WHEN THE SUN GOES DOWN.
"I saw Eternity the other night
Like a great ring of pure and endless light,
All calm, as it was bright:--
And round beneath it, time in hours, days, years,
Driven by the spheres,
Like a vast shadow moved, in which the world
And all her train were hurl'd."
HENRY VAUGHAN.
It is the end of May; a bright, rainless, and at times bitterly cold
month it has been. But now the chill east wind has almost died away.
Summer has come at last. Once more I am making for the Downs. Very
seldom am I there at this period of the year; but before going away for
several months, I bethought me that I would go and inspect the
improvements at the fox-covert, stopping on my way at the "Jubilee"
gorse covert we lately planted, to see if there is a litter of cubs
there this year. Across the fields we go, ankle deep in buttercups and
clover at one moment, then up the hedge to avoid treading the half-grown
barley. We are so accustomed to take a bee-line across these shooting
grounds of ours that we quite forget that the farmer would not thank us
for trampling down his crops at the end of May. But soon we are on the
Downs, well out of harm's way and far removed from highroads and
footpaths. What a glorious panorama lies all around! Why do we not come
here oftener in summer?--the country is ten times more lovely then than
it is in the shooting season. A field of sainfoin in June, with its
glorious blossoms of pink, is one of the prettiest sights in all
creation. Seen in the distance, amid a setting of green wheatfields and
verdant pastures, it ripples in the garish light of the summer sun like
a lake of rubies.
"Land and sea
Give themselves up to jollity;
And with the heart of May
Doth every beast keep holiday."
Ah! there will be lots of foxes when the hounds come to the fox-covert
next October. The unpleasant smell at the mouth of the earth tells us
that there are cubs there; and as we stand over it we can hear them
playing down below in the bowels of mother earth. Very distinct, too,
are the tracks--_traffic_, the keeper calls them--leading by sundry
well-trodden paths to the dell below--a nice sunny dell, facing
south-west, where in spring the violets and primroses grow among the
spreading elder. These cubs were not born here. Their mother brought
them from an old hollow stump of a tree by the river, half a mile away.
When she found her lair discovered by an angler who happened to pass
that way, she brought them across the river by the narrow footbridge
right up here on to the hill. The cubs from the tree have disappeared,
so no doubt these are the ones. Well, there are lots of rabbits for
them; the little fellows are popping about all over the place.
How tame all wild animals become in the summer!--all except the ones we
want to circumvent--magpies, jays, stoats, and such small deer. Lapwings
fly round us, crying restlessly, "Go away, go away!" Their shrill treble
accents remind one of a baby's squall. Pigeons and ringdoves, partridges
and hares seem to be plentiful "as blackberries in September." A
gorgeous cock pheasant crows and jumps up close to us, followed by his
mate. This is a pleasing sight up here, for they are wild birds. There
has been no rearing done in these copses on the hills within the
memory of man.
Tom Peregrine suddenly appears out of a hedge, where he has been
watching the antics of the cubs at the mouth of the fox-earth. He has
grown very serious of late, and tells you repeatedly that there is going
to be another big European war shortly. Let us hope his gloomy
forebodings are doomed to disappointment. Surely, surely at the end of
this marvellous nineteenth century, when there are so many men in the
world who have learnt the difficult lessons of life in a way that they
have never been learnt before, nations are no longer obliged to behave
like children, or worse still, with their petty jealousies and
bickerings and growlings, "like dogs that delight to bark and bite."
Tom Peregrine, having done but little work for many months, is now
making himself really useful, for a change, by copying out parts of this
great work; and, to do him justice, he writes a capital, clear hand. He
is very anxious to become secretary to "some great gentleman," he says.
If any of my readers require a sporting secretary, I can confidently
recommend him as a man of "plain sense rather than of much learning, of
a sociable temper, and one that understands a little of backgammon."
There is no fear of his "insulting you with Latin and Greek at your own
table." He would have suited Sir Roger capitally for a chaplain, I often
tell him; and though he hasn't a notion who Sir Roger may be, he
thoroughly enjoys the joke.
The fox-covert presents a strange appearance. It is full of young spruce
trees, and the lower branches have been lopped down, but not cut through
or killed. Under each tree there is now a grand hiding-place for foxes
and rabbits--a sort of big umbrella turned topsy-turvy. The rabbits
appreciate the pains we have been at; but I fear the foxes, for whom it
was intended, at present look on the shelter with suspicion. They
dislike the gum which oozes continually from the gashes in the bark; it
sticks to their coats, and gives an unpleasant sensation when they
roll. They cannot keep their beautiful coats sleek and glossy, as is
their invariable rule, as long as their is any gum sticking to them.
How clearly we can see the Swindon Hills in the bright evening
atmosphere! They must be more than twenty miles away. The grand old
White Horse, making the spot where long, long ago the Danes were
vanquished in fight, is not visible; but he is scarcely to be seen at
all now, as the lazy Berkshire people have neglected their duty. He
really must be scoured again this summer; he is a national institution.
Londoners take a much greater interest in him than do the honest folk
who live bang under his nose.
We must continue our excavations at Ladbarrow copse yonder. Men say it
is the largest barrow in the county, full of "golden coffins" and all
sorts of priceless antiquities! At present all we have discovered are
some bones, with which we stuffed our pockets. When we arrived home,
however, they were found to have belonged to a poor old sheep-dog that
was buried there. But see! the setting sun is tinging the tops of the
slender, shapely ash trees in yonder emerald copse. The whole plain is
changing from a vast arena of golden splendour to a mysterious shadowy
land of dreams. A fierce light still reveals every object on the hill
towards the east; but westwards beneath yon purple ridge all is wrapped
in dim, ambiguous shade.
It is sad to think that I alone of mortal men should be here to see this
glorious panorama. It seems such a waste of nature's bounteous store
that night after night this wondrous spectacle should be solemnly
displayed, with no better gallery than a stray shepherd, who, as he
"homeward plods his weary way," cares little for the grand drama that is
being performed entirely for his benefit. Nature is indeed prodigal of
her charms in out-of-the-way country places.
Sometimes whilst walking over these remote fields on summer evenings, I
have stopped to ask myself this question: Is it possible that these
exquisite wild flowers, these groves and dells of verdant tracery, these
birds with their priceless music, and these wondrous, ineffable effects
of light and shade which form part of the everyday pageant of English
rural scenery are doomed "to waste their sweetness on the desert air"?
Is it possible (to go further afield) that those lovely scenes in
Wales--the fairy glens near Bettws-y-Coed, or the luxuriant valleys of
Carmarthen, further south, where silvery Towey flows below the stately
ruins of Dynevor Castle; those romantic reaches on the Wye, from
Chepstow to the frowning hills of Brecon; those solitary, but
unspeakably grand, mountains and passes of the Highlands, such as
Glencoe, Ben Nevis, or those of the scarcely explored Hebrides; those
smiling waters of the lovely Trossachs; those countless spots in the
"Emerald Isle" that the tourist has never seen, whether in fertile
Wicklow or among the whispering woods and weird waters of the west;
those gorgeous forests of Ceylon; those interminable jungles of the
beautiful East, with their unknown depths of tropical splendour;--is it
possible that these scenes of wondrous beauty are inhabited and enjoyed
by nothing more than is visible to our limited mortal gaze?
I believed, as a boy, and with a romance still unsubdued by time I would
yet fain believe, that when the soul of man escapes from the poor
tenement of clay in which it has been pent up for some threescore years
and ten, it has not far to go. I would fain believe that heaven is not
only above us, but, in some form or other entirely beyond our mortal
ken, all around us, in every beautiful thing we see; that these hills
and vales, these woods of delicately wrought fan-tracery groining, these
mazes of golden light when the sun goes down, are peopled not alone by
human flesh and blood. "There are also terrestrial bodies, and bodies
celestial. But the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the
terrestrial is another."
Who can imagine the shape or form of the immortal soul? As I walked over
those golden fields to-night it seemed as if there were spirits all
around me--glorious, bright spirits of the dead--invisible, intangible,
like rays of pure light, in the clear atmosphere of those Elysian
fields. I cannot but believe that there arise from the secret parts of
this beautiful earth, at dawn of day and at eventide, other voices
besides the ineffable songs of birds, the rustling murmurs that whisper
in the woods, and the plaintive babbling of the brooks--hymns of unknown
depths of harmony, impossible to describe, because impossible to
imagine--crying night and day: "Blessing, and honour, and glory, and
power be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne and unto the Lamb for
ever and ever."
Yes, dear reader,
"Though inland far we be,
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither."
When the sun goes down, if you will turn for a little while from the
noise and clamour of the busy world, you shall list to those voices
ringing, ringing in your ears. Words of comfort shall you hear at
eventide, "and sorrow and sadness shall be no more,"--even though, as
the years roll on, perforce you cry, with Wordsworth:
"What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower,
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind."
THE END.
APPENDIX.
GEORGE RIDLER'S OVEN.
(_Note from the papers of the Gloucestershire Society_)
It is now generally understood that the words of this song have a hidden
meaning which was only known to the members of the Gloucestershire
Society, whose foundation dates from the year 1657. This was three years
before the restoration of Charles II. and when the people were growing
weary of the rule of Oliver Cromwell. The Society consisted of
Loyalists, whose object in combining was to be prepared to aid in the
restoration of the ancient constitution of the kingdom whenever a
favourable opportunity should present itself. The Cavalier or Royalist
party were supported by the Roman Catholics of the old and influential
families of the kingdom; and some of the Dissenters, who were disgusted
with the treatment they received from Cromwell, occasionally lent them a
kind of passive aid. Taking these considerations as the keynote to the
song, attempts have been made to discover the meaning which was
originally attached to its leading words. It is difficult at the present
time to give a clear explanation of all its points. The following,
however, is consistent throughout, and is, we believe, correct:--
"The stwuns that built Gaarge Ridler's oven,
And thauy qeum from the Bleakeney's Quaar;
And Gaarge he wur a jolly ould mon,
And his yead it graw'd above his yare."
By "George Ridler" was meant King Charles I. The "oven" was the Cavalier
party. The "stwuns" which built the oven, and which "came out of the
Blakeney Quaar," were the immediate followers of the Marquis of
Worcester, who held out to the last steadfastly for the royal cause at
Raglan Castle, which was not surrendered till 1646, and was, in fact,
the last stronghold retained for the king. "His head did grow above his
hair" was an allusion to the crown, the head of the State, and which the
king wore "above his hair."
"One thing of Gaarge Ridler's I must commend,
And that wur vor a notable theng;
He mead his braags avoore he died,
Wi' any dree brothers his zons zshou'd zeng."
This meant that the king, "before he died," boasted that notwithstanding
his present adversity, the ancient constitution of the kingdom was so
good and its vitality so great that it would surpass and outlive any
other form of government, whether republican, despotic, or protective.
"There's Dick the treble and John the mean
(Let every mon zing in his auwn pleace);
And Gaarge he wur the elder brother,
And therevoore he would zing the beass."
"Dick the treble, Jack the mean, and George the bass" meant the three
parts of the British constitution--King, Lords, and Commons. The
injunction to "let every man sing in his own place" was intended as a
warning to each of the three estates of the realm to preserve its proper
position and not to attempt to encroach on each other's prerogative.
"Mine hostess's moid (and her neaum 'twur Nell),
A pretty wench, and I lov'd her well;
I lov'd her well--good reauzon why,
Because zshe lov'd my dog and I."
"Mine hostess's moid" was an allusion to the queen, who was a Roman
Catholic; and her maid, the Church. The singer, we must suppose, was one
of the leaders of the party, and his "dog" a companion or faithful
official of the Society; and the song was sung on occasions when the
members met together socially: and thus, as the Roman Catholics were
Royalists, the allusion to the mutual attachment between the "maid" and
"my dog and I" is plain and consistent.
"My dog has gotten zitch a trick
To visit moids when thauy be zick;
When thauy be zick and like to die,
Oh, thether gwoes my dog and I."
The "dog"--that is, the official or devoted member of the Society--had
"a trick of visiting maids when they were sick." The meaning here was
that when any of the members were in distress, or desponding, or likely
to give up the royal cause in despair, the officials or active members
visited, consoled, and assisted them.
"My dog is good to catch a hen,--
A duck and goose is vood vor men;
And where good company I spy,
Oh, thether gwoes my dog and I."
The "dog," the official or agent of the Society, was "good to catch a
hen," a "duck," or a "goose"--that is, any who were well affected to the
royal cause of whatever party; wherever "good company I spy, Oh, thither
go my dog and I"--to enlist members into the Society.
"My mwother told I when I wur young,
If I did vollow the strong beer pwoot,
That drenk would pruv my auverdrow,
And meauk me wear a thzreadbare cwoat."
"The good ale-tap" was an allusion, under cover of a similarity in the
sound of the words "ale" and "aisle," to the Church, of which it was
dangerous at that time to be an avowed follower, and so the members were
cautioned that indiscretion would lead to their discovery and
"overthrow."
"When I hev dree zixpences under my thumb,
Oh, then I be welcome wherever I qeum
But when I have none, oh, then I pass by,--
'Tis poverty pearts good company."
The allusion here is to those unfaithful supporters of the royal cause
who "welcomed" the members of the Society when it appeared to be
prospering, but "parted" from them in adversity, probably referring
ironically to those lukewarm and changeable Dissenters who veered about,
for and against, as Cromwell favoured or contemned them. Such could
always be had wherever there were "three sixpence-under the thumb"; but
"poverty" easily parted such "good company."
"When I gwoes dead, as it may hap,
My greauve shall be under the good yeal tap;
In vouled earmes there wool us lie,
Cheek by jowl, my dog and I."
"If I should die," etc.--an expression of the singer's wish that if he
should die he may be buried with his faithful companion (as representing
the principles of the Society) under the good aisles of the church, thus
evincing his loyalty and attachment to the good old constitution and to
Church and king even in death.
INDEX
Abbey, Edwin
Ablington Manor
Acman Street
Aethelhum, the Saxon
Agriculture
Alder tree
Aldsworth and Oliver Cromwell
Alfred, King
Amphitheatre, Roman
Ampney Park
Angelus, the
Antiquity, charm of
_Arbor Diana_
Architecture, Elizabethan
Aristotle
Arlington Row
Artificial fox-earths
Austin, Alfred
Badgers
Bampton-in-the-Bush
Barnby, Joseph
Barns, tithe
Barometer
Barrows, ancient
Bathurst family
Bathurst, Lord
Battues
Bazley, Sir Thomas
Bettws-y-Coed
Bibury Races
Bibury village
Bigotphones
Blowing-stone, the
Bourton-on-the-Water
Bowly, Mrs. Christopher
Brassey, Albert, M.F.H.
Braydon Forest
Bromley-Davenport, W.
Buckland, Frank
Bull-ring, Roman
Burford
Burton on the Cotswolds
Cadge for hawks
Caesar, Julius
Camps, ancient British
Carlyle, Thomas
Cassey-Compton Manor House
Caves, prehistoric
Characters, village
Charles I.
Charles II.
Charlock
Chaucer
Chavenage
Chedworth
Chepstow, the Wye at
Chiltern Hills
Chivalry, ancient
Choirs, village
"Christmas Carol," Austin's
Christmas festivities
Church ales
Churchwardens
Cirencester
Civil Wars
Clarendon on Falkland
Climate of the Cotswolds
Coats-of-arms
Coffins, old stone
Coln, River
Coln-St.-Aldwyns
Coln-St.-Dennis
Conyger wood
Corinium Museum
Corncrakes, disappearance of
Coulson, Colonel, his trap
County cricket
Coursing on the Cotswolds
Cray-fish
Creswell family
Cricket pitch, how to improve
Cricket, prehistoric
Cricket, the game of
Cripps, Wilfred, C.B.
Crosses, wayside
Cub-hunting
Cubs, fox
Cudgel-playing, old-fashioned
Curlews
Cushats
Deadman's Acre
Deerhounds, Scotch
De Quincey
Derby Day on the Coln
De Vere, Aubrey
Dew
Dew-point
Dialect, Cotswold
Dickens, Charles, on cricket
Dogs
Downs, the mystery of the
Dream, Shakespeare's
Dress, simplicity in
Drayton, Michael
Dry-fly fishing
Ducks, wild
Duleep Singh at Hatherop
Dun, olive
Dürer, Albert
Earthquake of 1895
Earths for foxes
_Écrevisse_
Eel, curious capture of
Elder tree
Eldon, Lord
"Elegy," Gray's
Elizabeth, Queen, at Burford
Elms
"England, Merrie"
Escutcheons
Evening fishing
Excursion, Roger Plowman's
Fairwood
Falconry, the art of
Falkland, Lord, at Burford
Farmers, Cotswold
Feasts, ancient
Ferns growing on ash tree
Fieldfare, return of the
Field names
Firr, Tom
Flails, old-fashioned
Flanders mares
Flies, artificial
Flocks of lapwings
Flowers, wild
Fly-catcher, the
"Flying Dutchman"
Forest, Braydon
Forest, Savernake
Fossbridge
Fosseway
Fox-earths
Foxes
Fozbrooke
Free Foresters' Cricket Club
Galway nags
Gamekeeper, the
Gannet
Garden, an old
Garne of Aldsworth
Geese, wild
"George Ridler's Oven"
Gilbert White
Gilpin, John
Gipsies
Gloucestershire dialect
Glow-worms
Goethe (quoted)
Golf greens, treatment of
Gothic architecture
Grace, W.G.
Grasshoppers, Burke on
Gray's "Elegy"
Green-drake
Greyhound fox
Grounds, treatment of cricket
Gwynne, Nell, at Bibury Races
Hall, King Alfred's
Hallam, Arthur
Halo, solar
Hamilton, Sir William Rowan
Hangman's Stone, origin of
Hard riders
Hares
Harvest home
Hawking described
Hawks
Hedgehogs
Henry VIII.
Heraldry
Herbs
Herons
Hicks-Beach, Right Hon. Sir Michael
Hic-wall or heckle
Hill, White Horse
Hills, Jem
Hobbs of Maiseyhampton
Horse, description of
Horse for the Cotswolds
Hounds, Badminton
Hounds, Bombay
Hounds, Heythrop
Hounds, Lord Bathurst's
Hounds, Mr. T.B. Miller's
Hounds, Shakespeare on
Hunting, fox-
Hunting poem
Hunting, stag-, in olden times
Huntsman, a good
Hygrometer
Hymns
Hypocaust, Roman
Icknield Street
Implements, old stone
Inscribed stones (Roman)
Inscription on porch of manor house
Irmin Way
Irving, Washington (quoted)
Isaac Walton
Jansen, Cornelius, painter
Jefferies, Richard
Johnson, Dr.
Joyce on Fairford windows
Keble, John, at Fairford
Kelmscott
Kemble
Kestrel
Kingfishers
Kingmaker, the
Kipling, Rudyard
Kite, artificial
Knights Templar
Labourers, Cotswold
Lapwings
Larder, vixen's
Leland
Lenthall, Speaker
Leslie, G.
Limestone quarries,
Llewelyn, W. Dillwyn
Loam, use of clay or
Macomber Falls
Macpherson and Ossian
Madden, Right Hon. D.H.
Magpies
Mallard, a pugnacious
Manor parchments
Manuscript, an ancient
Marsh-harrier
Marsh-marigold
Master, Chester, family of
Maxwell, Sir Herbert
May flies
May-fly season
"Merrie England"
Meteor, a large
Miller, T.B., M.F.H.
Miller, the village
Monk, W.J., on Burford
Moorhens, habits of
Mop, Cirencester
Moreton-in-the-Marsh
Morris, William
Mounds, ancient burial
Mummers' play
Museums, Roman
Musicians, old village
Natal, scenery of
Nest, kingfisher's
Netting trout
Newton, Isaac
Nightjar or goatsucker
Night on the hills
Nimrod on Bibury Races
_Noblesse oblige_
Northleach
Oak, old
Oliver Cromwell
Oman's discovery
Ossian
"Oven, George Ridler's"
Owls
Oxen, ploughing with
Partridges
"Parvise," the
Pavements, Roman
Penance at Burford
Peregrine falcons
Peregrine, Thomas, keeper
Pheasants
Pigeon-shooting
Playing-fields, Eton
Pliny
"Plestor," the
Ploughing with oxen
Plover, common
Plover, golden
Plowman, Roger, goes to London
Poachers, scarcity of
Poges, Stoke
Political meetings
Politicians, village
Pope at Cirencester
Pottery, Roman
Prehistoric cricket
Prehistoric relics
Prescription, an excellent
Proverbs, Gloucestershire
Puffin
Quack, the village
Quails
Quarries, limestone
Quenington
Querns, the
Races, Bibury
Ramparts, ancient
Ready Token
Retrievers
Riders, good
Riding, hard
Roads, limestone
Roger de Coverley, Sir
Roman remains
Rookery, the
Rupert, Prince
Ruskin, John
Sainfoin
Sargent, J.
Savernake
Scent of foxes
Scotch deerhound
Scott, Lady Margaret
Scouring the White Horse
Shakespeare on the Cotswolds
Sheep, Cotswold
Sheep-washing
Sherborne House
Sherborne, Lord
Shooting, covert-
Sly, Isaac
Snake eaten by trout
Snipe
Solan goose
Solar halo
Songs, Gloucestershire
South Africa, wolds of
Sparrow-club
Spawn-beds of trout
_Spectator_, the
Sportsman, definition of a good
Spring flowers
Springs, Cotswold
Squirrels
Stag-hunting, wild
Stage-coach
Stoats
Stone age, relics of
Stowell
Stow-on-the-Wold
Sunsets described
Swans
Tame, John
Tanfield family
Teal
Tennyson
Terrier, fox-
Tesselated pavements
Thames
Thrashing
Thrush, song of
Tiercel-gentle
Tithe
Tithe barns
"Tolsey," the
Traps, vermin
Travess, Charles
Trees, beauty of ash
Trossachs, the
Trout eating snake
Trout, habits of
"Tuer," a
Turnip hower, the
Umpires, village
Uncertainty, charm of
Urns, sepulchral
Vale, Berkshire
Vale of White Horse Hounds
Valley, Coln
Valley, Thames
Victorian Era
Voles, water
Waller's pictures
Walnut tree in spring
Warwick, the kingmaker
Wasps, a plague of
Watercress
Wayside crosses
Weasels
Westbury White Horse
Wharfe, River
White Horse Hill
Whitsun ale
Whitsuntide sports
Whyte-Melville
Wildfowl
Williamstrip
Wimbrels,
Windrush, River
Wines, home-made
Winson village
Woodpeckers
Wood-pigeons
Wordsworth
Wren, Christopher
Yaffel
Yuletide
Zingari Cricket Club
Zodiacal light