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diff --git a/old/ftnng10.txt b/old/ftnng10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..19ce17e --- /dev/null +++ b/old/ftnng10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8766 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Afoot in England, by W.H. Hudson +#3 in our series by W.H. Hudson + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Afoot in England + +Author: W.H. Hudson + +Release Date: April, 2004 [EBook #5406] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on July 8, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AFOOT IN ENGLAND *** + + + + + + + + + + +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 dicovered 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 Nneteen: 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 hiniself 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 brillaint 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, veiwed 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 trival +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 dscovered, 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 THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AFOOT IN ENGLAND *** + +This file should be named ftnng10.txt or ftnng10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, ftnng11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, ftnng10a.txt + + + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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