +very happy animal. + +I was glad to think that there was at least one completely happy cow in +Devonshire. + +After leaving the cowkeeper I had that feeling of revulsion very +strongly which all who know and love cows occasionally experience at +the very thought of beef. I was for the moment more than tolerant of +vegetarianism, and devoutly hoped that for many days to come I should +not be sickened with the sight of a sirloin on some hateful board, cold, +or smoking hot, bleeding its red juices into the dish when gashed with a +knife, as if undergoing a second death. We do not eat negroes, although +their pigmented skins, flat feet, and woolly heads proclaim them a +different species; even monkey's flesh is abhorrent to us, merely +because we fancy that that creature in its ugliness resembles some +old men and some women and children that we know. But the gentle +large-brained social cow that caresses our hands and faces with +her rough blue tongue, and is more like man's sister than any other +non-human being--the majestic, beautiful creature with the juno eyes, +sweeter of breath than the rosiest virgin--we slaughter and feed on her +flesh--monsters and cannibals that we are! + +But though cannibals, it is very pleasant to find that many cowmen +love their cows. Walking one afternoon by a high unkept hedge near +Southampton Water, I heard loud shouts at intervals issuing from a +point some distance ahead, and on arriving at the spot found an old man +leaning idly over a gate, apparently concerned about nothing. "What +are you shouting about?" I demanded. "Cows," he answered, with a glance +across the wide green field dotted with a few big furze and bramble +bushes. On its far side half a dozen cows were, quietly grazing. "They +came fast enough when I was a-feeding of 'em," he presently added; "but +now they has to find for theirselves they don't care how long they keeps +me." I was going to suggest that it would be a considerable saving of +time if he went for them, but his air of lazy contentment as he leant +on the gate showed that time was of no importance to him. He was a +curious-looking old man, in old frayed clothes, broken boots, and a cap +too small for him. He had short legs, broad chest, and long arms, and +a very big head, long and horselike, with a large shapeless nose and +grizzled beard and moustache. His ears, too, were enormous, and stood +out from the head like the handles of a rudely shaped terra-cotta vase +or jar. The colour of his face, the ears included, suggested burnt clay. +But though Nature had made him ugly, he had an agreeable expression, +a sweet benign look in his large dark eyes, which attracted me, and I +stayed to talk with him. + +It has frequently been said that those who are much with cows, and have +an affection for them, appear to catch something of their expression--to +look like cows; just as persons of sympathetic or responsive nature, +and great mobility of face, grow to be like those they live and are in +sympathy with. The cowman who looks like a cow may be more bovine than +his fellows in his heavier motions and slower apprehensions, but he also +exhibits some of the better qualities--the repose and placidity of the +animal. + +He said that he was over seventy, and had spent the whole of his life +in the neighbourhood, mostly with cows, and had never been more than a +dozen miles from the spot where we were standing. At intervals while we +talked he paused to utter one of his long shouts, to which the cows paid +no attention. At length one of the beasts raised her head and had a long +look, then slowly crossed the field to us, the others following at some +distance. They were shorthorns, all but the leader, a beautiful young +Devon, of a uniform rich glossy red; but the silky hair on the distended +udder was of an intense chestnut, and all the parts that were not +clothed were red too--the teats, the skin round the eyes, the moist +embossed nose; while the hoofs were like polished red pebbles, and even +the shapely horns were tinged with that colour. Walking straight up to +the old man, she began deliberately licking one of his ears with her big +rough tongue, and in doing so knocked off his old rakish cap. Picking +it up he laughed like a child, and remarked, "She knows me, this one +does--and she loikes me." + + + + +Chapter Seventeen: An Old Road Leading Nowhere + + +So many and minute were the directions I received about the way from +the blessed cowkeeper, and so little attention did I give them, my mind +being occupied with other things, that they were quickly forgotten. +Of half a hundred things I remembered only that I had to "bear to the +left." This I did, although it seemed useless, seeing that my way was +by lanes, across fields, and through plantations. At length I came to +a road, and as it happened to be on my left hand I followed it. It was +narrow, worn deep by traffic and rains; and grew deeper, rougher, and +more untrodden as I progressed, until it was like the dry bed of a +mountain torrent, and I walked on boulder-stones between steep banks +about fourteen feet high. Their sides were clothed with ferns, grass +and rank moss; their summits were thickly wooded, and the interlacing +branches of the trees above, mingled with long rope-like shoots of +bramble and briar, formed so close a roof that I seemed to be walking in +a dimly lighted tunnel. At length, thinking that I had kept long enough +to a road which had perhaps not been used for a century, also tired +of the monotony of always bearing to the left, I scrambled out on the +right-hand side. For some time past I had been ascending a low, broad, +flat-topped hill, and on forcing my way through the undergrowth into the +open I found myself on the level plateau, an unenclosed spot overgrown +with heather and scattered furze bushes, with clumps of fir and birch +trees. Before me and on either hand at this elevation a vast extent of +country was disclosed. The surface was everywhere broken, but there +was no break in the wonderful greenness, which the recent rain had +intensified. There is too much green, to my thinking, with too much +uniformity in its soft, bright tone, in South Devon. After gazing on +such a landscape the brown, harsh, scanty vegetation of the hilltop +seemed all the more grateful. The heath was an oasis and a refuge; I +rambled about in it until my feet and legs were wet; then I sat down to +let them dry and altogether spent several agreeable hours at that spot, +pleased at the thought that no human fellow-creature would intrude upon +me. Feathered companions were, however, not wanting. The crowing of cock +pheasants from the thicket beside the old road warned me that I was on +preserved grounds. Not too strictly preserved, however, for there was my +old friend the carrion-crow out foraging for his young. He dropped down +over the trees, swept past me, and was gone. At this season, in the +early summer, he may be easily distinguished, when flying, from his +relation the rook. When on the prowl the crow glides smoothly and +rapidly through the air, often changing his direction, now flying close +to the surface, anon mounting high, but oftenest keeping nearly on a +level with the tree tops. His gliding and curving motions are somewhat +like those of the herring-gull, but the wings in gliding are carried +stiff and straight, the tips of the long flight-feathers showing a +slight upward curve. But the greatest difference is in the way the +head is carried. The rook, like the heron and stork, carries his beak +pointing lance-like straight before him. He knows his destination, and +makes for it; he follows his nose, so to speak, turning neither to +the right nor the left. The foraging crow continually turns his head, +gull-like and harrier-like, from side to side, as if to search the +ground thoroughly or to concentrate his vision on some vaguely seen +object. + +Not only the crow was there: a magpie chattered as I came from the +brake, but refused to show himself; and a little later a jay screamed at +me, as only a jay can. There are times when I am intensely in sympathy +with the feeling expressed in this ear-splitting sound, inarticulate +but human. It is at the same time warning and execration, the startled +solitary's outburst of uncontrolled rage at the abhorred sight of a +fellow-being in his woodland haunt. + +Small birds were numerous at that spot, as if for them also its wildness +and infertility had an attraction. Tits, warblers, pipits, finches, all +were busy ranging from place to place, emitting their various notes now +from the tree-tops, then from near the ground; now close at hand, then +far off; each change in the height, distance, and position of the singer +giving the sound a different character, so that the effect produced was +one of infinite variety. Only the yellow-hammer remained constant in +one spot, in one position, and the song at each repetition was the same. +Nevertheless this bird is not so monotonous a singer as he is reputed. +A lover of open places, of commons and waste lands, with a bush or dwarf +tree for tower to sit upon, he is yet one of the most common species in +the thickly timbered country of the Otter, Clyst, and Sid, in which I +had been rambling, hearing him every day and all day long. Throughout +that district, where the fields are small, and the trees big and near +together, he has the cirl-bunting's habit of perching to sing on the +tops of high hedgerow elms and oaks. + +By and by I had a better bird to listen to--a redstart. A female flew +down within fifteen yards of me; her mate followed and perched on a dry +twig, where he remained a long time for so shy and restless a creature. +He was in perfect plumage, and sitting there, motionless in the strong +sunlight, was wonderfully conspicuous, the gayest, most exotic-looking +bird of his family in England. Quitting his perch, he flew up into +a tree close by and began singing; and for half an hour thereafter I +continued intently listening to his brief strain, repeated at short +intervals--a song which I think has never been perfectly described. +"Practice makes perfect" is an axiom that does not apply to the art +of song in the bird world; since the redstart, a member of a highly +melodious family, with a good voice to start with, has never attained to +excellence in spite of much practising. The song is interesting both +on account of its exceptional inferiority and of its character. A +distinguished ornithologist has said that little birds have two ways of +making themselves attractive--by melody and by bright plumage; and that +most species excel in one or the other way; and that the acquisition of +gay colours by a species of a sober-coloured melodious family will +cause it to degenerate as a songster. He is speaking of the redstart. +Unfortunately for the rule there are too many exceptions. Thus confining +ourselves to a single family--that of the finches--in our own islands, +the most modest coloured have the least melody, while those that have +the gayest plumage are the best singers--the goldfinch, chaffinch, +siskin, and linnet. Nevertheless it is impossible to listen for any +length of time to the redstart, and to many redstarts, without feeling, +almost with irritation, that its strain is only the prelude of a song--a +promise never performed; that once upon a time in the remote past it +was a sweet, copious, and varied singer, and that only a fragment of its +melody now remains. The opening rapidly warbled notes are so charming +that the attention is instantly attracted by them. They are composed of +two sounds, both beautiful--the bright pure gushing robin-like note, and +the more tender expressive swallow-like note. And that is all; the song +scarcely begins before it ends, or collapses; for in most cases the pure +sweet opening strain is followed by a curious little farrago of gurgling +and squeaking sounds, and little fragments of varied notes, often so low +as to be audible only at a few yards' distance. It is curious that these +slight fragments of notes at the end vary in different individuals, in +strength and character and in number, from a single faintest squeal to +half a dozen or a dozen distinct sounds. In all cases they are emitted +with apparent effort, as if the bird strained its pipe in the vain +attempt to continue the song. + +The statement that the redstart is a mimic is to be met with in many +books about birds. I rather think that in jerking out these various +little broken notes which end its strain, whether he only squeaks or +succeeds in producing a pure sound, he is striving to recover his own +lost song rather than to imitate the songs of other birds. + +So much entertainment did I find at that spot, so grateful did it seem +in its openness after long confinement in the lower thickly wooded +country, that I practically spent the day there. At all events the best +time for walking was gone when I quitted it, and then I could think of +no better plan than to climb down into the old long untrodden road, or +channel, again just to see where it would lead me. After all, I said, +my time is my own, and to abandon the old way I have walked in so long +without discovering the end would be a mistake. So I went on in it once +more, and in about twenty minutes it came to an end before a group of +old farm buildings in a hollow in the woods. The space occupied by the +buildings was quite walled round and shut in by a dense growth of trees +and bushes; and there was no soul there and no domestic animal. The +place had apparently been vacant many years, and the buildings were in a +ruinous condition, with the roofs falling in. + +Now when I look back on that walk I blame myself for having gone on my +way without trying to find out something of the history of that forsaken +home to which the lonely old road had led me. Those ruinous buildings +once inhabited, so wrapped round and hidden away by trees, have now a +strange look in memory as if they had a story to tell, as if something +intelligent had looked from the vacant windows as I stood staring at +them and had said, We have waited these many years for you to come and +listen to our story and you are come at last. + +Something perhaps stirred in me in response to that greeting and +message, but I failed to understand it, and after standing there awhile, +oppressed by a sense of loneliness, I turned aside, and creeping and +pushing through a mass and tangle of vegetation went on my way towards +the coast. + +Possibly that idea or fancy of a story to tell, a human tragedy, came to +me only because of another singular experience I had that day when the +afternoon sun had grown oppressively hot--another mystery of a desolate +but not in this case uninhabited house. The two places somehow became +associated together in my mind. + +The place was a little farm-house standing some distance from the road, +in a lonely spot out of sight of any other habitation, and I thought I +would call and ask for a glass of milk, thinking that if things had +a promising look on my arrival my modest glass of milk would perhaps +expand to a sumptuous five-o'clock tea and my short rest to a long and +pleasant one. + +The house I found on coming nearer was small and mean-looking and very +old; the farm buildings in a dilapidated condition, the thatch rotten +and riddled with holes in which many starlings and sparrows had their +nests. Gates and fences were broken down, and the ground was everywhere +overgrown with weeds and encumbered with old broken and rusty +implements, and littered with rubbish. No person could I see about the +place, but knew it was inhabited as there were some fowls walking about, +and some calves shut in a pen in one of the numerous buildings were +dolefully calling--calling to be fed. Seeing a door half open at one end +of the house I went to it and rapped on the warped paintless wood with +my stick, and after about a minute a young woman came from an inner room +and asked me what I wanted. She was not disturbed or surprised at my +sudden appearance there: her face was impassive, and her eyes when they +met mine appeared to look not at me but at something distant, and her +words were spoken mechanically. + +I said that I was hot and thirsty and tired and would be glad of a glass +of milk. + +Without a word she turned and left me standing there, and presently +returned with a tumbler of milk which she placed on a deal table +standing near me. To my remarks she replied in monosyllables, and stood +impassively, her hands at her side, her eyes cast down, waiting for me +to drink the milk and go. And when I had finished it and set the glass +down and thanked her, she turned in silence and went back to that inner +room from which she first came. And hot and tired as I had felt a few +moments before, and desirous of an interval of rest in the cool shade, +I was glad to be out in the burning sun once more, for the sight of that +young woman had chilled my blood and made the heat out-of-doors seem +grateful to me. + +The sight of such a face in the midst of such surroundings had produced +a shock of surprise, for it was noble in shape, the features all fine +and the mouth most delicately chiselled, the eyes dark and beautiful, +and the hair of a raven blackness. But it was a colourless face, and +even the lips were pale. Strongest of all was the expression, which had +frozen there, and was like the look of one on whom some unimaginable +disaster or some hateful disillusionment had come, not to subdue nor +soften, but to change all its sweet to sour, and its natural warmth to +icy cold. + + + + +Chapter Eighteen: Branscombe + + +Health and pleasure resorts and all parasitic towns in fact, inland or +on the sea, have no attractions for me and I was more than satisfied +with a day or two of Sidmouth. Then one evening I heard for the first +time of a place called Branscomb--a village near the sea, over by Beer +and Seaton, near the mouth of the Axe, and the account my old host gave +me seemed so attractive that on the following day I set out to find +it. Further information about the unknown village came to me in a +very agreeable way in the course of my tramp. A hotter walk I never +walked--no, not even when travelling across a flat sunburnt treeless +plain, nearer than Devon by many degrees to the equator. One wonders why +that part of Devon which lies between the Exe and the Axe seems actually +hotter than other regions which undoubtedly have a higher temperature. +After some hours of walking with not a little of uphill and downhill, +I began to find the heat well-nigh intolerable. I was on a hard dusty +glaring road, shut in by dusty hedges on either side. Not a breath of +air was stirring; not a bird sang; on the vast sky not a cloud appeared. +If the vertical sun had poured down water instead of light and heat on +me my clothing could not have clung to me more uncomfortably. Coming at +length to a group of two or three small cottages at the roadside, I went +into one and asked for something to quench my thirst--cider or milk. +There was only water to be had, but it was good to drink, and the woman +of the cottage was so pretty and pleasant that I was glad to rest an +hour and talk with her in her cool kitchen. There are English counties +where it would perhaps be said of such a woman that she was one in a +thousand; but the Devonians are a comely race. In that blessed county +the prettiest peasants are not all diligently gathered with the dew +on them and sent away to supply the London flower-market. Among +the best-looking women of the peasant class there are two distinct +types--the rich in colour and the colourless. A majority are perhaps +intermediate, but the two extreme types may be found in any village or +hamlet; and when seen side by side--the lily and the rose, not to say +the peony--they offer a strange and beautiful contrast. + +This woman, in spite of the burning climate, was white as any pale town +lady; and although she was the mother of several children, the face was +extremely youthful in appearance; it seemed indeed almost girlish in its +delicacy and innocent expression when she looked up at me with her blue +eyes shaded by her white sun-bonnet. The children were five or six in +number, ranging from a boy of ten to a baby in her arms--all clean and +healthy looking, with bright, fun-loving faces. + +I mentioned that I was on my way to Branscombe, and inquired the +distance. + +"Branscomb--are you going there? Oh, I wonder what you will think of +Branscombe!" she exclaimed, her white cheeks flushing, her innocent eyes +sparkling with excitement. + +What was Branscombe to her, I returned with indifference; and what did +it matter what any stranger thought of it? + +"But it is my home!" she answered, looking hurt at my careless words. "I +was born there, and married there, and have always lived at Branscombe +with my people until my husband got work in this place; then we had to +leave home and come and live in this cottage." + +And as I began to show interest she went on to tell me that Branscombe +was, oh, such a dear, queer, funny old place! That she had been to other +villages and towns--Axmouth, and Seaton, and Beer, and to Salcombe Regis +and Sidmouth, and once to Exeter; but never, never had she seen a place +like Branscombe--not one that she liked half so well. How strange that I +had never been there--had never even heard of it! People that went +there sometimes laughed at it at first, because it was such a funny, +tumbledown old place; but they always said afterwards that there was no +sweeter spot on the earth. + +Her enthusiasm was very delightful; and, when baby cried, in the +excitement of talk she opened her breast and fed it before me. A pretty +sight! But for the pure white, blue-veined skin she might have been +taken for a woman of Spain--the most natural, perhaps the most lovable, +of the daughters of earth. But all at once she remembered that I was a +stranger, and with a blush turned aside and covered her fair skin. Her +shame, too, like her first simple unconscious action, was natural; for +we live in a cooler climate, and are accustomed to more clothing than +the Spanish; and our closer covering "has entered the soul," as the +late Professor Kitchen Parker would have said; and that which was only +becoming modesty in the English woman would in the Spanish seem rank +prudishness. + +In the afternoon I came to a slender stream, clear and swift, running +between the hills that rose, round and large and high, on either hand, +like vast downs, some grassy, others wooded. This was the Branscombe, +and, following it, I came to the village; then, for a short mile my way +ran by a winding path with the babbling stream below me on one side, +and on the other the widely separated groups and little rows of thatched +cottages. + +Finally, I came to the last and largest group of all, the end of the +village nearest to the sea, within ten minutes' walk of the shingly +beach. Here I was glad to rest. Above, on the giant downs, were stony +waste places, and heather and gorse, where the rabbits live, and had for +neighbours the adder, linnet, and wheatear, and the small grey titlark +that soared up and dropped back to earth all day to his tinkling little +tune. On the summit of the cliff I had everything I wanted and had come +to seek--the wildness and freedom of untilled earth; an unobstructed +prospect, hills beyond hills of malachite, stretching away along the +coast into infinitude, long leagues of red sea-wall and the wide expanse +and everlasting freshness of ocean. And the village itself, the little +old straggling place that had so grand a setting, I quickly found +that the woman in the cottage had not succeeded in giving me a false +impression of her dear home. It was just such a quaint unimproved, +old-world, restful place as she had painted. It was surprising to find +that there were many visitors, and one wondered where they could all +stow themselves. The explanation was that those who visited Branscombe +knew it, and preferred its hovels to the palaces of the fashionable +seaside town. No cottage was too mean to have its guest. I saw a lady +push open the cracked and warped door of an old barn and go in, pulling +the door to after her--it was her bed-sitting-room. I watched a party +of pretty merry girls marching, single file, down a narrow path past a +pig-sty, then climb up a ladder to the window of a loft at the back of a +stone cottage and disappear within. It was their bedroom. The relations +between the villagers and their visitors were more intimate and kind +than is usual. They lived more together, and were more free and easy in +company. The men were mostly farm labourers, and after their day's work +they would sit out-of-doors on the ground to smoke their pipes; and +where the narrow crooked little street was narrowest--at my end of the +village--when two men would sit opposite each other, each at his own +door, with legs stretched out before them, their boots would very nearly +touch in the middle of the road. When walking one had to step over +their legs; or, if socially inclined, one could stand by and join in the +conversation. When daylight faded the village was very dark--no lamp +for the visitors--and very silent, only the low murmur of the sea on the +shingle was audible, and the gurgling sound of a swift streamlet flowing +from the hill above and hurrying through the village to mingle with the +Branscombe lower down in the meadows. Such a profound darkness and quiet +one expects in an inland agricultural village; here, where there +were visitors from many distant towns, it was novel and infinitely +refreshing. + +No sooner was it dark than all were in bed and asleep; not one square +path of yellow light was visible. To enjoy the sensation I went out and +sat down, and listened alone to the liquid rippling, warbling sound of +the swift-flowing streamlet--that sweet low music of running water to +which the reed-warbler had listened thousands of years ago, striving to +imitate it, until his running rippling song was perfect. + +A fresh surprise and pleasure awaited me when I explored the coast east +of the village; it was bold and precipitous in places, and from the +summit of the cliff a very fine view of the coast-line on either hand +could be obtained. Best of all, the face of the cliff itself was the +breeding-place of some hundreds of herring-gulls. The eggs at the period +of my visit were not yet hatched, but highly incubated, and at that +stage both parents are almost constantly at home, as if in a state of +anxious suspense. I had seen a good many colonies of this gull before at +various breeding stations on the coast--south, west, and east--but never +in conditions so singularly favourable as at this spot. From the vale +where the Branscombe pours its clear waters through rough masses of +shingle into the sea the ground to the east rises steeply to a height of +nearly five hundred feet; the cliff is thus not nearly so high as many +another, but it has features of peculiar interest. Here, in some former +time, there has been a landslip, a large portion of the cliff at its +highest part falling below and forming a sloping mass a chalky soil +mingled with huge fragments of rock, which lies like a buttress against +the vertical precipice and seems to lend it support. The fall must have +occurred a very long time back, as the vegetation that overspreads the +rude slope--hawthorn, furze, and ivy--has an ancient look. Here are huge +masses of rock standing isolated, that resemble in their forms ruined +castles, towers, and churches, some of them completely overgrown with +ivy. On this rough slope, under the shelter of the cliff, with the sea +at its feet, the villagers have formed their cultivated patches. The +patches, wildly irregular in form, some on such steeply sloping ground +as to suggest the idea that they must have been cultivated on all +fours, are divided from each other by ridges and by masses of rock, deep +fissures in the earth, strips of bramble and thorn and furze bushes. +Altogether the effect was very singular the huge rough mass of jumbled +rock and soil, the ruin wrought by Nature in one of her Cromwellian +moods, and, scattered irregularly about its surface, the plots or +patches of cultivated smoothness--potato rows, green parallel +lines ruled on a grey ground, and big, blue-green, equidistant +cabbage-globes--each plot with its fringe of spike-like onion leaves, +crinkled parsley, and other garden herbs. Here the villagers came by a +narrow, steep, and difficult path they had made, to dig in their plots; +while, overhead, the gulls, careless of their presence, pass and repass +wholly occupied with their own affairs. + +I spent hours of rare happiness at this spot in watching the birds. +I could not have seen and heard them to such advantage if their +breeding-place had been shared with other species. Here the +herring-gulls had the rock to themselves, and looked their best in their +foam-white and pearl-grey plumage and yellow legs and beaks. While I +watched them they watched me; not gathered in groups, but singly or in +pairs, scattered up and down all over the face of the precipice above +me, perched on ledges and on jutting pieces of rock. Standing motionless +thus, beautiful in form and colour, they looked like sculptured figures +of gulls, set up on the projections against the rough dark wall of +rock, just as sculptured figures of angels and saintly men and women +are placed in niches on a cathedral front. At first they appeared quite +indifferent to my presence, although in some instances near enough +for their yellow irides to be visible. While unalarmed they were very +silent, standing in that clear sunshine that gave their whiteness +something of a crystalline appearance; or flying to and fro along the +face of the cliff, purely for the delight of bathing in the warm lucent +air. Gradually a change came over them. One by one those that were on +the wing dropped on to some projection, until they had all settled down, +and, letting my eyes range up and down over the huge wall of rock, it +was plain to see that all the birds were watching me. They had made the +discovery that I was a stranger. In my rough old travel-stained clothes +and tweed hat I might have passed for a Branscombe villager, but I +did no hoeing and digging in one of the cultivated patches; and when +I deliberately sat down on a rock to watch them, they noticed it and +became suspicious; and as time went on and I still remained immovable, +with my eyes fixed on them, the suspicion and anxiety increased and +turned to fear; and those that were sitting on their nests got up and +came close to the edge of the rock, to gaze with the others and join in +the loud chorus of alarm. It was a wonderful sound. Not like the tempest +of noise that may be heard at the breeding-season at Lundy Island, and +at many other stations where birds of several species mix their various +voices--the yammeris and the yowlis, and skrykking, screeking, skrymming +scowlis, and meickle moyes and shoutes, of old Dunbar's wonderful +onomatopoetic lines. Here there was only one species, with a clear +resonant cry, and as every bird uttered that one cry, and no other, +a totally different effect was produced. The herring-gull and lesser +black-backed gull resemble each other in language as they do in general +appearance; both have very powerful and clear voices unlike the guttural +black-headed and common gull. But the herring-gull has a shriller, more +piercing voice, and resembles the black-backed species just as, in human +voices, a boy's clear treble resembles a baritone. Both birds have a +variety of notes; and both, when the nest is threatened with danger, +utter one powerful importunate cry, which is repeated incessantly until +the danger is over. And as the birds breed in communities, often very +populous, and all clamour together, the effect of so many powerful and +unisonant voices is very grand; but it differs in the two species, +owing to the quality of their voices being different; the storm of +sound produced by the black-backs is deep and solemn, while that of the +herring-gulls has a ringing sharpness almost metallic. + +It is probable that in the case I am describing the effect of sharpness +and resonance was heightened by the position of the birds, perched +motionless, scattered about on the face of the perpendicular wall of +rock, all with their beaks turned in my direction, raining their cries +upon me. It was not a monotonous storm of cries, but rose and fell; for +after two or three minutes the excitement would abate somewhat and the +cries grow fewer and fewer; then the infection would spread again, bird +after bird joining the outcry; and after a while there would be another +lull, and so on, wave following wave of sound. I could have spent hours, +and the hours would have seemed like minutes, listening to that strange +chorus of ringing chiming cries, so novel was its effect, and unlike +that of any other tempest of sound produced by birds which I had ever +heard. When by way of a parting caress and benediction (given and +received) I dipped my hands in Branscombe's clear streamlet it was with +a feeling of tender regret that was almost a pain. For who does not make +a little inward moan, an Eve's Lamentation, an unworded, "Must I leave +thee, Paradise?" on quitting any such sweet restful spot, however brief +his stay in it may have been? But when I had climbed to the summit of +the great down on the east side of the valley and looked on the wide +land and wider sea flashed with the early sunlight I rejoiced full of +glory at my freedom. For invariably when the peculiar character and +charm of a place steals over and takes possession of me I begin to fear +it, knowing from long experience that it will be a painful wrench to get +away and that get away sooner or later I must. Now I was free once more, +a wanderer with no ties, no business to transact in any town, no worries +to make me miserable like others, nothing to gain and nothing to lose. + +Pausing on the summit to consider which way I should go, inland, towards +Axminister, or along the coast by Beer, Seton, Axmouth, and so on to +Lyme Regis, I turned to have a last look and say a last good-bye to +Branscombe and could hardly help waving my hand to it. + +Why, I asked myself, am I not a poet, or verse-maker, so as to say my +farewell in numbers? My answer was, Because I am too much occupied in +seeing. There is no room and time for 'tranquillity,' since I want to go +on to see something else. As Blake has it: "Natural objects always did +and do, weaken, deaden and obliterate imagination in me." + +We know however that they didn't quite quench it in him. + + + + +Chapter Nineteen: Abbotsbury + + +Abbotsbury is an old unspoilt village, not on but near the sea, divided +from it by half a mile of meadowland where all sorts of meadow and water +plants flourish, and where there are extensive reed and osier beds, +the roosting-place in autumn and winter of innumerable starlings. I +am always delighted to come on one of these places where starlings +congregate, to watch them coming in at day's decline and listen to their +marvellous hubbub, and finally to see their aerial evolutions when they +rise and break up in great bodies and play at clouds in the sky. When +the people of the place, the squire and keepers and others who have an +interest in the reeds and osiers, fall to abusing them on account of the +damage they do, I put my fingers in my ears. But at Abbotsbury I did not +do so, but listened with keen pleasure to the curses they vented and the +story they told. This was that when the owner of Abbotsbury came down +for the October shooting and found the starlings more numerous than +ever, he put himself into a fine passion and reproached his keepers and +other servants for not having got rid of the birds as he had desired +them to do. Some of them ventured to say that it was easier said than +done, whereupon the great man swore that he would do it himself without +assistance from any one, and getting out a big duck-gun he proceeded +to load it with the smallest shot and went down to the reed bed and +concealed himself among the bushes at a suitable distance. The birds +were pouring in, and when it was growing dark and they had settled down +for the night he fired his big piece into the thick of the crowd, and by +and by when the birds after wheeling about for a minute or two settled +down again in the same place he fired again. Then he went home, and +early next morning men and boys went into the reeds and gathered +a bushel or so of dead starlings. But the birds returned in their +thousands that evening, and his heart being still hot against them he +went out a second time to slaughter them wholesale with his big gun. +Then when he had blazed into the crowd once more, and the dead and +wounded fell like rain into the water below, the revulsion came and he +was mad with himself for having done such a thing, and on his return to +the house, or palace, he angrily told his people to "let the starlings +alone" for the future--never to molest them again! + +I thought it one of the loveliest stories I had ever heard; there is no +hardness comparable to that of the sportsman, yet here was one, a very +monarch among them, who turned sick at his own barbarity and repented. + +Beyond the flowery wet meadows, favored by starlings and a +breeding-place of swans, is the famous Chesil Bank, one of the seven +wonders of Britain. And thanks to this great bank, a screen between sea +and land extending about fourteen miles eastward from Portland, this +part of the coast must remain inviolate from the speculative builder of +seaside holiday resorts or towns of lodging-houses. + +Every one has heard of the Fleet in connection with the famous swannery +of Abbotsbury, the largest in the land. I had heard so much about the +swannery that it had but little interest for me. The only thing about +it which specially attracted my attention was seeing a swan rise up and +after passing over my head as I stood on the bank fly straight out over +the sea. I watched him until he had diminished to a small white spot +above the horizon, and then still flying he faded from sight. Do these +swans that fly away over the sea, and others which appear in small +flocks or pairs at Poole Harbour and at other places on the coast, +ever return to the Fleet? Probably some do, but, I fancy some of these +explorers must settle down in waters far from home, to return no more. + +The village itself, looked upon from this same elevation, is very +attractive. Life seems quieter, more peaceful there out of sight of the +ocean's turbulence, out of hearing of its "accents disconsolate." The +cottages are seen ranged in a double line along the narrow crooked +street, like a procession of cows with a few laggards scattered behind +the main body. One is impressed by its ancient character. The cottages +are old, stone-built and thatched; older still is the church with +its grey square tower, and all about are scattered the memorials of +antiquity--the chantry on the hill, standing conspicuous alone, apart, +above the world; the vast old abbey barn, and, rough thick stone walls, +ivy-draped and crowned with beautiful valerian, and other fragments that +were once parts of a great religious house. + +Looking back at the great round hill from the village it is impossible +not to notice the intense red colour of the road that winds over its +green slope. One sometimes sees on a hillside a ploughed field of +red earth which at a distance might easily be taken for a field of +blossoming trifolium. Viewed nearer the crimson of the clover and red of +the earth are very dissimilar; distance appears to intensify the red of +the soil and to soften that of the flower until they are very nearly +of the same hue. The road at Abbotsbury was near and looked to me more +intensely red than any ordinary red earth, and the sight was strangely +pleasing. These two complementary colours, red and green, delight us +most when seen thus--a little red to a good deal of green, and the more +luminous the red and vivid the green the better they please us. We see +this in flowers--in the red geranium, for example--where there is no +brown soil below, but green of turf or herbage. I sometimes think the +red campions and ragged-robins are our most beautiful wild flowers when +the sun shines level on the meadow and they are like crimson flowers +among the tall translucent grasses. I remember the joy it was in boyhood +in early spring when the flowers were beginning to bloom, when in our +gallops over the level grass pampas we came upon a patch of scarlet +verbenas. The first sight of the intense blooms scattered all about the +turf would make us wild with delight, and throwing ourselves from our +ponies we would go down among the flowers to feast on the sight. + +Green is universal, but the red earth which looks so pleasing amid the +green is distributed very partially, and it may be the redness of +the soil and the cliffs in Devon have given that county a more vivid +personality, so to speak, than most others. Think of Kent with its white +cliffs, chalk downs, and dull-coloured clays in this connection! + +The humble subterraneous mole proves himself on occasions a good +colourist when he finds a soil of the proper hue to burrow in, and the +hillocks he throws up from numberless irregular splashes of bright +red colour on a green sward. The wild animals that strike us as most +beautiful, when seen against a green background, are those which bear +the reddest fur--fox, squirrel, and red deer. One day, in a meadow a +few miles from Abbotsbury, I came upon a herd of about fifty milch cows +scattered over a considerable space of ground, some lying down, others +standing ruminating, and still others moving about and cropping the long +flowery grasses. All were of that fine rich red colour frequently seen +in Dorset and Devon cattle, which is brighter than the reds of other red +animals in this country, wild and domestic, with the sole exception of +a rare variety of the collie dog. The Irish setter and red chouchou come +near it. So beautiful did these red cows look in the meadow that I stood +still for half an hour feasting my eyes on the sight. + +No less was the pleasure I experienced when I caught sight of that road +winding over the hill above the village. On going to it I found that it +had looked as red as rust simply because it was rust-earth made rich +and beautiful in colour with iron, its red hue variegated with veins and +streaks of deep purple or violet. I was told that there were hundreds of +acres of this earth all round the place--earth so rich in iron that many +a man's mouth had watered at the sight of it; also that every effort had +been made to induce the owner of Abbotsbury to allow this rich mine to +be worked. But, wonderful to relate, he had not been persuaded. + +A hard fragment of the red stuff, measuring a couple of inches across +and weighing about three ounces avoirdupois, rust-red in colour with +purple streaks and yellow mottlings, is now lying before me. The +mineralogist would tell me that its commercial value is naught, or +something infinitesimal; which is doubtless true enough, as tens of +thousands of tons of the same material lie close to the surface under +the green turf and golden blossoming furze at the spot where I picked up +my specimen. The lapidary would not look at it; nevertheless, it is the +only article of jewellery I possess, and I value it accordingly. And +I intend to keep this native ruby by me for as long as the lords of +Abbotsbury continue in their present mind. The time may come when I +shall be obliged to throw it away. That any millionaire should hesitate +for a moment to blast and blacken any part of the earth's surface, +howsoever green and refreshing to the heart it may be, when by so doing +he might add to his income, seems like a fable, or a tale of fairyland. +It is as if one had accidentally discovered the existence of a little +fantastic realm, a survival from a remote past, almost at one's doors; +a small independent province, untouched by progress, asking to be +conquered and its antediluvian constitution taken from it. + +From the summit of that commanding hill, over which the red path winds, +a noble view presents itself of the Chesil Bank, or of about ten miles +of it, running straight as any Roman road, to end beneath the rugged +stupendous cliffs of Portland. The ocean itself, and not conquering +Rome, raised this artificial-looking wall or rampart to stay its own +proud waves. Formed of polished stones and pebbles, about two hundred +yards in width, flat-topped, with steeply sloping sides, at this +distance it has the appearance of a narrow yellow road or causeway +between the open sea on one hand and the waters of the Fleet, a narrow +lake ten miles long, on the other. + +When the mackerel visit the coast, and come near enough to be taken in +a draw-net, every villager who owns a share (usually a tenth) in a +fishing-boat throws down his spade or whatever implement he happens to +have in his hand at the moment, and hurries away to the beach to take +his share in the fascinating task. At four o'clock one morning a youth, +who had been down to the sea to watch, came running into the village +uttering loud cries which were like excited yells--a sound to rouse the +deepest sleeper. The mackerel had come! For the rest of the day there +was a pretty kind of straggling procession of those who went and came +between the beach and the village--men in blue cotton shirts, +blue jerseys, blue jackets, and women in grey gowns and big white +sun-bonnets. During the latter part of the day the proceedings were +peculiarly interesting to me, a looker-on with no share in any one of +the boats, owing to the catches being composed chiefly of jelly-fish. +Some sympathy was felt for the toilers who strained their muscles again +and again only to be mocked in the end; still, a draught of jelly-fish +was more to my taste than one of mackerel. The great weight of a catch +of this kind when the net was full was almost too much for the ten or +twelve men engaged in drawing it up; then (to the sound of deep curses +from those of the men who were not religious) the net would be opened +and the great crystalline hemispheres, hyaline blue and delicate +salmon-pink in colour, would slide back into the water. Such rare and +exquisite colours have these great glassy flowers of ocean that to see +them was a feast; and every time a net was hauled up my prayer--which I +was careful not to repeat aloud--was, Heaven send another big draught of +jelly-fish! + +The sun, sinking over the hills towards Swyre and Bridport, turned +crimson before it touched the horizon. The sky became luminous; the +yellow Chesil Bank, stretching long leagues away, and the hills behind +it, changed their colours to violet. The rough sea near the beach +glittered like gold; the deep green water, flecked with foam, was +mingled with fire; the one boat that remained on it, tossing up and down +near the beach, was like a boat of ebony in a glittering fiery sea. A +dozen men were drawing up the last net; but when they gathered round to +see what they had taken--mackerel or jelly-fish--I cared no longer to +look with them. That sudden, wonderful glory which had fallen on the +earth and sea had smitten me as well and changed me; and I was like some +needy homeless tramp who has found a shilling piece, and, even while +he is gloating over it, all at once sees a great treasure before +him--glittering gold in heaps, and all rarest sparkling gems, more than +he can gather up. + +But it is a poor simile. No treasures in gold and gems, though heaped +waist-high all about, could produce in the greediest man, hungry for +earthly pleasures, a delight, a rapture, equal to mine. For this joy was +of another and higher order and very rare, and was a sense of lightness +and freedom from all trammels as if the body had become air, essence, +energy, or soul, and of union with all visible nature, one with sea and +land and the entire vast overarching sky. + +We read of certain saints who were subject to experiences of this kind +that they were "snatched up" into some supramundane region, and that +they stated on their return to earth that it was not lawful for them +to speak of the things they had witnessed. The humble naturalist and +nature-worshipper can only witness the world glorified--transfigured; +what he finds is the important thing. I fancy the mystics would have +been nearer the mark if they had said that their experiences during +their period of exaltation could not be reported, or that it would be +idle to report them, since their questioners lived on the ground +and would be quite incapable on account of the mind's limitations of +conceiving a state above it and outside of its own experience. + +The glory passed and with it the exaltation: the earth and sea turned +grey; the last boat was drawn up on the slope and the men departed +slowly: only one remained, a rough-looking youth, about fifteen years +old. Some important matter which he was revolving in his mind had +detained him alone on the darkening beach. He sat down, then stood up +and gazed at the rolling wave after wave to roar and hiss on the shingle +at his feet; then he moved restlessly about, crunching pebbles beneath +his thick boots; finally, making up his mind, he took off his coat, +threw it down, and rolled up his shirt-sleeves, with the resolute air +of a man about to engage in a fight with an adversary nearly as big as +himself. Stepping back a little space, he made a rush at the sea, not +to cast himself in it, but only, as it turned out, with the object +of catching some water in the hollow of his hands from the top of an +incoming wave. He only succeeded in getting his legs wet, and in hastily +retreating he fell on his back. Nothing daunted, he got up and renewed +the assault, and when he succeeded in catching water in his hands +he dashed it on and vigorously rubbed it over his dirty face. After +repeating the operation about a dozen times, receiving meanwhile several +falls and wettings, he appeared satisfied, put on his coat and marched +away homewards with a composed air. + + + + +Chapter Twenty: Salisbury Revisited + + +Since that visit to Salisbury, described in a former chapter, when I +watched and listened to the doves in those cold days in early spring, I +have been there a good many times, but never at the time when the bird +colony is most interesting to observe, just before and during the early +part of the breeding-season. At length, in the early days of June, 1908, +the wished opportunity was mine--wished yet feared, seeing that it +was possible some disaster had fallen upon that unique colony of +stock-doves. It is true they appeared to be long established and well +able to maintain their foothold on the building in spite of malicious +persecuting daws, but there was nothing to show that they had been long +there, seeing that it had been observed by no person but myself that the +cathedral doves were stock-doves and not the domestic pigeon found on +other large buildings. Great was my happiness to find them still there, +as well as the daws and all the other feathered people who make this +great building their home; even the kestrels were not wanting. There +were three there one morning, quarrelling with the daws in the old way +in the old place, halfway up the soaring spire. The doves were somewhat +diminished in number, but there were a good many pairs still, and I +found no dead young ones lying about, as they were now probably grown +too large to be ejected, but several young daws, about a dozen I think, +fell to the ground during my stay. Undoubtedly they were dragged out +of their nests and thrown down, perhaps by daws at enmity with their +parents, or it may be by the doves, who are not meek-spirited, as we +have seen, or they would not be where they are, and may on occasion +retaliate by invading their black enemies' nesting-holes. + +Swallows, martins, and swifts were numerous, the martins especially, and +it was beautiful to see them for ever wheeling about in a loose swarm +about the building. They reminded me of bees and flies, and sometimes +with a strong light on them they were like those small polished black +and silvery-white beetles (Gyrinus) which we see in companies on the +surface of pools and streams, perpetually gliding and whirling about +in a sort of complicated dance. They looked very small at a height of a +couple of hundred feet from the ground, and their smallness and numbers +and lively and eccentric motions made them very insect-like. + +The starlings and sparrows were in a small minority among the breeders, +but including these there were seven species in all, and as far as I +could make out numbered about three hundred and fifty birds--probably +the largest wild bird colony on any building in England. + +Nor could birds in all this land find a more beautiful building to nest +on, unless I except Wells Cathedral solely on account of its west front, +beloved of daws, and where their numerous black company have so fine an +appearance. Wells has its west front; Salisbury, so vast in size, is yet +a marvel of beauty in its entirety; and seeing it as I now did every +day and wanting nothing better, I wondered at my want of enthusiasm on a +previous visit. Still, to me, the bird company, the sight of their airy +gambols and their various voices, from the deep human-like dove tone +to the perpetual subdued rippling, running-water sound of the aerial +martins, must always be a principal element in the beautiful effect. +Nor do I know a building where Nature has done more in enhancing the +loveliness of man's work with her added colouring. The way too in which +the colours are distributed is an example of Nature's most perfect +artistry; on the lower, heavier buttressed parts, where the darkest hues +should be, we find the browns and rust-reds of the minute aerial alga, +mixed with the greys of lichen, these darker stainings extending upwards +to a height of fifty or sixty feet, in places higher, then giving place +to more delicate hues, the pale tender greens and greenish greys, in +places tinged with yellow, the colours always appearing brightest on +the smooth surface between the windows and sculptured parts. The effect +depends a good deal on atmosphere and weather: on a day of flying clouds +and a blue sky, with a brilliant sunshine on the vast building after a +shower, the colouring is most beautiful. It varies more than in the +case of colour in the material itself or of pigments, because it is a +"living" colour, as Crabbe rightly says in his lumbering verse: + + The living stains, which Nature's hand alone, + Profuse of life, pours out upon the stone. + +Greys, greens, yellows, and browns and rust-reds are but the colours of +a variety of lowly vegetable forms, mostly lichens and the aerial alga +called iolithus. + +Without this colouring, its "living stains," Salisbury would not have +fascinated me as it did during this last visit. It would have left me +cold though all the architects and artists had assured me that it was +the most perfectly beautiful building on earth. + +I also found an increasing charm in the interior, and made the discovery +that I could go oftener and spend more hours in this cathedral without +a sense of fatigue or depression than in any other one known to me, +because it has less of that peculiar character which we look for and +almost invariably find in our cathedrals. It has not the rich sombre +majesty, the dim religious light and heavy vault-like atmosphere of the +other great fanes. So airy and light is it that it is almost like being +out of doors. You do not experience that instantaneous change, as of a +curtain being drawn excluding the light and air of day and of being +shut in, which you have on entering other religious houses. This is due, +first, to the vast size of the interior, the immense length of the nave, +and the unobstructed view one has inside owing to the removal by the +"vandal" Wyatt of the old ponderous stone screen--an act for which I +bless while all others curse his memory; secondly, to the comparatively +small amount of stained glass there is to intercept the light. So +graceful and beautiful is the interior that it can bear the light, and +light suits it best, just as a twilight best suits Exeter and Winchester +and other cathedrals with heavy sculptured roofs. One marvels at a +building so vast in size which yet produces the effect of a palace +in fairyland, or of a cathedral not built with hands but brought into +existence by a miracle. + +I began to think it not safe to stay in that place too long lest it +should compel me to stay there always or cause me to feel dissatisfied +and homesick when away. + +But the interior of itself would never have won me, as I had not +expected to be won by any building made by man; and from the inside I +would pass out only to find a fresh charm in that part where Nature had +come more to man's aid. + +Walking on the cathedral green one morning, glancing from time to time +at the vast building and its various delicate shades of colour, I asked +myself why I kept my eyes as if on purpose away from it most of the +time, now on the trees, then on the turf, and again on some one walking +there--why, in fact, I allowed myself only an occasional glance at the +object I was there solely to look at. I knew well enough, but had never +put it into plain words for my own satisfaction. + +We are all pretty familiar from experience with the limitations of +the sense of smell and the fact that agreeable odours please us only +fitfully; the sensation comes as a pleasing shock, a surprise, and is +quickly gone. If we attempt to keep it for some time by deliberately +smelling a fragrant flower or any perfume, we begin to have a sense of +failure as if we had exhausted the sense, keen as it was a moment ago. + +There must be an interval of rest for the nerve before the sensation can +be renewed in its first freshness. Now it is the same, though in a +less degree, with the more important sense of sight. We look long and +steadily at a thing to know it, and the longer and more fixedly we look +the better, if it engages the reasoning faculties; but an aesthetic +pleasure cannot be increased or retained in that way. We must look, +merely glancing as it were, and look again, and then again, with +intervals, receiving the image in the brain even as we receive the +"nimble emanation" of a flower, and the image is all the brighter for +coming intermittently. In a large prospect we are not conscious of +this limitation because of the wideness of the field and the number and +variety of objects or points of interest in it; the vision roams hither +and thither over it and receives a continuous stream or series of +pleasing impressions; but to gaze fixedly at the most beautiful object +in nature or art does but diminish the pleasure. Practically it ceases +to be beautiful and only recovers the first effect after we have given +the mind an interval of rest. + +Strolling about the green with this thought in my mind, I began to pay +attention to the movements of a man who was manifestly there with the +same object as myself--to look at the cathedral. I had seen him there +for quite half an hour, and now began to be amused at the emphatic +manner in which he displayed his interest in the building. He walked +up and down the entire length and would then back away a distance of +a hundred yards from the walls and stare up at the spire, then slowly +approach, still gazing up, until coming to a stop when quite near the +wall he would remain with his eyes still fixed aloft, the back of his +head almost resting on his back between his shoulders. His hat somehow +kept on his head, but his attitude reminded me of a saying of the Arabs +who, to give an idea of the height of a great rock or other tall object, +say that to look up at it causes your turban to fall off. The Americans, +when they were chewers of tobacco, had a different expression; they said +that to look up at so tall a thing caused the tobacco juice to run down +your throat. + +His appearance when I approached him interested me too. His skin was +the color of old brown leather and he had a big arched nose, clear light +blue very shrewd eyes, and a big fringe or hedge of ragged white beard +under his chin; and he was dressed in a new suit of rough dark brown +tweeds, evidently home-made. When I spoke to him, saying something about +the cathedral, he joyfully responded in broadest Scotch. It was, he +said, the first English cathedral he had ever seen and he had never seen +anything made by man to equal it in beauty. He had come, he told me, +straight from his home and birthplace, a small village in the north of +Scotland, shut out from the world by great hills where the heather grew +knee-deep. He had never been in England before, and had come directly to +Salisbury on a visit to a relation. + +"Well," I said, "now you have looked at it outside come in with me and +see the interior." + +But he refused: it was enough for one day to see the outside of such a +building: he wanted no more just then. To-morrow would be soon enough +to see it inside; it would be the Sabbath and he would go and worship +there. + +"Are you an Anglican?" I asked. + +He replied that there were no Anglicans in his village. They had two +Churches--the Church of Scotland and the Free Church. + +"And what," said I, "will your minister say to your going to worship in +a cathedral? We have all denominations here in Salisbury, and you will +perhaps find a Presbyterian place to worship in." + +"Now it's strange your saying that!" he returned, with a dry little +laugh. "I've just had a letter from him the morning and he writes on +this varra subject. 'Let me advise you,' he tells me in the letter, 'to +attend the service in Salisbury Cathedral. Nae doot,' he says, 'there +are many things in it you'll disapprove of, but not everything perhaps, +and I'd like ye to go.'" + +I was a little sorry for him next day when we had an ordination service, +very long, complicated, and, I should imagine, exceedingly difficult to +follow by a wild Presbyterian from the hills. He probably disapproved of +most of it, but I greatly admired him for refusing to see anything +more of the cathedral than the outside on the first day. His method was +better than that of an American (from Indiana, he told me) I met the +following day at the hotel. He gave two hours and a half, including +attendance at the morning service, to the cathedral, inside and out, +then rushed off for an hour at Stonehenge, fourteen miles away, on a +hired bicycle. I advised him to take another day--I did not want to +frighten him by saying a week--and he replied that that would make him +miss Winchester. After cycling back from Stonehenge he would catch a +train to Winchester and get there in time to have some minutes in the +cathedral before the doors closed. He was due in London next morning. +He had already missed Durham Cathedral in the north through getting +interested in and wasting too much time over some place when he was +going there. Again, he had missed Exeter Cathedral in the south, and it +would be a little too bad to miss Winchester too! + + + + +Chapter Twenty-One: Stonehenge + + +That American from Indiana! As it was market day at Salisbury I asked +him before we parted if he had seen the market, also if they had market +days in the country towns in his State? He said he had looked in at the +market on his way back from the cathedral. No, they had nothing of the +kind in his State. Indiana was covered with a network of railroads and +electric tram lines, and all country produce, down to the last new-laid +egg, was collected and sent off and conveyed each morning to the towns, +where it was always market day. + +How sad! thought I. Poor Indiana, that once had wildness and romance +and memories of a vanished race, and has now only its pretty meaningless +name! + +"I suppose," he said, before getting on his bicycle, "there's nothing +beside the cathedral and Stonehenge to see in Wiltshire?" + +"No, nothing," I returned, "and you'll think the time wasted in seeing +Stonehenge." + +"Why?" + +"Only a few old stones to see." + +But he went, and I have no doubt did think the time wasted, but it would +be some consolation to him, on the other side, to be able to say that he +had seen it with his own eyes. + +How did these same "few old stones" strike me on a first visit? It was +one of the greatest disillusionments I ever experienced. Stonehenge +looked small--pitiably small! For it is a fact that mere size is very +much to us, in spite of all the teachings of science. We have heard of +Stonehenge in our childhood or boyhood--that great building of unknown +origin and antiquity, its circles of stones, some still standing, others +lying prostrate, like the stupendous half-shattered skeleton of a giant +or monster whose stature reached to the clouds. It stands, we read or +were told, on Salisbury Plain. To my uninformed, childish mind a plain +anywhere was like the plain on which I was born--an absolutely level +area stretching away on all sides into infinitude; and although the +effect is of a great extent of earth, we know that we actually see +very little of it, that standing on a level plain we have a very near +horizon. On this account any large object appearing on it, such as a +horse or tree or a big animal, looks very much bigger than it would on +land with a broken surface. + +Oddly enough, my impossible Stonehenge was derived from a sober +description and an accompanying plate in a sober work--a gigantic folio +in two volumes entitled "A New System of Geography", dated some time in +the eighteenth century. How this ponderous work ever came to be out on +the pampas, over six thousand miles from the land of its origin, is +a thing to wonder at. I remember that the Stonehenge plate greatly +impressed me and that I sacrilegiously cut it out of the book so as to +have it! + +Now we know, our reason tells us continually, that the mental pictures +formed in childhood are false because the child and man have different +standards, and furthermore the child mind exaggerates everything; +nevertheless, such pictures persist until the scene or object so +visualized is actually looked upon and the old image shattered. This +refers to scenes visualized with the inner eye, but the disillusion is +almost as great when we return to a home left in childhood or boyhood +and look on it once more with the man's eyes. How small it is! How +diminished the hills, and the trees that grew to such a vast height, +whose tops once seemed "so close against the sky"--what poor little +trees they now are! And the house itself, how low it is; and the rooms +that seemed so wide and lofty, where our footfalls and childish voices +sounded as in some vast hall, how little and how mean they look! + + Children, they are very little, + +the poet says, and they measure things by their size; but it seems odd +that unless we grow up amid the scenes where our first impressions +were received they should remain unaltered in the adult mind. The most +amusing instance of a false picture of something seen in childhood and +continuing through life I have met was that of an Italian peasant I knew +in South America. He liked to talk to me about the cranes, those great +and wonderful birds he had become acquainted with in childhood in his +home on the plains of Lombardy. The birds, of course, only appeared in +autumn and spring when migrating, and passed over at a vast height above +the earth. These birds, he said, were so big and had such great wings +that if they came down on the flat earth they would be incapable of +rising, hence they only alighted on the tops of high mountains, and as +there was nothing for them to eat in such places, it being naked rock +and ice, they were compelled to subsist on each other's droppings. Now +it came to pass that one year during his childhood a crane, owing +to some accident, came down to the ground near his home. The whole +population of the village turned out to see so wonderful a bird, and +were amazed at its size; it was, he said, the strangest sight he +had ever looked on. How big was it? I asked him; was it as big as an +ostrich? An ostrich, he said, was nothing to it; I might as well ask +him how it compared with a lapwing. He could give me no measurements: +it happened when he was a child; he had forgotten the exact size, but he +had seen it with his own eyes and he could see it now in his mind--the +biggest bird in the world. Very well, I said, if he could see it plainly +in his mind he could give some rough idea of the wing-spread--how +much would it measure from tip to tip? He said it was perhaps fifty +yards--perhaps a good deal more! + +A similar trick was played by my mind about Stonehenge. As a child I had +stood in imagination before it, gazing up awestruck on those stupendous +stones or climbing and crawling like a small beetle on them. And what at +last did I see with my physical eyes? Walking over the downs, miscalled +a plain, anticipating something tremendous, I finally got away from the +woods at Amesbury and spied the thing I sought before me far away on +the slope of a green down, and stood still and then sat down in pure +astonishment. Was this Stonehenge--this cluster of poor little grey +stones, looking in the distance like a small flock of sheep or goats +grazing on that immense down! How incredibly insignificant it appeared +to me, dwarfed by its surroundings--woods and groves and farmhouses, and +by the vast extent of rolling down country visible at that point. It was +only when I had recovered from the first shock, when I had got to +the very place and stood among the stones, that I began to experience +something of the feeling appropriate to the occasion. + +The feeling, however, must have been very slight, since it permitted +me to become interested in the appearance and actions of a few sparrows +inhabiting the temple. The common sparrow is parasitical on man, +consequently but rarely found at any distance from human habitations, +and it seemed a little strange to find them at home at Stonehenge on the +open plain. They were very active carrying up straws and feathers to the +crevices on the trioliths where the massive imposts rest on the upright +stones. I noticed the birds because of their bright appearance: they +were lighter coloured than any sparrows I have ever seen, and one cock +bird when flying to and fro in the sunlight looked almost white. I +formed the idea that this small colony of about a dozen birds had been +long established at that place, and that the change in their colouring +was a direct result of the unusual conditions in which they existed, +where there was no shade and shelter of trees and bushes, and they were +perpetually exposed for generations to the full light of the wide open +sky. + +On revisiting Stonehenge after an interval of some years I looked for +my sparrows and failed to find them. It was at the breeding-season, when +they would have been there had they still existed. No doubt the little +colony had been extirpated by a sparrow-hawk or by the human guardians +of "The Stones," as the temple is called by the natives. + +It remains to tell of my latest visit to "The Stones." I had resolved to +go once in my life with the current or crowd to see the sun rise on the +morning of the longest day at that place. This custom or fashion is a +declining one: ten or twelve years ago, as many as one or two thousand +persons would assemble during the night to wait the great event, but the +watchers have now diminished to a few hundreds, and on some years to +a few scores. The fashion, no doubt, had its origin when Sir Norman +Lockyer's theories, about Stonehenge as a Sun Temple placed so that +the first rays of sun on the longest day of the year should fall on the +centre of the so-called altar or sacrificial stone placed in the middle +of the circle, began to be noised about the country, and accepted by +every one as the true reading of an ancient riddle. But I gather from +natives in the district that it is an old custom for people to go and +watch for sunrise on the morning of June 21. A dozen or a score of +natives, mostly old shepherds and labourers who lived near, would go +and sit there for a few hours and after sunrise would trudge home, but +whether or not there is any tradition or belief associated with the +custom I have not ascertained. "How long has the custom existed?" I +asked a field labourer. "From the time of the old people--the Druids," +he answered, and I gave it up. + +To be near the spot I went to stay at Shrewton, a downland village +four miles from "The Stones"; or rather a group of five pretty little +villages, almost touching but distinct, like five flowers or five +berries on a single stem, each with its own old church and individual +or parish life. It is a pretty tree-shaded place, full of the crooning +sound of turtle-doves, hidden among the wide silent open downs and +watered by a clear swift stream, or winter bourne, which dries up during +the heats of late summer, and flows again after the autumn rains, "when +the springs rise" in the chalk hills. While here, I rambled on the downs +and haunted "The Stones." The road from Shrewton to Amesbury, a straight +white band lying across a green country, passes within a few yards +of Stonehenge: on the right side of this narrow line the land is all +private property, but on the left side and as far as one can see it +mostly belongs to the War Office and is dotted over with camps. I +roamed about freely enough on both sides, sometimes spending hours at +a stretch, not only on Government land but "within bounds," for the +pleasure of spying on the military from a hiding-place in some pine +grove or furze patch. I was seldom challenged, and the sentinels I came +across were very mild-mannered men; they never ordered me away; they +only said, or hinted, that the place I was in was not supposed to be +free to the public. + +I come across many persons who lament the recent great change on +Salisbury Plain. It is hateful to them; the sight of the camp and troops +marching and drilling, of men in khaki scattered about everywhere over +a hundred square leagues of plain; the smoke of firing and everlasting +booming of guns. It is a desecration; the wild ancient charm of the land +has been destroyed in their case, and it saddens and angers them. I was +pretty free from these uncomfortable feelings. + +It is said that one of the notions the Japanese have about the fox--a +semi-sacred animal with them--is that, if you chance to see one crossing +your path in the morning, all that comes before your vision on that day +will be illusion. As an illustration of this belief it is related that +a Japanese who witnessed the eruption of Krakatoa, when the heavens were +covered with blackness and kindled with intermitting flashes and the +earth shaken by the detonations, and when all others, thinking the +end of the world had come, were swooning with extreme fear, viewed it +without a tremor as a very sublime but illusory spectacle. For on that +very morning he had seen a fox cross his path. + +A somewhat similar effect is produced on our minds if we have what +may be called a sense of historical time--a consciousness of the +transitoriness of most things human--if we see institutions and works +as the branches on a pine or larch, which fail and die and fall away +successively while the tree itself lives for ever, and if we measure +their duration not by our own few swift years, but by the life +of nations and races of men. It is, I imagine, a sense capable of +cultivation, and enables us to look upon many of man's doings that would +otherwise vex and pain us, and, as some say, destroy all the pleasure +of our lives, not exactly as an illusion, as if we were Japanese and +had seen a fox in the morning, but at all events in what we call a +philosophic spirit. + +What troubled me most was the consideration of the effect of the new +conditions on the wild life of the plain--or of a very large portion +of it. I knew of this before, but it was nevertheless exceedingly +unpleasant when I came to witness it myself when I took to spying on +the military as an amusement during my idle time. Here we have tens of +thousands of very young men, boys in mind, the best fed, healthiest, +happiest crowd of boys in all the land, living in a pure bracing +atmosphere, far removed from towns, and their amusements and +temptations, all mad for pleasure and excitement of some kind to fill +their vacant hours each day and their holidays. Naturally they take to +birds'-nesting and to hunting every living thing they encounter during +their walks on the downs. Every wild thing runs and flies from them, and +is chased or stoned, the weak-winged young are captured, and the nests +picked or kicked up out of the turf. In this way the creatures are being +extirpated, and one can foresee that when hares and rabbits are no +more, and even the small birds of the plain, larks, pipits, wheatears, +stonechats, and whincats, have vanished, the hunters in khaki will take +to the chase of yet smaller creatures--crane-flies and butterflies and +dragon-flies, and even the fantastic, elusive hover-flies which the +hunters of little game will perhaps think the most entertaining fly of +all. + +But it would be idle to grieve much at this small incidental and +inevitable result of making use of the plain as a military camp and +training-ground. The old god of war is not yet dead and rotting on his +iron hills; he is on the chalk hills with us just now, walking on the +elastic turf, and one is glad to mark in his brown skin and sparkling +eyes how thoroughly alive he is. + +A little after midnight on the morning of June 21, 1908, a Shrewton +cock began to crow, and that trumpet sound, which I never hear without a +stirring of the blood, on account of old associations, informed me that +the late moon had risen or was about to rise, linking the midsummer +evening and morning twilights, and I set off to Stonehenge. It was a +fine still night, without a cloud in the pale, dusky blue sky, thinly +sprinkled with stars, and the crescent moon coming up above the horizon. +After the cock ceased crowing a tawny owl began to hoot, and the long +tremulous mellow sound followed me for some distance from the village, +and then there was perfect silence, broken occasionally by the tinkling +bells of a little company of cyclists speeding past towards "The +Stones." I was in no hurry: I only wished I had started sooner to enjoy +Salisbury Plain at its best time, when all the things which offend the +lover of nature are invisible and nonexistent. Later, when the first +light began to appear in the east before two o'clock, it was no false +dawn, but insensibly grew brighter and spread further, until touches +of colour, very delicate, palest amber, then tender yellow and rose +and purple, began to show. I felt then as we invariably feel on such +occasions, when some special motive has called us forth in time to +witness this heavenly change, as of a new creation-- + + The miracle of diuturnity + Whose instancy unbeds the lark, + +that all the days of my life on which I had not witnessed it were wasted +days! + +O that unbedding of the lark! The world that was so still before now all +at once had a sound; not a single song and not in one place, but a sound +composed of a thousand individual sounds, rising out of the dark earth +at a distance on my right hand and up into the dusky sky, spreading far +and wide even as the light was spreading on the opposite side of the +heavens--a sound as of multitudinous twanging, girding, and clashing +instruments, mingled with shrill piercing voices that were not like +the voices of earthly beings. They were not human nor angelic, but +passionless, and it was as if the whole visible world, the dim grassy +plain and the vast pale sky sprinkled with paling stars, moonlit and +dawnlit, had found a voice to express the mystery and glory of the +morning. + +It was but eight minutes past two o'clock when this "unbedding of the +lark" began, and the heavenly music lasted about fourteen minutes, then +died down to silence, to recommence about half an hour later. At first I +wondered why the sound was at a distance from the road on my right hand +and not on my left hand as well. Then I remembered what I had seen on +that side, how the "boys" at play on Sundays and in fact every day hunt +the birds and pull their nests out, and I could only conclude that the +lark has been pretty well wiped out from all that part of the plain over +which the soldiers range. + +At Stonehenge I found a good number of watchers, about a couple of +hundred, already assembled, but more were coming in continually, and +a mile or so of the road to Amesbury visible from "The Stones" had +at times the appearance of a ribbon of fire from the lamps of this +continuous stream of coming cyclists. Altogether about five to six +hundred persons gathered at "The Stones," mostly young men on bicycles +who came from all the Wiltshire towns within easy distance, from +Salisbury to Bath. I had a few good minutes at the ancient temple when +the sight of the rude upright stones looking black against the moonlit +and star-sprinkled sky produced an unexpected feeling in me: but the +mood could not last; the crowd was too big and noisy, and the noises +they made too suggestive of a Bank Holiday crowd at the Crystal Palace. + +At three o'clock a ribbon of slate-grey cloud appeared above the eastern +horizon, and broadened by degrees, and pretty soon made it evident that +the sun would be hidden at its rising at a quarter to four. The crowd, +however, was not down-hearted; it sang and shouted; and by and by, just +outside the barbed-wire enclosure a rabbit was unearthed, and about +three hundred young men with shrieks of excitement set about its +capture. It was a lively scene, a general scrimmage, in which everyone +was trying to capture an elusive football with ears and legs to it, +which went darting and spinning about hither and thither among the +multitudinous legs, until earth compassionately opened and swallowed +poor distracted bunny up. It was but little better inside the enclosure, +where the big fallen stones behind the altar-stone, in the middle, on +which the first rays of sun would fall, were taken possession of by a +crowd of young men who sat and stood packed together like guillemots on +a rock. These too, cheated by that rising cloud of the spectacle they +had come so far to see, wanted to have a little fun, and began to be +very obstreperous. By and by they found out an amusement very much to +their taste. + +Motor-cars were now arriving every minute, bringing important-looking +persons who had timed their journeys so as to come upon the scene a +little before 3:45, when the sun would show on the horizon; and whenever +one of these big gentlemen appeared within the circle of stones, +especially if he was big physically and grotesque-looking in his +motorist get-up, he was greeted with a tremendous shout. In most cases +he would start back and stand still, astonished at such an outburst, and +then, concluding that the only way to save his dignity was to face the +music, he would step hurriedly across the green space to hide himself +behind the crowd. + +The most amusing case was that of a very tall person adorned with an +exceedingly long, bright red beard, who had on a Glengarry cap and +a great shawl over his overcoat. The instant this unfortunate person +stepped into the arena a general wild cry of "Scotland for ever!" was +raised, followed by such cheers and yells that the poor man actually +staggered back as if he had received a blow, then seeing there was no +other way out of it, he too rushed across the open space to lose himself +among the others. + +All this proved very entertaining, and I was glad to laugh with the +crowd, thinking that after all we were taking a very mild revenge on our +hated enemies, the tyrants of the roads. + +The fun over, I went soberly back to my village, and finding it +impossible to get to sleep I went to Sunday-morning service at Shrewton +Church. It was strangely restful there after that noisy morning crowd +at Stonehenge. The church is white stone with Norman pillars and old oak +beams laid over the roof painted or distempered blue--a quiet, peaceful +blue. There was also a good deal of pleasing blue colour in the glass +of the east window. The service was, as I almost invariably find it in +a village church, beautiful and impressive. Listening to the music +of prayer and praise, with some natural outdoor sound to fill up the +pauses--the distant crow of a cock or the song of some bird close by--a +corn-bunting or wren or hedge-sparrow--and the bright sunlight filling +the interior, I felt as much refreshed as if kind nature's sweet +restorer, balmy sleep, had visited me that morning. The sermon was +nothing to me; I scarcely heard it, but understood that it was about +the Incarnation and the perfection of the plan of salvation and the +unreasonableness of the Higher Criticism and of all who doubt because +they do not understand. I remembered vaguely that on three successive +Sundays in three village churches in the wilds of Wiltshire I had heard +sermons preached on and against the Higher Criticism. I thought it would +have been better in this case if the priest had chosen to preach on +Stonehenge and had said that he devoutly wished we were sun-worshippers, +like the Persians, as well as Christians; also that we were Buddhists, +and worshippers of our dead ancestors like the Chinese, and that we were +pagans and idolaters who bow down to sticks and stones, if all these +added cults would serve to make us more reverent. And I wish he could +have said that it was as irreligious to go to Stonehenge, that ancient +temple which man raised to the unknown god thousands of years ago, to +indulge in noise and horseplay at the hour of sunrise, as it would be to +go to Salisbury Cathedral for such a purpose. + + + + +Chapter Twenty-Two: The Village and "The Stones" + + +My experiences at "The Stones" had left me with the idea that but for +the distracting company the hours I spent there would have been very +sweet and precious in spite of the cloud in the east. Why then, I asked, +not go back on another morning, when I would have the whole place to +myself? If a cloud did not matter much it would matter still less that +it was not the day of the year when the red disc flames on the watcher's +sight directly over that outstanding stone and casts first a shadow then +a ray of light on the altar. In the end I did not say good-bye to the +village on that day, but settled down to listen to the tales of my +landlady, or rather to another instalment of her life-story and to +further chapters in the domestic history of those five small villages in +one. I had already been listening to her every evening, and at odd times +during the day, for over a week, at first with interest, then a little +impatiently. I was impatient at being kept in, so to speak. Out-of-doors +the world was full of light and heat, full of sounds of wild birds +and fragrance of flowers and new-mown hay; there were also delightful +children and some that were anything but delightful--dirty, ragged +little urchins of the slums. For even these small rustic villages +have their slums; and it was now the time when the young birds were +fluttering out of their nests--their hunger cries could be heard +everywhere; and the ragged little barbarians were wild with excitement, +chasing and stoning the flutterers to slay them; or when they succeeded +in capturing one without first having broken its wings or legs it was to +put it in a dirty cage in a squalid cottage to see it perish miserably +in a day or two. Perhaps I succeeded in saving two or three threatened +lives in the lanes and secret green places by the stream; perhaps +I didn't; but in any case it was some satisfaction to have made the +attempt. + +Now all this made me a somewhat impatient listener to the village +tales--the old unhappy things, for they were mostly old and always +unhappy; yet in the end I had to listen. It was her eyes that did it. +At times they had an intensity in their gaze which made them almost +uncanny, something like the luminous eyes of an animal hungrily fixed on +its prey. They held me, though not because they glittered: I could have +gone away if I had thought proper, and remained to listen only because +the meaning of that singular look in her grey-green eyes, which came +into them whenever I grew restive, had dawned on my careless mind. + +She was an old woman with snow-white hair, which contrasted rather +strangely with her hard red colour; but her skin was smooth, her face +well shaped, with fine acquiline features. No doubt it had been a very +handsome face though never beautiful, I imagine; it was too strong and +firm and resolute; too like the face of some man we see, which, though +we have but a momentary sight of it in a passing crowd, affects us like +a sudden puff of icy-cold air--the revelation of a singular and +powerful personality. Yet she was only a poor old broken-down woman in a +Wiltshire village, held fast in her chair by a hopeless infirmity. With +her legs paralysed she was like that prince in the Eastern tale on whom +an evil spell had been cast, turning the lower half of his body into +marble. But she did not, like the prince, shed incessant tears and +lament her miserable destiny with a loud voice. She was patient and +cheerful always, resigned to the will of Heaven, and--a strange thing +this to record of an old woman in a village!--she would never speak of +her ailments. But though powerless in body her mind was vigorous and +active teeming with memories of all the vicissitudes of her exceedingly +eventful, busy life, from the time when she left her village as a young +girl to fight her way in the great world to her return to end her life +in it, old and broken, her fight over, her children and grandchildren +dead or grown up and scattered about the earth. + +Chance having now put me in her way, she concluded after a few +preliminary or tentative talks that she had got hold of an ideal +listener; but she feared to lose me--she wanted me to go on listening +for ever. That was the reason of that painfully intense hungry look in +her eyes; it was because she discovered certain signs of lassitude or +impatience in me, a desire to get up and go away and refresh myself in +the sun and wind. Poor old woman, she could not spring upon and hold me +fast when I attempted to move off, or pluck me back with her claws; she +could only gaze with fiercely pleading eyes and say nothing; and so, +without being fascinated, I very often sat on listening still when I +would gladly have been out-of-doors. + +She was a good fluent talker; moreover, she studied her listener, and +finding that my interest in her own interminable story was becoming +exhausted she sought for other subjects, chiefly the strange events in +the lives of men and women who had lived in the village and who had long +been turned to dust. They were all more or less tragical in character, +and it astonished me to think that I had stayed in a dozen or twenty, +perhaps forty, villages in Wiltshire, and had heard stories equally +strange and moving in pretty well every one of them. + +If each of these small centres possessed a scribe of genius, or at any +rate one with a capacity for taking pains, who would collect and print +in proper form these remembered events, every village would in time +have its own little library of local history, the volumes labelled +respectively, "A Village Tragedy", "The Fields of Dulditch", "Life's +Little Ironies", "Children's Children", and various others whose titles +every reader will be able to supply. + +The effect of a long spell of listening to these unwritten tragedies was +sometimes strong enough to cloud my reason, for on going directly forth +into the bright sunshine and listening to the glad sounds which filled +the air, it would seem that this earth was a paradise and that +all creation rejoiced in everlasting happiness excepting man alone +who--mysterious being!--was born to trouble and disaster as the sparks +fly upwards. A pure delusion, due to our universal and ineradicable +passion for romance and tragedy. Tell a man of a hundred humdrum +lives which run their quiet contented course in this village, and the +monotonous unmoving story, or hundred stories, will go in at one ear +and out at the other. Therefore such stories are not told and not +remembered. But that which stirs our pity and terror--the frustrate +life, the glorious promise which was not fulfilled, the broken hearts +and broken fortunes, and passion, crime, remorse, retribution--all this +prints itself on the mind, and every such life is remembered for ever +and passed on from generation to generation. But it would really form +only one brief chapter in the long, long history of the village life +with its thousand chapters. + +The truth is, if we live in fairly natural healthy condition, we are +just as happy as the lower animals. Some philosopher has said that the +chief pleasure in a man's life, as in that of a cow, consists in the +processes of mastication, deglutition, and digestion, and I am very +much inclined to agree with him. The thought of death troubles us very +little--we do not believe in it. A familiar instance is that of the +consumptive, whose doctor and friends have given him up and wait but +to see the end, while he, deluded man, still sees life, an illimitable, +green, sunlit prospect, stretching away to an infinite distance before +him. + +Death is a reality only when it is very near, so close on us that we can +actually hear its swift stoaty feet rustling over the dead leaves, and +for a brief bitter space we actually know that his sharp teeth will +presently be in our throat. + +Out in the blessed sunshine I listen to a blackcap warbling very +beautifully in a thorn bush near the cottage; then to the great shout +of excited joy of the children just released from school, as they rush +pell-mell forth and scatter about the village, and it strikes me that +the bird in the thorn is not more blithe-hearted than they. An old +rook--I fancy he is old, a many-wintered crow--is loudly caw-cawing from +the elm tree top; he has been abroad all day in the fields and has seen +his young able to feed themselves; and his own crop full, and now he is +calling to the others to come and sit there to enjoy the sunshine with +him. I doubt if he is happier than the human inhabitants of the village, +the field labourers and shepherds who have been out toiling since the +early hours, and are now busy in their own gardens and allotments or +placidly smoking their pipes at their cottage doors. + +But I could not stay longer in that village of old unhappy memories +and of quiet, happy, uninteresting lives that leave no memory, so after +waiting two more days I forced myself to say good-bye to my poor old +landlady. Or rather to say "Good night," as I had to start at one +o'clock in the morning so as to have a couple, of hours before sunrise +at "The Stones" on my way to Salisbury. Her latest effort to detain me a +day longer had been made and there was no more to say. + +"Do you know," she said in a low mysterious voice, "that it is not safe +to be alone at midnight on this long lonely road--the loneliest place +in all Salisbury Plain?" "The safest," I said. "Safe as the Tower of +London--the protectors of all England are there." "Ah, there's where the +danger is!" she returned. "If you meet some desperate man, a deserter +with his rifle in his hand perhaps, do you think he would hesitate about +knocking you over to save himself and at the same time get a little +money to help him on his way?" + +I smiled at her simulated anxiety for my safety, and set forth when it +was very dark but under a fine starry sky. The silence, too, was very +profound: there was no good-bye from crowing cock or hooting owl on this +occasion, nor did any cyclist pass me on the road with a flash of light +from his lamp and a tinkle from his bell. The long straight road on the +high down was a dim grey band visible but a few yards before me, lying +across the intense blackness of the earth. By day I prefer as a rule +walking on the turf, but this road had a rare and peculiar charm at this +time. It was now the season when the bird's-foot-trefoil, one of the +commonest plants of the downland country, was in its fullest bloom, so +that in many places the green or grey-green turf as far as one could see +on every side was sprinkled and splashed with orange-yellow. Now +this creeping, spreading plant, like most plants that grow on the +close-cropped sheep-walks, whose safety lies in their power to root +themselves and live very close to the surface, yet must ever strive to +lift its flowers into the unobstructed light and air and to overtop or +get away from its crowding neighbours. On one side of the road, where +the turf had been cut by the spade in a sharp line, the plant had found +a rare opportunity to get space and light and had thrust out such a +multitude of bowering sprays, projecting them beyond the turf, as to +form a close band or rope of orange-yellow, which divided the white road +from the green turf, and at one spot extended unbroken for upwards of a +mile. The effect was so singular and pretty that I had haunted this road +for days for the pleasure of seeing that flower border made by nature. +Now all colour was extinguished: beneath and around me there was a +dimness which at a few yards' distance deepened to blackness, and above +me the pale dim blue sky sprinkled with stars; but as I walked I had the +image of that brilliant band of yellow colour in my mind. + +By and by the late moon rose, and a little later the east began to grow +lighter and the dark down to change imperceptibly to dim hoary green. +Then the exquisite colours of the dawn once more, and the larks rising +in the dim distance--a beautiful unearthly sound--and so in the end I +came to "The Stones," rejoicing, in spite of a cloud which now appeared +on the eastern horizon to prevent the coming sun from being seen, that +I had the place to myself. The rejoicing came a little too soon; a very +few minutes later other visitors on foot and on bicycles began to come +in, and we all looked at each other a little blankly. Then a motorcar +arrived, and two gentlemen stepped out and stared at us, and one +suddenly burst out laughing. + +"I see nothing to laugh at!" said his companion a little severely. + +The other in a low voice made some apology or explanation which I failed +to catch. It was, of course, not right; it was indecent to laugh on +such an occasion, for we were not of the ebullient sort who go to "The +Stones" at three o'clock in the morning "for a lark"; but it was very +natural in the circumstances, and mentally I laughed myself at the +absurdity of the situation. However, the laugher had been rebuked for +his levity, and this incident over, there was nothing further to disturb +me or any one in our solemn little gathering. + +It was a very sweet experience, and I cannot say that my early morning +outing would have been equally good at any other lonely spot on +Salisbury Plain or anywhere else with a wide starry sky above me, the +flush of dawn in the east, and the larks rising heavenward out of the +dim misty earth. Those rudely fashioned immemorial stones standing dark +and large against the pale clear moonlit sky imparted something to +the feeling. I sat among them alone and had them all to myself, as +the others, fearing to tear their clothes on the barbed wire, had +not ventured to follow me when I got through the fence. Outside the +enclosure they were some distance from me, and as they talked in subdued +tones, their voices reached me as a low murmur--a sound not out of +harmony with the silent solitary spirit of the place; and there was now +no other sound except that of a few larks singing fitfully a long way +off. + +Just what the element was in that morning's feeling which Stonehenge +contributed I cannot say. It was too vague and uncertain, too closely +interwoven with the more common feeling for nature. No doubt it was +partly due to many untraceable associations, and partly to a thought, +scarcely definite enough to be called a thought, of man's life in this +land from the time this hoary temple was raised down to the beginning +of history. A vast span, a period of ten or more, probably of twenty +centuries, during which great things occurred and great tragedies were +enacted, which seem all the darker and more tremendous to the mind +because unwritten and unknown. But with the mighty dead of these blank +ages I could not commune. Doubtless they loved and hated and rose and +fell, and there were broken hearts and broken lives; but as beings of +flesh and blood we cannot visualize them, and are in doubt even as to +their race. And of their minds, or their philosophy of life, we know +absolutely nothing. We are able, as Clifford has said in his Cosmic +Emotion, to shake hands with the ancient Greeks across the great desert +of centuries which divides our day from theirs; but there is no shaking +hands with these ancients of Britain--or Albion, seeing that we are +on the chalk. To our souls they are as strange as the builders of +Tiuhuanaco, or Mitla and Itzana, and the cyclopean ruins of Zimbabwe and +the Carolines. + +It is thought by some of our modern investigators of psychic phenomena +that apparitions result from the coming out of impressions left in the +surrounding matter, or perhaps in the ether pervading it, especially in +moments of supreme agitation or agony. The apparition is but a restored +picture, and pictures of this sort are about us in millions; but for our +peace they are rarely visible, as the ability to see them is the faculty +of but a few persons in certain moods and certain circumstances. Here, +then, if anywhere in England, we, or the persons who are endowed with +this unpleasant gift, might look for visions of the time when Stonehenge +was the spiritual capital, the Mecca of the faithful (when all were +that), the meeting-place of all the intellect, the hoary experience, the +power and majesty of the land. + +But no visions have been recorded. It is true that certain stories of +alleged visions have been circulated during the last few years. One, +very pretty and touching, is of a child from the London slums who saw +things invisible to others. This was one of the children of the very +poor, who are taken in summer and planted all about England in cottages +to have a week or a fortnight of country air and sunshine. Taken to +Stonehenge, she had a vision of a great gathering of people, and so +real did they seem that she believed in the reality of it all, and so +beautiful did they appear to her that she was reluctant to leave, and +begged to be taken back to see it all again. Unfortunately it is not +true. A full and careful inquiry has been made into the story, of +which there are several versions, and its origin traced to a little +story-telling Wiltshire boy who had read or heard of the white-robed +priests of the ancient days at "The Stones," and who just to astonish +other little boys naughtily pretended that he had seen it all himself! + + + + +Chapter Twenty-Three: Following a River + + +The stream invites us to follow: the impulse is so common that it might +be set down as an instinct; and certainly there is no more fascinating +pastime than to keep company with a river from its source to the sea. +Unfortunately this is not easy in a country where running waters have +been enclosed, which should be as free as the rain and sunshine to all, +and were once free, when England was England still, before landowners +annexed them, even as they annexed or stole the commons and shut up the +footpaths and made it an offence for a man to go aside from the road to +feel God's grass under his feet. Well, they have also got the road now, +and cover and blind and choke us with its dust and insolently hoot-hoot +at us. Out of the way, miserable crawlers, if you don't want to be +smashed! + +Sometimes the way is cut off by huge thorny hedges and fences of barbed +wire--man's devilish improvement on the bramble--brought down to the +water's edge. The river-follower must force his way through these +obstacles, in most cases greatly to the detriment of his clothes and +temper; or, should they prove impassable, he must undress and go into +the water. Worst of all is the thought that he is a trespasser. The +pheasants crow loudly lest he should forget it. Occasionally, too, in +these private places he encounters men in velveteens with guns under +their arms, and other men in tweeds and knickerbockers, with or without +guns, and they all stare at him with amazement in their eyes, like +disturbed cattle in a pasture; and sometimes they challenge him. But +I must say that, although I have been sharply spoken to on several +occasions, always, after a few words, I have been permitted to keep on +my way. And on that way I intend to keep until I have no more strength +to climb over fences and force my way through hedges, but like a blind +and worn-out old badger must take to my earth and die. + +I found the Exe easy to follow at first. Further on exceedingly +difficult in places; but I was determined to keep near it, to have it +behind me and before me and at my side, following, leading, a beautiful +silvery serpent that was my friend and companion. For I was following +not the Exe only, but a dream as well, and a memory. Before I knew it +the Exe was a beloved stream. Many rivers had I seen in my wanderings, +but never one to compare with this visionary river, which yet existed, +and would be found and followed at last. My forefathers had dwelt for +generations beside it, listening all their lives long to its music, and +when they left it they still loved it in exile, and died at last +with its music in their ears. Nor did the connection end there; their +children and children's children doubtless had some inherited memory of +it; or how came I to have this feeling, which made it sacred, and drew +me to it? We inherit not from our ancestors only, but, through them, +something, too, from the earth and place that knew them. + +I sought for and found it where it takes its rise on open Exmoor; a +simple moorland stream, not wild and foaming and leaping over rocks, but +flowing gently between low peaty banks, where the little lambs leap +over it from side to side in play. Following the stream down, I come at +length to Exford. Here the aspect of the country begins to change; it +is not all brown desolate heath; there are green flowery meadows by +the river, and some wood. A little further down and the Exe will be a +woodland stream; but of all the rest of my long walk I shall only say +that to see the real beauty of this stream one must go to Somerset. From +Exford to Dulverton it runs, singing aloud, foam-flecked, between high +hills clothed to their summits in oak woods: after its union with +the Barle it enters Devonshire as a majestic stream, and flows calmly +through a rich green country; its wild romantic charm has been left +behind. + +The uninformed traveller, whose principle it is never to look at a +guide-book, is surprised to find that the small village of Exford +contains no fewer than half a dozen inns. He asks how they are kept +going; and the natives, astonished at his ignorance, proceed to +enlighten him. Exford is the headquarters of the stag-hunt: thither +the hunters flock in August, and spend so much money during thir brief +season that the innkeepers grow rich and fat, and for the rest of the +year can afford to doze peacefully behind their bars. Here are the +kennels, and when I visited them they contained forty or fifty couples +of stag-hounds. These are gigantic foxhounds, selected for their great +size from packs all over the country. When out exercising these big +vari-coloured dogs make a fine show. It is curious to find that, +although these individual variations are continually appearing--very +large dogs born of dogs of medium size--others cannot be bred from them; +the variety cannot be fixed. + +The village is not picturesque. Its one perennial charm is the swift +river that flows through it, making music on its wide sandy and +pebbly floor. Hither and thither flit the wagtails, finding little +half-uncovered stones in the current to perch upon. Both the pied and +grey species are there; and, seeing them together, one naturally wishes +to resettle for himself the old question as to which is the prettiest +and most graceful. Now this one looks best and now that; but the +delicately coloured grey and yellow bird has the longest tail and can +use it more prettily. Her tail is as much to her, both as ornament and +to express emotions, as a fan to any flirtatious Spanish senora. One +always thinks of these dainty feathered creatures as females. It would +seem quite natural to call the wagtail "lady-bird," if that name had +not been registered by a diminutive podgy tortoise-shaped black and red +beetle. + +So shallow is the wide stream in the village that a little girl of about +seven came down from a cottage, and to cool her feet waded out into +the middle, and there she stood for some minutes on a low flat stone, +looking down on her own wavering image broken by a hundred hurrying +wavelets and ripples. This small maidie, holding up her short, shabby +frock with her wee hands, her bright brown hair falling over her face as +she bent her head down and laughed to see her bare little legs and their +flickering reflection beneath, made a pretty picture. Like the wagtails, +she looked in harmony with her surroundings. + +So many are the villages, towns, and places of interest seen, so many +the adventures met with in this walk, starting with the baby streamlet +beyond Simonsbath, and following it down to Exeter and Exmouth, that it +would take half a volume to describe them, however briefly. Yet at the +end I found that Exford had left the most vivid and lasting impression, +and was remembered with most pleasure. It was more to me than Winsford, +that fragrant, cool, grey and green village, the home of immemorial +peace, second to no English village in beauty; with its hoary church +tower, its great trees, its old stone, thatched cottages draped in ivy +and vine, its soothing sound of running waters. Exeter itself did not +impress me so strongly, in spite of its cathedral. The village of Exford +printed itself thus sharply on my mind because I had there been filled +with wonder and delight at the sight of a face exceeding in loveliness +all the faces seen in that West Country--a rarest human gem, which had +the power of imparting to its setting something of its own wonderful +lustre. The type was a common Somerset one, but with marked differences +in some respects, else it could not have been so perfect. + +The type I speak of is a very distinct one: in a crowd in a London +street you can easily spot a Somerset man who has this mark on his +countenance, but it shows more clearly in the woman. There are more +types than one, but the variety is less than in other places; the women +are more like each other, and differ more from those that are outside +their borders than is the case in other English counties. A woman of +this prevalent type, to be met with anywhere from Bath and Bedminster +to the wilds of Exmoor, is of a good height, and has a pleasant, often a +pretty face; regular features, the nose straight, rather long, with thin +nostrils; eyes grey-blue; hair brown, neither dark nor light, in many +cases with a sandy or sunburnt tint. Black, golden, reds, chestnuts are +rarely seen. There is always colour in the skin, but not deep; as a rule +it is a light tender brown with a rosy or reddish tinge. Altogether +it is a winning face, with smiling eyes; there is more in it of that +something we can call "refinement" than is seen in women of the same +class in other counties. The expression is somewhat infantile; a young +woman, even a middle-aged woman, will frequently remind you of a little +girl of seven or eight summers. The innocent eyes and mobile mouth are +singularly childlike. This peculiarity is the more striking when we +consider the figure. This is not fully developed according to the +accepted standards the hips are too small, the chest too narrow and +flat, the arms too thin. True or false, the idea is formed of a woman +of a childlike, affectionate nature, but lacking in passion, one to be +chosen for a sister rather than a wife. Something in us--instinct or +tradition--will have it that the well-developed woman is richest in +the purely womanly qualities--the wifely and maternal feelings. The +luxuriant types that abound most in Devonshire are not common here. + +It will be understood that the women described are those that live +in cottages. Here, as elsewhere, as you go higher in the social +scale--further from the soil as it were--the type becomes less and less +distinct. Those of the "higher class," or "better class," are few, and +always in a sense foreigners. + + + + +Chapter Twenty-Four: Troston + + +I doubt if the name of this small Suffolk village, remote from towns and +railroads, will have any literary associations for the reader, unless +he be a person of exceptionally good memory, who has taken a special +interest in the minor poets of the last century; or that it would +help him if I add the names of Honington and Sapiston, two other small +villages a couple of miles from Troston, with the slow sedgy Little +Ouse, or a branch of it, flowing between them. Yet Honington was the +birthplace of Robert Bloomfield, known as "the Suffolk poet" in the +early part of the last century (although Crabbe was living then and was +great, as he is becoming again after many years); while at Sapiston, the +rustic village on the other side of the old stone bridge, he acquired +that love of nature and intimate knowledge of farm life and work which +came out later in his Farmer's Boy. Finally, Troston, the little village +in which I write, was the home of Capel Lofft, a person of importance in +his day, who discovered Bloomfield, found a publisher for his poems, and +boomed it with amazing success. + +I dare say it will only provoke a smile of amusement in readers of +literary taste when I confess that Bloomfield's memory is dear to me; +that only because of this feeling for the forgotten rustic who wrote +rhymes I am now here, strolling about in the shade of the venerable +trees in Troston Park-the selfsame trees which the somewhat fantastic +Capel knew in his day as "Homer," "Sophocles," "Virgil," "Milton," and +by other names, calling each old oak, elm, ash, and chestnut after one +of the immortals. + +I can even imagine that the literary man, if he chanced to be a personal +friend, would try to save me from myself by begging me not to put +anything of this sort into print. He would warn me that it matters +nothing that Bloomfield's verse was exceedingly popular for a time, that +twenty-five or thirty editions of his Farmer's Boy were issued within +three years of its publication in 1800 that it continued to be read for +half a century afterwards. There are other better tests. Is it alive +to-day? What do judges of literature say of it now? Nothing! They smile +and that's all. The absurdity of his popularity was felt in his own day. +Byron laughed at it; Crabbe growled and Charles Lamb said he had looked +at the Farmer's Boy and it made him sick. Well, nobody wants to look at +it now. + +Much more might be said very easily on this side; nevertheless, I think +I shall go on with my plea for the small verse-maker who has long fallen +out; and though I may be unable to make a case out, the kindly critic +may find some circumstance to extenuate my folly--to say, in the end, +that this appears to be one of the little foolishnesses which might be +forgiven. + +I must confess at starting that the regard I have for one of his poems, +the Farmer's Boy, is not wholly a matter of literary taste or +the critical faculty; it is also, to some extent, a matter of +association,--and as the story of how this comes about is rather +curious, I will venture to give it. + +In the distant days of my boyhood and early youth my chief delight +was in nature, and when I opened a book it was to find something about +nature in it, especially some expression of the feeling produced in us +by nature, which was, in my case, inseparable from seeing and hearing, +and was, to me, the most important thing in life. For who could look +on earth, water, sky, on living or growing or inanimate things, without +experiencing that mysterious uplifting gladness in him! In due time I +discovered that the thing I sought for in printed books was to be found +chiefly in poetry, that half a dozen lines charged with poetic feeling +about nature often gave me more satisfaction than a whole volume of +prose on such subjects. Unfortunately this kind of literature was not +obtainable in my early home on the then semi-wild pampas. There were a +couple of hundred volumes on the shelves--theology, history, biography, +philosophy, science, travels, essays, and some old forgotten fiction; +but no verse was there, except Shenstone, in a small, shabby, coverless +volume. This I read and re-read until I grew sick of bright Roxana +tripping o'er the green, or of gentle Delia when a tear bedews her eye +to think yon playful kid must die. To my uncultivated mind--for I had +never been at school, and lived in the open air with the birds and +beasts--this seemed intolerably artificial; for I was like a hungry +person who has nothing but kickshaws put before him, and eats because +he is hungry until he loathes a food which in its taste confounds the +appetite. Never since those distant days have I looked at a Shenstone or +even seen his name in print or heard it spoken, without a slight return +of that old sensation of nausea. If Shenstone alone had come to me, the +desire for poetry would doubtless have been outlived early in life; +but there were many passages, some very long, from the poets in various +books on the shelves, and these kept my appetite alive. There was +Brown's Philosophy, for example; and Brown loved to illustrate his point +with endless poetic quotations, the only drawback in my case being that +they were almost exclusively drawn from Akenside, who was not "rural." +But there were other books in which other poets were quoted, and of +all these the passages which invariably pleased me most were the +descriptions of rural sights and sounds. + +One day, during a visit to the city of Buenos Ayres, I discovered in a +mean street, in the southern part of the town, a second-hand bookshop, +kept by an old snuffy spectacled German in a long shabby black coat. I +remember him well because he was a very important person to me. It was +the first shop of the kind I had seen--I doubt if there was another in +the town; and to be allowed to rummage by the hour among this mass of +old books on the dusty shelves and heaped on the brick floor was a novel +and delightful experience. The books were mostly in Spanish, French, +and German, but there were some in English, and among them I came upon +Thomson's Seasons. I remember the thrill of joy I experienced when I +snatched up the small thin octavo in its smooth calf binding. It was the +first book in English I ever bought, and to this day when I see a copy +of the Seasons on a bookstall, which is often enough, I cannot keep +my fingers off it and find it hard to resist the temptation to throw +a couple of shillings away and take it home. If shillings had not been +wanted for bread and cheese I should have had a roomful of copies by +now. + +Few books have given me more pleasure, and as I still return to it from +time to time I do not suppose I shall ever outgrow the feeling, in spite +of its having been borne in on me, when I first conversed with readers +of poetry in England, that Thomson is no longer read--that he is +unreadable. + +After such a find I naturally went back many times to burrow in that +delightful rubbish heap, and was at length rewarded by the discovery of +yet another poem of rural England--the Farmer's Boy. I was prepared to +like it, for although I did not know anything about the author's early +life, the few passages I had come across in quotations in James Rennie's +and other old natural history compilations had given me a strong desire +to read the whole poem. I certainly did like it--this quiet description +in verse of a green spot in England, my spiritual country which so far +as I knew I was never destined to see; and that I continue to like it +is, as I have said, the reason of my being in this place. + +While thus freely admitting that the peculiar circumstances of the case +caused me to value this poem, and, in fact, made it very much more to +me than it could be to persons born in England with all its poetical +literature to browse on, I am at the same time convinced that this is +not the sole reason for my regard. + +I take it that the Farmer's Boy is poetry, not merely slightly poetized +prose in the form of verse, although it is undoubtedly poetry of a very +humble order. + +Mere descriptions of rural scenes do not demand the higher qualities of +the poet--imagination and passion. The lower kind of inspiration is, in +fact, often better suited to such themes and shows nature by the common +light of day, as it were, instead of revealing it as by a succession of +lightning flashes. Even among those who confine themselves to this lower +plane, Bloomfield is not great: his small flame is constantly sinking +and flickering out. But at intervals it burns up again and redeems +the work from being wholly commonplace and trivial. He is, in fact, no +better than many another small poet who has been devoured by Time since +his day, and whose work no person would now attempt to bring back. It +is probable, too, that many of these lesser singers whose fame was brief +would in their day have deeply resented being placed on a level with the +Suffolk peasant-poet. In spite of all this, and of the impossibility of +saving most of the verse which is only passably good from oblivion, I +still think the Farmer's Boy worth preserving for more reasons than one, +but chiefly because it is the only work of its kind. + +There is no lack of rural poetry--the Seasons to begin with and much +Thomsonian poetry besides, treating of nature in a general way; then we +have innumerable detached descriptions of actual scenes, such as we find +scattered throughout Cowper's Task, and numberless other works. Besides +all this there are the countless shorter poems, each conveying an +impression of some particular scene or aspect of nature; the poet of +the open air, like the landscape painter, is ever on the look out for +picturesque "bits" and atmospheric effects as a subject. In Bloomfield +we get something altogether different--a simple, consistent, and fairly +complete account of the country people's toilsome life in a remote +agricultural district in England--a small rustic village set amid green +and arable fields, woods and common lands. We have it from the inside by +one who had part in it, born and bred to the humble life he described; +and, finally, it is not given as a full day-to-day record--photographed +as we may say--with all the minute unessential details and repetitions, +but as it appeared when looked back upon from a distance, reliving it in +memory, the sights and sounds and events which had impressed the boy's +mind standing vividly out. Of this lowly poem it may be truly said that +it is "emotion recollected in tranquillity," to use the phrase invented +by Wordsworth when he attempted a definition of poetry generally and +signally failed, as Coleridge demonstrated. + +It will be said that the facts of Bloomfield's life--that he was a +farmer's boy whose daily tasks were to scare the crows, feed the pigs, +and forty things besides, and that later, when learning the shoemaker's +trade in a London garret, he put these memories together and made them +into a poem--are wholly beside the question when we come to judge the +work as literature. A peasant poet may win a great reputation in his own +day on account of the circumstances of the case, but in the end his work +must be tried by the same standards applied in other and in all cases. + +There is no getting away from this, and all that remains is to endeavour +to show that the poem, although poor as a whole, is not altogether bad, +but contains many lines that glow with beautiful poetic feeling, and +many descriptive passages which are admirable. Furthermore, I will +venture to say that despite the feebleness of a large part of the work +(as poetry) it is yet worth preserving in its entirety on account of its +unique character. It may be that I am the only person in England able +to appreciate it so fully owing to the way in which it first came to my +notice, and the critical reader can, if he thinks proper, discount what +I am now saying as mere personal feeling. But the case is this: when, in +a distant region of the world, I sought for and eagerly read anything I +could find relating to country scenes and life in England--the land of +my desire--I was never able to get an extended and congruous view of it, +with a sense of the continuity in human and animal life in its relation +to nature. It was all broken up into pieces or "bits"; it was in +detached scenes, vividly reproduced to the inner eye in many cases, +but unrelated and unharmonized, like framed pictures of rural subjects +hanging on the walls of a room. Even the Seasons failed to supply this +want, since Thomson in his great work is of no place and abides nowhere, +but ranges on eagle's wings over the entire land, and, for the matter +of that, over the whole globe. But I did get it in the Farmer's Boy. I +visualized the whole scene, the entire harmonious life; I was with him +from morn till eve always in that same green country with the same sky, +cloudy or serene, above me; in the rustic village, at the small church +with a thatched roof where the daws nested in the belfry, and the +children played and shouted among the gravestones in the churchyard; in +woods and green and ploughed fields and the deep lanes--with him and his +fellow-toilers, and the animals, domestic and wild, regarding their life +and actions from day to day through all the vicissitudes of the year. + +The poem, then, appears to fill a place in our poetic literature, or to +fill a gap; at all events from the point of view of those who, born and +living in distant parts of the earth, still dream of the Old Home. This +perhaps accounts for the fact, which I heard at Honington, that most of +the pilgrims to Bloomfield's birthplace are Americans. + +Bloomfield followed his great example in dividing his poem into the four +seasons, and he begins, Thomson-like, with an invitation to the Muse:-- + + O come, blest spirit, whatsoe'er thou art, + Thou kindling warmth that hov'rest round my heart. + +But happily he does not attempt to imitate the lofty diction of the +Seasons or Windsor Forest, the noble poem from which, I imagine, +Thomson derived his sonorous style. He had a humble mind and knew his +limitations, and though he adopted the artificial form of verse which +prevailed down to his time he was still able to be simple and natural. + +"Spring" does not contain much of the best of his work, but the opening +is graceful and is not without a touch of pathos in his apologetic +description of himself, as Giles, the farmer's boy. + + Nature's sublimer scenes ne'er charmed my eyes + Nor Science led me... + From meaner objects far my raptures flow... + Quick-springing sorrows, transient as the dew, + Delight from trifles, trifles ever new. + 'Twas thus with Giles; meek, fatherless, and poor, + Labour his portion... + His life was cheerful, constant servitude... + Strange to the world, he wore a bashful look, + The fields his study, Nature was his book. + +The farm is described, the farmer, his kind, hospitable master; the +animals, the sturdy team, the cows and the small flock of fore-score +ewes. Ploughing, sowing, and harrowing are described, and the result +left to the powers above: + + Yet oft with anxious heart he looks around, + And marks the first green blade that breaks the ground; + In fancy sees his trembling oats uprun, + His tufted barley yellow with the sun. + +While his master dreams of what will be, Giles has enough to do +protecting the buried grain from thieving rooks and crows; one of the +multifarious tasks being to collect the birds that have been shot, for +although-- + + Their danger well the wary plunderers know + And place a watch on some conspicuous bough, + Yet oft the skulking gunner by surprise + Will scatter death among them as they rise. + +'Tis useless, he tells us, to hang these slain robbers about the fields, +since in a little while they are no more regarded than the men of rags +and straw with sham rifles in their hands. It was for him to shift +the dead from place to place, to arrange them in dying attitudes with +outstretched wings. Finally, there was the fox, the stealer of dead +crows, to be guarded against; and again at eventide Giles must trudge +round to gather up his dead and suspend them from twigs out of reach of +hungry night-prowlers. Called up at daybreak each morning, he would take +his way through deep lanes overarched with oaks to "fields remote from +home" to redistribute his dead birds, then to fetch the cows, and here +we have an example of his close naturalist-like observation in his +account of the leading cow, the one who coming and going on all +occasions is allowed precedence, who maintains her station, "won by +many a broil," with just pride. A picture of the cool dairy and its +work succeeds, and a lament on the effect of the greed and luxury of +the over-populous capital which drains the whole country-side of all +produce, which makes the Suffolk dairy-wives run mad for cream, leaving +nothing but the "three-times skimmed sky-blue" to make cheese for local +consumption. What a cheese it is, that has the virtue of a post, which +turns the stoutest blade, and is at last flung in despair into the +hog-trough, where + + It rests in perfect spite, + Too big to swallow and too hard to bite! + +We then come to the sheep, "for Giles was shepherd too," and here there +is more evidence of his observant eye when he describes the character of +the animals, also in what follows about the young lambs, which forms the +best passage in this part. I remember that, when first reading it, being +then little past boyhood myself, how much I was struck by the vivid +beautiful description of a crowd of young lambs challenging each other +to a game, especially at a spot where they have a mound or hillock for a +playground which takes them with a sort of goatlike joyous madness. For +how often in those days I used to ride out to where the flock of one to +two thousand sheep were scattered on the plain, to sit on my pony and +watch the glad romps of the little lambs with keenest delight! I cannot +but think that Bloomfield's fidelity to nature in such pictures as +these does or should count for something in considering his work. He +concludes:-- + + Adown the slope, then up the hillock climb, + Where every mole-hill is a bed of thyme, + Then panting stop; yet scarcely can refrain; + A bird, a leaf, will set them off again; + Or if a gale with strength unusual blow, + Scattering the wild-briar roses into snow, + Their little limbs increasing efforts try, + Like a torn rose the fair assemblage fly. + +This image of the wind-scattered petals of the wild rose reminds +him bitterly of the destined end of these joyous young lives--his +white-fleeced little fellow-mortals. He sees the murdering butcher +coming in his cart to demand the firstlings of the flock; he cannot +suppress a cry of grief and indignation--he can only strive to shut out +the shocking image from his soul! + +"Summer" opens with some reflections on the farmer's life in a prosy +Crabbe-like manner; and here it may be noted that as a rule Bloomfield +no sooner attempts to rise to a general view than he grows flat; and in +like manner he usually fails when he attempts wide prospects and large +effects. He is at his best only when describing scenes and incidents +at the farm in which he himself is a chief actor, as in this part when, +after the sowing of the turnip seed, he is sent out to keep the small +birds from the ripening corn: + + There thousands in a flock, for ever gay, + Loud chirping sparrows welcome on the day, + And from the mazes of the leafy thorn + Drop one by one upon the bending corn. + +Giles trudging along the borders of the field scares them with his +brushing-pole, until, overcome by fatigue and heat, he takes a rest by +the brakes and lying, half in sun and half in shade, his attention is +attracted to the minute insect life that swarms about him: + + The small dust-coloured beetle climbs with pain + O'er the smooth plantain leaf, a spacious plain! + Then higher still by countless steps conveyed, + He gains the summit of a shivering blade, + And flirts his filmy wings and looks around, + Exulting in his distance from the ground. + +It is one of his little exquisite pictures. Presently his vision is +called to the springing lark: + + Just starting from the corn, he cheerly sings, + And trusts with conscious pride his downy wings; + Still louder breathes, and in the face of day + Mounts up and calls on Giles to mark his way. + Close to his eye his hat he instant bends + And forms a friendly telescope that lends + Just aid enough to dull the glaring light + And place the wandering bird before his sight, + That oft beneath a light cloud sweeps along; + Lost for a while yet pours a varied song; + The eye still follows and the cloud moves by, + Again he stretches up the clear blue sky, + His form, his motions, undistinguished quite, + Save when he wheels direct from shade to light. + +In the end he falls asleep, and waking refreshed picks up his poles and +starts again brushing round. + +Harvesting scenes succeed, with a picture of Mary, the village beauty, +taking her share in the work, and how the labourers in their unwonted +liveliness and new-found wit + + Confess the presence of a pretty face. + +She is very rustic herself in her appearance:-- + + Her hat awry, divested of her gown, + Her creaking stays of leather, stout and brown: + Invidious barrier! why art thou so high, + When the slight covering of her neck slips by, + Then half revealing to the eager sight + Her full, ripe bosom, exquisitely white? + +The leather stays have no doubt gone the way of many other dreadful +things, even in the most rustic villages in the land; not so the +barbarous practice of docking horses' tails, against which he protests +in this place when describing the summer plague of flies and the +excessive sufferings of the domestic animals, especially of the poor +horses deprived of their only defence against such an enemy. At his +own little farm there was yet another plague in the form of an +old broken-winged gander, "the pest and tryant of the yard," whose +unpleasant habit it was to go for the beasts and seize them by the +fetlocks. The swine alone did not resent the attacks but welcomed them, +receiving the assaults as caresses, and stretching themselves out and +lying down and closing their pigs' eyes, they would emit grunts of +satisfaction, while the triumphant bird, followed by the whole gabbling +flock, would trample on the heads of their prostrate foes. + +"Autumn" opens bravely: + + Again the year's decline, 'midst storms and floods, + The thund'ring chase, the yellow fading woods + Invite my song. + +It contains two of the best things in the poem, the first in the opening +part, describing the swine in the acorn season, a delightful picture +which must be given in full:-- + + No more the fields with scattered grain supply + The restless tenants of the sty; + From oak to oak they run with eager haste, + And wrangling share the first delicious taste + Of fallen acorns; yet but thinly found + Till a strong gale has shook them to the ground. + It comes; and roaring woods obedient wave: + Their home well pleased the joint adventurers leave; + The trudging sow leads forth her numerous young, + Playful, and white, and clean, the briars among, + Till briars and thorns increasing fence them round, + Where last year's mould'ring leaves bestrew the ground, + And o'er their heads, loud lashed by furious squalls, + Bright from their cups the rattling treasure falls; + Hot thirsty food; whence doubly sweet and cool + The welcome margin of some rush-grown pool, + The wild duck's lonely haunt, whose jealous eye + Guards every point; who sits prepared to fly, + On the calm bosom of her little lake, + Too closely screened for ruffian winds to shake; + And as the bold intruders press around, + At once she starts and rises with a bound; + With bristles raised the sudden noise they hear, + And ludicrously wild and winged with fear, + The herd decamp with more than swinish speed, + And snorting dash through sedge and rush and reed; + Through tangled thickets headlong on they go, + Then stop and listen for their fancied foe; + The hindmost still the growing panic spreads, + Repeated fright the first alarm succeeds, + Till Folly's wages, wounds and thorns, they reap; + Yet glorying in their fortunate escape, + Their groundless terrors by degrees soon cease, + And Night's dark reign restores their peace. + For now the gale subsides, and from each bough + The roosting pheasant's short but frequent crow + Invites to rest, and huddling side by side + The herd in closest ambush seek to hide; + Seek some warm slope with shagged moss o'erspread, + Dried leaves their copious covering and their bed. + In vain may Giles, through gathering glooms that fall, + And solemn silence, urge his piercing call; + Whole days and nights they tarry 'midst their store, + Nor quit the woods till oaks can yield no more. + +It is a delightful passage to one that knows a pig--the animal we +respect for its intelligence, holding it in this respect higher, more +human, than the horse, and at the same time laugh at on account of +certain ludicrous points about it, as for example its liability to lose +its head. Thousands of years of comfortable domestic life have failed to +rid it of this inconvenient heritage from the time when wild in woods +it ran. Yet in this particular instance the terror of the swine does +not seem wholly inexcusable, if we know a wild duck as well as a pig, +especially the duck that takes to haunting a solitary woodland pool, +who, when intruded on, springs up with such a sudden tremendous splash +and flutter of wings and outrageous screams, that man himself, if not +prepared for it, may be thrown off his balance. + +Passing over other scenes, about one hundred and fifty lines, we come to +the second notable passage, when after the sowing of the winter wheat, +poor Giles once more takes up his old occupation of rook-scaring. It is +now as in spring and summer-- + + Keen blows the blast and ceaseless rain descends; + The half-stripped hedge a sorry shelter lends, + +and he thinks it would be nice to have a hovel, no matter how small, to +take refuge in, and at once sets about its construction. + + In some sequestered nook, embanked around, + Sods for its walls and straw in burdens bound; + Dried fuel hoarded is his richest store, + And circling smoke obscures his little door; + Whence creeping forth to duty's call he yields, + And strolls the Crusoe of the lonely fields. + On whitehorn tow'ring, and the leafless rose, + A frost-nipped feast in bright vermilion glows; + Where clust'ring sloes in glossy order rise, + He crops the loaded branch, a cumbrous prize; + And on the flame the splutt'ring fruit he rests, + Placing green sods to seat the coming guests; + His guests by promise; playmates young and gay; + But ah! fresh pastures lure their steps away! + He sweeps his hearth, and homeward looks in vain, + Till feeling Disappointment's cruel pain + His fairy revels are exchanged for rage, + His banquet marred, grown dull his hermitage, + The field becomes his prison, till on high + Benighted birds to shades and coverts fly. + +"The field becomes his prison," and the thought of this trivial +restraint, which is yet felt so poignantly, brings to mind an infinitely +greater one. Look, he says-- + + From the poor bird-boy with his roasted sloes + +to the miserable state of those who are confined in dungeons, deprived +of daylight and the sight of the green earth, whose minds perpetually +travel back to happy scenes, + + Trace and retrace the beaten worn-out way, + +whose chief bitterness it is to be forgotten and see no familiar +friendly face. + +"Winter" is, I think, the best of the four parts it gives the idea that +the poem was written as it stands, from "Spring" onwards, that by the +time he got to the last part the writer had acquired a greater ease and +assurance. At all events it is less patchy and more equal. It is also +more sober in tone, as befits the subject, and opens with an account of +the domestic animals on the farm, their increased dependence on man and +the compassionate feelings they evoke in us. He is, we feel, dealing +with realities, always from the point of view of a boy of sensitive +mina and tender heart--one taken in boyhood from this life before it had +wrought any change in him. For in due time the farm boy, however fine +his spirit may be, must harden and grow patient and stolid in heat and +cold and wet, like the horse that draws the plough or cart; and as he +hardens he grows callous. In his wretched London garret if any change +came to him it was only to an increased love and pity for the beasts he +had lived among, who looked and cried to him to be fed. He describes it +well, the frost and bitter cold, the hungry cattle following the cart +to the fields, the load of turnips thrown out on the hard frozen ground; +but the turnips too are frozen hard and they cannot eat them until +Giles, following with his beetle, splits them up with vigorous blows, +and the cows gather close round him, sending out a cloud of steam from +their nostrils. + +The dim short winter day soon ends, but the sound of the flails +continues in the barns till long after dark before the weary labourers +end their task and trudge home. Giles, too, is busy at this time taking +hay to the housed cattle, many a sweet mouthful being snatched from the +load as he staggers beneath it on his way to the racks. Then follow +the well-earned hours of "warmth and rest" by the fire in the big old +kitchen which he describes:-- + + For the rude architect, unknown to fame, + (Nor symmetry nor elegance his aim), + Who spread his floors of solid oak on high, + On beams rough-hewn from age to age that lie, + Bade his wide fabric unimpaired sustain + The orchard's store, and cheese, and golden grain; + Bade from its central base, capacious laid, + The well-wrought chimney rear its lofty head + Where since hath many a savoury ham been stored, + And tempests howled and Christmas gambols roared. + +The tired ploughman, steeped in luxurious heat, by and by falls asleep +and dreams sweetly until his chilblains or the snapping fire awakes him, +and he pulls himself up and goes forth yawning to give his team their +last feed, his lantern throwing a feeble gleam on the snow as he makes +his way to the stable. Having completed his task, he pats the sides +of those he loves best by way of good-night, and leaves them to their +fragrant meal. And this kindly action on his part suggests one of the +best passages of the poem. Even old well-fed Dobbin occasionally rebels +against his slavery, and released from his chains will lift his clumsy +hoofs and kick, "disdainful of the dirty wheel." Short-sighted Dobbin! + + Thy chains were freedom, and thy toils repose, + Could the poor post-horse tell thee all his woes; + Show thee his bleeding shoulders, and unfold + The dreadful anguish he endures for gold; + Hired at each call of business, lust, or rage, + That prompts the traveller on from stage to stage. + Still on his strength depends their boasted speed; + For them his limbs grow weak, his bare ribs bleed; + And though he groaning quickens at command, + Their extra shilling in the rider's hand + Becomes his bitter scourge.... + +The description, too long to quote, which follows of the tortures +inflicted on the post-horse a century ago, is almost incredible to us, +and we flatter ourselves that such things would not be tolerated now. +But we must get over the ground somehow, and I take it that but for the +invention of other more rapid means of transit the present generation +would be as little concerned at the pains of the post-horse as they +are at the horrors enacted behind the closed doors of the physiological +laboratories, the atrocity of the steel trap, the continual murdering by +our big game hunters of all the noblest animals left on the globe, and +finally the annual massacre of millions of beautiful birds in their +breeding time to provide ornaments for the hats of our women. + +"Come forth he must," says Bloomfield, when he describes how the +flogged horse at length gains the end of the stage and, "trembling under +complicated pains," when "every nerve a separate anguish knows," he is +finally unharnessed and led to the stable door, but has scarcely tasted +food and rest before he is called for again. + + Though limping, maimed and sore; + He hears the whip; the chaise is at the door... + The collar tightens and again he feels + His half-healed wounds inflamed; again the wheels + With tiresome sameness in his ears resound + O'er blinding dust or miles of flinty ground. + +This is over and done with simply because the post-horse is no longer +wanted, and we have to remember that no form of cruelty inflicted, +whether for sport or profit or from some other motive, on the lower +animals has ever died out of itself in the land. Its end has invariably +been brought about by legislation through the devotion of men who were +the "cranks," the "faddists," the "sentimentalists," of their day, who +were jeered and laughed at by their fellows, and who only succeeded by +sheer tenacity and force of character after long fighting against public +opinion and a reluctant Parliament, in finally getting their law. + +Bloomfield's was but a small voice crying in the wilderness, and he was +indeed a small singer in the day of our greatest singers. As a poet he +was not worthy to unloose the buckles of their shoes; but he had one +thing in common with the best and greatest, the feeling of tender love +and compassion for the lower animals which was in Thomson and Cowper, +but found its highest expression in his own great contemporaries, +Coleridge, Shelley, and Wordsworth. In virtue of this feeling he was of +their illustrious brotherhood. + +In conclusion, I will quote one more passage. From the subject of horses +he passes to that of dogs and their occasional reversion to wildness, +when the mastiff or cur, the "faithful" house-dog by day, takes to +sheep-killing by night. As a rule he is exceedingly cunning, committing +his depredations at a distance frown home, and after getting his fill +of slaughter he sneaks home in the early hours to spend the day in his +kennel "licking his guilty paws." This is an anxious time for shepherds +and farmers, and poor Giles is compelled to pay late evening visits to +his small flock of heavy-sided ewes penned in their distant fold. It is +a comfort to him to have a full moon on these lonely expeditions, and +despite his tremors he is able to appreciate the beauty of the scene. + + With saunt'ring steps he climbs the distant stile, + Whilst all around him wears a placid smile; + There views the white-robed clouds in clusters driven + And all the glorious pageantry of heaven. + Low on the utmost bound'ry of the sight + The rising vapours catch the silver light; + Thence fancy measures as they parting fly + Which first will throw its shadow on the eye, + Passing the source of light; and thence away + Succeeded quick by brighter still than they. + For yet above the wafted clouds are seen + (In a remoter sky still more serene) + Others detached in ranges through the air, + Spotless as snow and countless as they're fair; + Scattered immensely wide from east to west + The beauteous semblance of a flock at rest. + +This is almost the only passage in the poem in which something of the +vastness of visible nature is conveyed. He saw the vastness only in the +sky on nights with a full moon or when he made a telescope of his hat +to watch the flight of the lark. It was not a hilly country about his +native place, and his horizon was a very limited one, usually bounded by +the hedgerow timber at the end of the level field. The things he depicts +were seen at short range, and the poetry, we see, was of a very modest +kind. It was a "humble note" which pleased me in the days of long ago +when I was young and very ignorant, and as it pleases me still it may +be supposed that mentally I have not progressed with the years. +Nevertheless, I am not incapable of appreciating the greater music; +all that is said in its praise, even to the extremest expressions of +admiration of those who are moved to a sense of wonder by it, find an +echo in me. But it is not only a delight to me to listen to the lark +singing at heaven's gate and to the vesper nightingale in the oak +copse--the singer of a golden throat and wondrous artistry; I also love +the smaller vocalists--the modest shufewing and the lesser whitethroat +and the yellowhammer with his simple chant. These are very dear to +me: their strains do not strike me as trivial; they have a lesser +distinction of their own and I would not miss them from the choir. The +literary man will smile at this and say that my paper is naught but an +idle exercise, but I fancy I shall sleep the better tonight for having +discharged this ancient debt which has been long on my conscience. + + + + +Chapter Twenty-Five: My Friend Jack + + +My friend rack is a retriever--very black, very curly, perfect in shape, +but just a retriever; and he is really not my friend, only he thinks +he is, which comes to the same thing. So convinced is he that I am +his guide, protector, and true master, that if I were to give him a +downright scolding or even a thrashing he would think it was all right +and go on just the same. His way of going on is to make a companion of +me whether I want him or not. I do not want him, but his idea is that +I want him very much. I bitterly blame myself for having made the first +advances, although nothing came of it except that he growled. I met him +in a Cornish village in a house where I stayed. There was a nice kennel +there, painted green, with a bed of clean straw and an empty plate which +had contained his dinner, but on peeping in I saw no dog. Next day it +was the same, and the next, and the day after that; then I inquired +about it--Was there a dog in that house or not? Oh, yes, certainly there +was: Jack, but a very independent sort of dog. On most days he looked +in, ate his dinner and had a nap on his straw, but he was not what you +would call a home-keeping dog. + +One day I found him in, and after we had looked for about a minute +at each other, I squatting before the kennel, he with chin on paws +pretending to be looking through me at something beyond, I addressed +a few kind words to him, which he received with the before-mentioned +growl. I pronounced him a surly brute and went away. It was growl +for growl. Nevertheless I was well pleased at having escaped the +consequences in speaking kindly to him. I am not a "doggy" person nor +even a canophilist. The purely parasitic or degenerate pet dog moves +me to compassion, but the natural vigorous outdoor dog I fear and avoid +because we are not in harmony; consequently I suffer and am a loser when +he forces his company on me. The outdoor world I live in is not the one +to which a man goes for a constitutional, with a dog to save him +from feeling lonely, or, if he has a gun, with a dog to help him kill +something. It is a world which has sound in it, distant cries and +penetrative calls, and low mysterious notes, as of insects and +corncrakes, and frogs chirping and of grasshopper warblers--sounds like +wind in the dry sedges. And there are also sweet and beautiful songs; +but it is very quiet world where creatures move about subtly, on wings, +on polished scales, on softly padded feet--rabbits, foxes, stoats, +weasels, and voles and birds and lizards and adders and slow-worms, also +beetles and dragon-flies. Many are at enmity with each other, but on +account of their quietude there is no disturbance, no outcry and rushing +into hiding. And having acquired this habit from them I am able to see +and be with them. The sitting bird, the frolicking rabbit, the basking +adder--they are as little disturbed at my presence as the butterfly +that drops down close to my feet to sun his wings on a leaf or frond and +makes me hold my breath at the sight of his divine colour, as if he had +just fluttered down from some brighter realm in the sky. Think of a dog +in this world, intoxicated with the odours of so many wild creatures, +dashing and splashing through bogs and bushes! It is ten times worse +than a bull in a china-shop. The bull can but smash a lot of objects +made of baked clay; the dog introduces a mad panic in a world of living +intelligent beings, a fairy realm of exquisite beauty. They scuttle away +and vanish into hiding as if a deadly wind had blown over the earth and +swept them out of existence. Only the birds remain--they can fly and +do not fear for their own lives, but are in a state of intense anxiety +about their eggs and young among the bushes which he is dashing through +or exploring. + +I had good reason, then, to congratulate myself on Jack's surly +behaviour on our first meeting. Then, a few days later, a curious thing +happened. Jack was discovered one morning in his kennel, and when spoken +to came or rather dragged himself out, a most pitiable object. He was +horribly bruised and sore all over; his bones appeared to be all broken; +he was limp and could hardly get on his feet, and in that miserable +condition he continued for some three days. + +At first we thought he had been in a big fight--he was inclined +that way, his master said--but we could discover no tooth marks or +lacerations, nothing but bruises. Perhaps, we said, he had fallen into +the hands of some cruel person in one of the distant moorland farms, who +had tied him up, then thrashed him with a big stick, and finally turned +him loose to die on the moor or crawl home if he could. His master +looked so black at this that we said no more about it. But Jack was +a wonderfully tough dog, all gristle I think, and after three days of +lying there like a dead dog he quickly recovered, though I'm quite sure +that if his injuries had been distributed among any half-dozen pampered +or pet dogs it would have killed them all. A morning came when the +kennel was empty: Jack was not dead--he was well again, and, as usual, +out. + +Just then I was absent for a week or ten days then, back again, I went +out one fine morning for a long day's ramble along the coast. A mile or +so from home, happening to glance back I caught sight of a black dog's +face among the bushes thirty or forty yards away gazing earnestly at me. +It was Jack, of course, nothing but his head visible in an opening +among the bushes--a black head which looked as if carved in ebony, in +a wonderful setting of shining yellow furze blossoms. The beauty and +singularity of the sight made it impossible for me to be angry with +him, though there's nothing a man more resents than being shadowed, or +secretly followed and spied upon, even by a dog, so, without considering +what I was letting myself in for, I cried out "Jack" and instantly he +bounded out and came to my side, then flew on ahead, well pleased to +lead the way. + +"I must suffer him this time," I said resignedly, and went on, he always +ahead acting as my scout and hunter--self-appointed, of course, but as +I had not ordered him back in trumpet tones and hurled a rock at him +to enforce the command, he took it that he was appointed by me. He +certainly made the most of his position; no one could say that he was +lacking in zeal. He scoured the country to the right and left and far in +advance of me, crashing through furze thickets and splashing across bogs +and streams, spreading terror where he went and leaving nothing for +me to look at. So it went on until after one o'clock when, tired and +hungry, I was glad to go down into a small fishing cove to get some +dinner in a cottage I knew. Jack threw himself down on the floor and +shared my meal, then made friends with the fisherman's wife and got a +second meal of saffron cake which, being a Cornish dog, he thoroughly +enjoyed. + +The second half of the day was very much like the first, altogether a +blank day for me, although a very full one for Jack, who had filled a +vast number of wild creatures with terror, furiously hunted a hundred or +more, and succeeded in killing two or three. + +Jack was impossible, and would never be allowed to follow me again. So +I sternly said and so thought, but when the time came and I found him +waiting for me his brown eyes bright with joyful anticipation, I could +not scowl at him and thunder out No! I could not help putting myself in +his place. For here he was, a dog of boundless energy who must exercise +his powers or be miserable, with nothing in the village for him except +to witness the not very exciting activities of others; and that, I +discovered, had been his life. He was mad to do something, and because +there was nothing for him to do his time was mostly spent in going about +the village to keep an eye on the movements of the people, especially of +those who did the work, always with the hope that his services might +be required in some way by some one. He was grateful for the smallest +crumbs, so to speak. House-work and work about the house--milking, +feeding the pigs and so on--did not interest him, nor would he attend +the labourers in the fields. Harvest time would make a difference; now +it was ploughing, sowing, and hoeing, with nothing for Jack. But he was +always down at the fishing cove to see the boats go out or come in and +join in the excitement when there was a good catch. It was still better +when the boat went with provisions to the lighthouse, or to relieve the +keeper, for then Jack would go too and if they would not have him he +would plunge into the waves and swim after it until the sails were +hoisted and it flew like a great gull from him and he was compelled to +swim back to land. If there was nothing else to do he would go to the +stone quarry and keep the quarrymen company, sharing their dinner +and hunting away the cows and donkeys that came too near. Then at +six o'clock he would turn up at the cricket-field, where a few young +enthusiasts would always attend to practise after working hours. + +Living this way Jack was, of course, known to everybody--as well known +as the burly parson, the tall policeman, and the lazy girl who acted as +postman and strolled about the parish once a day delivering the letters. +When Jack trotted down the village street he received as many greetings +as any human inhabitant--"Hullo, Jack!" or "Morning, Jack," or "Where be +going, Jack?" + +But all this variety, and all he could do to fit himself into and be +a part of the village life and fill up his time, did not satisfy him. +Happiness for Jack was out on the moor--its lonely wet thorny places, +pregnant with fascinating scents, not of flowers and odorous herbs, +but of alert, warm-blooded, and swift-footed creatures. And I was going +there--would I, could I, be so heartless as to refuse to take him? + +You see that Jack, being a dog, could not go there alone. He was a +social being by instinct as well as training, dependent on others, or +on the one who was his head and master. His human master, or the man who +took him out and spoke to him in a tone of authority, represented the +head of the pack--the leading dog for the time being, albeit a dog that +walked on his hind legs and spoke a bow-wow dialect of his own. + +I thought of all this and of many things besides. The dog, I remembered, +was taken by man out of his own world and thrust into one where he can +never adapt himself perfectly to the conditions, and it was consequently +nothing more than simple justice on my part to do what I could to +satisfy his desire even at some cost to myself. But while I was +revolving the matter in my mind, feeling rather unhappy about it, Jack +was quite happy, since he had nothing to revolve. For him it was all +settled and done with. Having taken him out once, I must go on taking +him out always. Our two lives, hitherto running apart--his in the +village, where he occupied himself with uncongenial affairs, mine on +the moor where, having but two legs to run on, I could catch no +rabbits--were now united in one current to our mutual advantage. His +habits were altered to suit the new life. He stayed in now so as not +to lose me when I went for a walk, and when returning, instead of going +back to his kennel, he followed me in and threw himself down, all wet, +on the rug before the fire. His master and mistress came in and stared +in astonishment. It was against the rules of the house! They ordered +him out and he looked at them without moving. Then they spoke again very +sharply indeed, and he growled a low buzzing growl without lifting his +chin from his paws, and they had to leave him! He had transferred +his allegiance to a new master and head of the pack. He was under my +protection and felt quite safe: if I had taken any part in that scene it +would have been to order those two persons who had once lorded it over +him out of the room! + +I didn't really mind his throwing over his master and taking possession +of the rug in my sitting-room, but I certainly did very keenly resent +his behaviour towards the birds every morning at breakfast-time. It was +my chief pleasure to feed them during the bad weather, and it was often +a difficult task even before Jack came on the scene to mix himself in my +affairs. The Land's End is, I believe, the windiest place in the world, +and when I opened the window and threw the scraps out the wind would +catch and whirl them away like so many feathers over the garden wall, +and I could not see what became of them. It was necessary to go out +by the kitchen door at the back (the front door facing the sea being +impossible) and scatter the food on the lawn, and then go into watch the +result from behind the window. The blackbirds and thrushes would wait +for a lull to fly in over the wall, while the daws would hover overhead +and sometimes succeed in dropping down and seizing a crust, but often +enough when descending they would be caught and whirled away by the +blast. The poor magpies found their long tails very much against them in +the scramble, and it was even worse with the pied wagtail. He would go +straight for the bread and get whirled and tossed about the smooth lawn +like a toy bird made of feathers, his tail blown over his head. It was +bad enough, and then Jack, curious about these visits to the lawn, came +to investigate and finding the scraps, proceeded to eat them all up. +I tried to make him understand better by feeding him before I fed the +birds; then by scolding and even hitting him, but he would not see it; +he knew better than I did; he wasn't hungry and he didn't want bread, +but he would eat it all the same, every scrap of it, just to prevent +it from being wasted. Jack was doubtless both vexed and amused at my +simplicity in thinking that all this food which I put on the lawn would +remain there undevoured by those useless creatures the birds until it +was wanted. + +Even this I forgave him, for I saw that he had not, that with his dog +mind he could not, understand me. I also remembered the words of a wise +old Cornish writer with regard to the mind of the lower animals: "But +their faculties of mind are no less proportioned to their state of +subjection than the shape and properties of their bodies. They have +knowledge peculiar to their several spheres and sufficient for the +under-part they have to act." + +Let me be free from the delusion that it is possible to raise them above +this level, or in other words to add an inch to their mental stature. +I have nothing to forgive Jack after all. And so in spite of everything +Jack was suffered at home and accompanied me again and again in my walks +abroad; and there were more blank days, or if not altogether blank, +seeing that there was Jack himself to be observed and thought about, +they were not the kind of days I had counted on having. My only +consolation was that Jack failed to capture more than one out of every +hundred, or perhaps five hundred, of the creatures he hunted, and that I +was even able to save a few of these. But I could not help admiring +his tremendous energy and courage, especially in cliff-climbing when +we visited the headlands--those stupendous masses and lofty piles of +granite which rise like castles built by giants of old. He would almost +make me tremble for his life when, after climbing on to some projecting +rock, he would go to the extreme end and look down over it as if it +pleased him to watch the big waves break in foam on the black rocks a +couple of hundred feet below. But it was not the big green waves or any +sight in nature that drew him--he sniffed and sniffed and wriggled and +twisted his black nose, and raised and depressed his ears as he sniffed, +and was excited solely because the upward currents of air brought him +tidings of living creatures that lurked in the rocks below--badger and +fox and rabbit. One day when quitting one of these places, on looking +up I spied Jack standing on the summit of a precipice about seventy-five +feet high. Jack saw me and waved his tail, and then started to come +straight down to me! From the top a faint rabbit track was, visible +winding downwards to within twenty-four feet of the ground; the rest +was a sheer wall of rock. Down he dashed, faster and faster as he got +to where the track ended, and then losing his footing he fell swiftly to +the earth, but luckily dropped on a deep spongy turf and was not hurt. +After witnessing this reckless act I knew how he had come by those +frightful bruises on a former occasion. He had doubtless fallen a long +way down a cliff and had been almost crushed on the stones. But the +lesson was lost on Jack; he would have it that where rabbits and foxes +went he could go! + +After all, the chief pleasure those blank bad days had for me was the +thought that Jack was as happy as he could well be. But it was not +enough to satisfy me, and by and by it came into my mind that I had +been long enough at that place. It was hard to leave Jack, who had put +himself so entirely in my hands, and trusted me so implicitly. But--the +weather was keeping very bad: was there ever known such a June as this +of 1907? So wet and windy and cold! Then, too, the bloom had gone from +the furze. It was, I remembered, to witness this chief loveliness that +I came. Looking on the wide moor and far-off boulder-strewn hills and +seeing how rusty the bushes were, I quoted-- + + The bloom has gone, and with the bloom go I, + +and early in the morning, with all my belongings on my back, I stole +softly forth, glancing apprehensively in the direction of the kennel, +and out on to the windy road. It was painful to me to have to decamp in +this way; it made me think meanly of myself; but if Jack could read this +and could speak his mind I think he would acknowledge that my way of +bringing the connection to an end was best for both of us. I was not +the person, or dog on two legs, he had taken me for, one with a proper +desire to kill things: I only acted according to my poor lights. +Nothing, then, remains to be said except that one word which it was not +convenient to speak on the windy morning of my departure--Good-bye Jack. + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Afoot in England, by W.H. Hudson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AFOOT IN ENGLAND *** + +***** This file should be named 5406.txt or 5406.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/0/5406/ + +Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. |