To hear people talking about North Devon, and the savage part called
Exmoor, you might almost think that there never was any place in
the world so beautiful, or any living men so wonderful. It is not my
intention to make little of them, for they would be the last to permit
it; neither do I feel ill will against them for the pangs they allowed
me to suffer; for I dare say they could not help themselves, being so
slow-blooded, and hard to stir even by their own egrimonies. But when I
look back upon the things that happened, and were for a full generation
of mankind accepted as the will of God, I say, that the people who
endured them must have been born to be ruled by the devil. And in
thinking thus I am not alone; for the very best judges of that day
stopped short of that end of the world, because the law would not go any
further. Nevertheless, every word is true of what I am going to tell,
and the stoutest writer of history cannot make less of it by denial.
My father was Sylvester Ford of Quantock, in the county of Somerset,
a gentleman of large estate as well as ancient lineage. Also of high
courage and resolution not to be beaten, as he proved in his many rides
with Prince Rupert, and woe that I should say it! in his most sad death.
To this he was not looking forward much, though turned of threescore
years and five; and his only child and loving daughter, Sylvia, which
is myself, had never dreamed of losing him. For he was exceeding fond of
me, little as I deserved it, except by loving him with all my heart and
thinking nobody like him. And he without anything to go upon, except
that he was my father, held, as I have often heard, as good an opinion
of me.
Upon the triumph of that hard fanatic, the Brewer, who came to a timely
end by the justice of high Heaven--my father, being disgusted with
England as well as banished from her, and despoiled of all his property,
took service on the Continent, and wandered there for many years, until
the replacement of the throne. Thereupon he expected, as many others
did, to get his states restored to him, and perhaps to be held in high
esteem at court, as he had a right to be. But this did not so come
to pass. Excellent words were granted him, and promise of tenfold
restitution; on the faith of which he returned to Paris, and married a
young Italian lady of good birth and high qualities, but with nothing
more to come to her. Then, to his great disappointment, he found
himself left to live upon air--which, however distinguished, is not
sufficient--and love, which, being fed so easily, expects all who lodge
with it to live upon itself.
My father was full of strong loyalty; and the king (in his value of that
sentiment) showed faith that it would support him. His majesty took
both my father's hands, having learned that hearty style in France, and
welcomed him with most gracious warmth, and promised him more than he
could desire. But time went on, and the bright words faded, like a rose
set bravely in a noble vase, without any nurture under it.
Another man had been long established in our hereditaments by the
Commonwealth; and he would not quit them of his own accord, having a
sense of obligation to himself. Nevertheless, he went so far as to offer
my father a share of the land, if some honest lawyers, whom he quoted,
could find proper means for arranging it. But my father said: “If I
cannot have my rights, I will have my wrongs. No mixture of the two for
me.” And so, for the last few years of his life, being now very poor
and a widower, he took refuge in an outlandish place, a house and small
property in the heart of Exmoor, which had come to the Fords on
the spindle side, and had been overlooked when their patrimony was
confiscated by the Brewer. Of him I would speak with no contempt,
because he was ever as good as his word.
In the course of time, we had grown used to live according to our
fortunes. And I verily believe that we were quite content, and
repined but little at our lost importance. For my father was a very
simple-minded man, who had seen so much of uproarious life, and the
falsehood of friends, and small glitter of great folk, that he was glad
to fall back upon his own good will. Moreover he had his books, and me;
and as he always spoke out his thoughts, he seldom grudged to thank the
Lord for having left both of these to him. I felt a little jealous of
his books now and then, as a very poor scholar might be; but reason is
the proper guide for women, and we are quick enough in discerning it,
without having to borrow it from books.
At any rate now we were living in a wood, and trees were the only
creatures near us, to the best of our belief and wish. Few might say in
what part of the wood we lived, unless they saw the smoke ascending from
our single chimney; so thick were the trees, and the land they stood
on so full of sudden rise and fall. But a little river called the Lynn
makes a crooked border to it, and being for its size as noisy a water as
any in the world perhaps, can be heard all through the trees and leaves
to the very top of the Warren Wood. In the summer all this was sweet
and pleasant; but lonely and dreary and shuddersome, when the twigs bore
drops instead of leaves, and the ground would not stand to the foot, and
the play of light and shadow fell, like the lopping of a tree, into one
great lump.
Now there was a young man about this time, and not so very distant from
our place--as distances are counted there--who managed to make himself
acquainted with us, although we lived so privately. To me it was a
marvel, both why and how he did it; seeing what little we had to offer,
and how much we desired to live alone. But Mrs. Pring told me to look in
the glass, if I wanted to know the reason; and while I was blushing with
anger at that, being only just turned eighteen years, and thinking of
nobody but my father, she asked if I had never heard the famous rhymes
made by the wise woman at Tarrsteps:
“Three fair maids live upon Exymoor,
The rocks, and the woods, and the dairy-door.
The son of a baron shall woo all three,
But barren of them all shall the young man be.”
Of the countless things I could never understand, one of the very
strangest was how Deborah Pring, our only domestic, living in the lonely
depths of this great wood, and seeming to see nobody but ourselves,
in spite of all that contrived to know as much of the doings of the
neighbourhood as if she went to market twice a week. But my father cared
little for any such stuff; coming from a better part of the world, and
having been mixed with mighty issues and making of great kingdoms, he
never said what he thought of these little combings of petty pie crust,
because it was not worth his while. And yet he seemed to take a kindly
liking to the young De Wichehalse; not as a youth of birth only, but
as one driven astray perhaps by harsh and austere influence. For his
father, the baron, was a godly man,--which is much to-the credit of
anyone, growing rarer and rarer, as it does,--and there should be no
rasp against such men, if they would only bear in mind that in their
time they had been young, and were not quite so perfect then. But lo!
I am writing as if I knew a great deal more than I could know until the
harrow passed over me.
No one, however, need be surprised at the favour this young man obtained
with all who came into his converse. Handsome, and beautiful as he was,
so that bold maids longed to kiss him, it was the sadness in his eyes,
and the gentle sense of doom therein, together with a laughing scorn of
it, that made him come home to our nature, in a way that it feels but
cannot talk of. And he seemed to be of the past somehow, although so
young and bright and brave; of the time when greater things were done,
and men would die for women. That he should woo three maids in vain, to
me was a stupid old woman's tale.
“Sylvia,” my father said to me, when I was not even thinking of him, “no
more converse must we hold with that son of the Baron de Wichehalse. I
have ordered Pring to keep the door; and Mistress Pring, who hath the
stronger tongue, to come up if he attempted to dispute; the while I go
away to catch our supper.”
He was bearing a fishing rod made by himself, and a basket strapped over
his shoulders.
“But why, father? Why should such a change be? How hath the young
gentleman displeased thee?” I put my face into his beard as I spoke,
that I might not appear too curious.
“Is it so?” he answered, “then high time is it. No more shall he enter
this “--_house_ he would have said, but being so truthful changed it
into--“hut. I was pleased with the youth. He is gentle and kind; but
weak--my dear child, remember that. Why are we in this hut, my dear? and
thou, the heiress of the best land in the world, now picking up sticks
in the wilderness? Because the man who should do us right is weak,
and wavering, and careth but for pleasure. So is this young Marwood de
Wichehalse. He rideth with the Doones. I knew it not, but now that I
know, it is enough.”
My father was of tall stature and fine presence, and his beard shone
like a cascade of silver. It was not the manner of the young as yet to
argue with their elders, and though I might have been a little fluttered
by the comely gallant's lofty talk and gaze of daring melancholy, I said
good-bye to him in my heart, as I kissed my noble father. Shall I ever
cease to thank the Lord that I proved myself a good daughter then?