"THE SWEET NEW GRASS WITH FLOWERS."
Baa--baa! A long-drawn pettish bleating that sometimes sounded absurdly
like the "Ma--ma!" of a spoilt child. The lambs gambolled in the genial
sunshine over the daisies; the ewes, arrived at the age of common sense,
fed steadily on the young sweet grass, and did not notice the flowers.
Geoffrey Newton looked at them from the other side of the hedge, where
indeed he had no business to be. He had carelessly wandered in a
day-dream from the footpath, and was now in the midst of mowing-grass,
to walk in which is against the unwritten laws of country life, because
when trampled down it is difficult to mow. Yet there is a great
pleasure in pushing through it, tall grasses and bennets and sorrel
stems reaching to the knee--the very dogs delight in it. See a spaniel
just let loose; how he circles round, plunging over it!--visible as he
bounds up, lost to sight next moment in the matted mass; the higher it
is the more he likes it.
Baa--maa!
"For how many thousand years have the lambs been happy in the
spring-tide?" thought Geoffrey. "And yet it is said that the world is
growing old! Nature is always young. Earth was never younger than she
is to-day. Goethe was right there:"
Thy works sublime are now as bright
As on creation's day they rose.
"If we could only somehow translate that eternal youth into our own
lives--if! The dew still lingers here in the shade. How slumberous it
is even in the morning! Unseen lotos-flowers bloom in the spring, and
the odour makes us drowsy."
His eyelids fell as he walked on, and his slow steps led him whither
they would.
When a thoughtful man feels an overpowering love--a great passion rising
within him--his ideal often becomes a kind of judge. All the creed of
life that has grown up in the mind is passed in review: will the
half-formed scepticism, the firm dogma, the theory, stand before the new
light thrown upon them by the love that is in itself a faith?
So he dreamed of Margaret, and saw and did not see the beauty around
him. His feet, sinking into the soft green carpet, were dusted over
with the yellow pollen of the buttercups. The young shoot of the
bramble projecting from the bush caught at his sleeve; but the weak
tender prickles, not yet hardened into thorns, gave way, and did not
hold. Slender oval leaves on a drooping willow-bough lightly brushed
without awaking him. The thrush on her nest sat still, seeing with the
intuition of a wild creature that no harm threatened her. Finches sang
on the boughs above, and scarcely moved as he passed under.
"Crake--crake!" from the thickest of the grass where the bird crept
concealed. Butterflies fluttered from flower to flower in their curious
sidelong way. Every branch and bush and blade of grass--the air above
where the swallow floated, the furrow in the earth where the mice ran--
all instinct with life; the glamour of the sunshine filling the field
with a magic spell.
A little brook slipped away without a sound past the tall green rushes
and the water-plantains and the grey chequered grass that lifts its
spear-like points in moist places; a swift shallow streamlet winding
through the meadow, its clear surface almost flush with the sward. Now
running water draws a dreamer; so he followed it across the mead, past
the footpath and the stepping-stone that had sunk into the stream: past
the dark-green bunches of the marsh marigolds, whose broad golden petals
open under the harsh winds of early spring, and not far from the
peewit's nest; for she rose and flew round him, calling plaintively, her
pure white breast almost within reach, till finding that her treasure
was unheeded, she slowly dropped behind: past the dog-violets, blue but
not sweet, that looked up more boldly than their forerunners, whose
modest heads had scarce appeared above the dead leaves on the bank.
Yonder the roan cattle were feeding; and in the midst stood an ancient,
gnarled, and many-twisted hawthorn, whose bark had become as iron under
the fierce heats and fiercer storms of years; yet its branches were
green, and crowned with the may--white virgin may-bloom scenting the
air--and under its shadow a young heifer meditated. Past hollow
willows, till presently the turf beneath grew soft and yielding as
velvet, his foot sinking into the pile of the moss, and the shade of
trees fell on him, where the bank of the brook became steep, and low
down in its bed it rushed into the wood.
After awhile oak and elm gave place to black and gloomy firs that hung
over and darkened the water. Large flecks of grey lichen clung to them,
and from above a red squirrel peered down. Here the thick branches
forced his steps aside from the stream, and out among the ashpoles where
the wood-pigeons built their nests, and: in the strength of their love
looked down upon him fearlessly from their feeble platforms of twigs.
Under an ash-stole he saw a rare plant growing, and stooped and went on
his knees to reach it, and so pushed aside the thick boughs, and, as it
were, looked through a screen, and his heart gave a great bound.
There was a narrow space clear of wood, where a green footpath little
used went by, and a large, gnarled, crooked-grown ash-stole opposite,
forming a natural arm-chair, well lined with soft dry moss, and canopied
overhead with leafy branches, drooping woodbine, and climbing briar,
whose roses would soon bloom. The brake fern, young yet and tender,
rose up and gave itself for her footstool--for Margaret sat there,
leaning back luxuriously in her woodland throne. He thought she must
have heard the rustling of the boughs he had parted, and kept still as
an Indian hunter, holding his breath for fear lest she should see him
thus spying. A minute passed, and there was no motion; then he saw that
her right arm hung down listlessly--that the head leaned a little to one
side, the face rather away from him--that her hat had evidently dropped
from her hand, and an open book had fallen at her feet. She was
slumbering.
His chest pressed on the green fern, bluebells hung over his feet.
"Coo-coo-oo!" the dove with burnished neck called gently to his mate,
sitting on the ivied tree.
"Jug-jug-jug!" sang the nightingale hard by in the hawthorn--the
nightingale that by night is sad, but whose heart is full of joy in the
morning. The goldfinches swept by overhead with a gleam of colour from
their wings, coquetting on their way to the apple-trees.
The sun looked on the world with glorious eye. A ray, warm, but yet not
fiercely so, fell aslant between the leaves of the great oak boughs
above, and lit up one delicate ear--small, white, with pink within, as
in the shell the cameo-cutter graves with his tool; or rather, pink like
the apple-bloom, that loveliest of flowers--for as a blossom it peeped
forth beneath her brown wavy hair. Her lips were slightly parted: "Thy
teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn, which came up from
the washing." For their backs are level and white, and glisten with the
water. The highly-arched eyebrows did not meet above the straight nose,
but left a space there. In some old magic-book he had read that this
space was the peculiar precinct of the Queen of Love. A briar had
jealously snatched at the loose sleeve of the right arm, which hung
down, baring the wrist--a round, soft, white arm, veined with blue, an
exquisite polish on the skin. The fingers were long and slightly rosy;
from them a few flowers had dropped on the open page of the book.
So still was he that a weasel came along the green path, his neck erect
like a snake in the grass, stopped, looked him straight in the eyes, and
went by without fear. He gazed, rapt in the devotion of the artist,
till a sense came over him like that feeling which the Greeks embodied
in the punishment that fell on those who looked unbidden upon the
Immortals. It was the strength and the perfect purity of the passion
that held him there that also impelled him to withdraw. Slowly he
worked his way backwards noiselessly, till, sufficiently far away, he
rose to his feet, and hesitated.
Then he made a detour, and stepped into the green footpath thirty or
forty yards distant from her throne, and began to make a noise as he
approached her. He rustled the fern with his foot; he seized a branch
and forcibly snapped it, causing a sharp crack. A woodpecker, startled,
flew off with a discordant "Yuckle!" the dove ceased to coo; the brown
nightingale was silent, and sought a distant hazel-thicket. He lifted
his voice and sang--he had a naturally fine voice--a verse of the dear
old ballad, his favourite:
"If she be dead, then take my horse,
My saddle and bridle also;
For I will unto some far country,
Where no man shall me know."
Off came his hat--she had risen and faced him, blushing faintly. Her
deep grey eyes looked down, and the long eyelashes drooped over them, as
she held out her hand.
"I was coming to Greene Ferne," said he, "and lost my way in the copse."
"You must have gone a long way round."
"Never mind--my instinct guided me right;" then, seeing that the meaning
he expressed behind the words still further confused her, he added, "It
was quite accidental."
Now Margaret had roamed out into the fields under the influence of a
dawning feeling, which as yet she hardly admitted to herself, but which
seemed to desire solitude. And he had surprised her dreaming of him.
So she walked silently before him--the path was narrow--glad that, he
could not see her face, leading the way to the farm. Outside the copse
he came to her side, ruthlessly trampling down the mowing-grass again.
There was a slight movement among the cattle in the next field, and they
saw several persons approaching. They were May Fisher, Valentine
Browne, the Rev Felix St Bees, and a tall, ill-dressed, shambling
fellow hanging in the rear, whom they called Augustus. Instantly the
thought occurred to Margaret that they would at once conclude her
meeting with Geoffrey was prearranged.
"We were coming to find you," said May. "We have lost you all the
morning."
Valentine looked sharply from one to the other, jealously suspicious,
and barely acknowledged Geof's greeting. So Felix and he fell into the
rear, Margaret went on with May, and Valentine accompanied them.
St Bees, a little quick-mannered man, was one of that noble band who
may be said to give their lives for others. With ample private means,
he accepted and remained in the curacy of Kingsbury, the stipend paid
for which was nominal. Many of the workmen in the town walked in daily
from the villages, and Felix visited them at their homes; frequently
preaching, too, for Basil Thorpe at Millbourne, the village of which
Greene Ferne was a tithing or small hamlet. He and Newton were old
friends--his own love for May no secret. Augustus Basset was a specimen
of humanity not uncommonly seen on large farms--the last stray relic of
a good family, half bailiff, half hanger-on, half keeper, half poacher,
and never wholly anything except intoxicated. An old soldier (he had
served as a trooper in the Guards), his appetite for tobacco was
insatiable, and as he walked he mumbled to himself, louder and louder,
till by-and-by gaining courage he asked Geoffrey for a cigar. Newton at
once handed him his case, when Mrs Estcourt, coming out from the house,
and detecting this piece of begging, told him to go and see about
engaging some mowers, who would soon be required.
"There ain't no mowers to be got," grumbled Augustus, as he shambled
off. "If you don't look out, you won't have a man on the farm; there'll
be a strike. Just as if a man couldn't be trusted in the cellar, her
keeps the key in her pocket!" Intense disgust.
They had some lunch at the farm; then Geoffrey and Valentine, feeling
that they had no excuse for remaining longer, left together. But three
fields distant, Valentine remarked that he must go down and see to his
cottage, simply an excuse to part company. So each pursued his way
alone.
Passing into the highway road that ran through the hamlet, Valentine, as
he went by the Spotted Cow, a small wayside inn, saw Ruck and Hedges
sitting with others outside, enjoying a pipe and gossip under the elm
from which the sign was hung. On the rude table before them stood some
mugs. Valentine beckoned to Ruck, who came.
"Have you sent up the clover?"
"Eez, eez."
"And the oats?"
"Thaay be goin' up this arternoon, sir."
"My trainer said your last hay was not so good."
"Did a'? Then he doan't knaw good clauver when a' sees it. This be
vine tackle, I can tell ee."
"Well, I hope it is. Good day."
"A' be terrable sharp about his osses," said the old man, when he got
back to his seat; "but I thenks zumtimes as thur be volk that be sharper
than he."
"Who do ee mean?" asked his crony, Farmer Hedges.
"Aw, we shall zee. I've got half a mind to tell un; but he won't take
no notiss of such as we."
"Not a mossel of use," said Hedges sententiously. "These yer quality be
such a akkerd lot;" and he knocked the ashes out of his pipe on the
iron-bound edge of the trestle-table. The object of this armour was to
prevent the labourers sticking their billhooks into it when they called
for a quart, for hedge-cutters are apt to strike their tools into the
nearest piece of wood when they want their hands free. Having filled
the pipe again, and finding he had no match, he stepped into the
inn-kitchen to light it at the fire, and instantly noticed a large
red-hot nail in a log of burning wood.
"Missis, missis!" The landlady came running. "Look ee thur--thur's a
crooked nail in thuck log. Draw un out--doan't ee waste un. Nails be
amazin' useful thengs."
"Zo um be," said Farmer Ruck. "Volk used to save um. I knowed them as
had a gallon measure full of hoss-stubs: thaay be the toughest iron, and
makes the vinest gun-barrels."
"Them cut nails be as rotten as matchwood," said Bill the
"wunt-catcher," i.e. mole-catcher, throwing down his wooden traps.
"Time o' day to ee, missus;" nodding to her over the mug, and meaning
good health. "The vinest gun as ever you seed wur thuck long un up to
Warren. Mebbe you minds Kippur Mathew?"
"I minds un," said Farmer Ruck.
"Thuck gun would kill your chain. Thur wur a hole in the barrel as yer
med put yer vinger in. Mathew, he squints along at the geame, and I
holds a dock-leaf auver this yer hole, and he lets vly, and kills half a
score o' quests," [wood-pigeons].
[This expedient of the dock-leaf over a crack in the barrel was actually
put in practice.]
"A' wur a chap to fiddle," said Hedges. "A' made hisself a fiddle out
o' thuck maple as growed in Little Furlong hedge. Hulloa, Pistol-legs!"
This was addressed to an aged man who had crawled up on two sticks. His
legs, bent outwards--curved like the butt of a pistol--had obtained him
this nickname.
"Nation dry weather," said the ancient, lifting his head with some
difficulty. "Gie me a drap."
A labourer leaning against the elm handed him his quart.
"Ay, ay; thur bean't no such ale as thur used to be;"--after he had
taken his fill.
"I say, Gaffer," said another fellow, a carter, who had left his horses
by the drinking-trough--"I say, Gaffer Pistol-legs, how old bist thee?"
"Aw," said the patriarch, shaking his head, "I be amazin' old, I be. I
be vourscore and five year come Christmas."
"Warn you minds a main deal?"
"I minds when the new water-wheel wur put in Fisher's mill."
"When wur thuck?"
"Aw, about dree-score year ago."
"Anything else, Gaffer?"
"Eez; I minds when your grandfeyther wur put in the stocks."
"Ha, ha! and after all your 'sperience, Pistol-legs, what do ee think be
the best theng of all?" said Hedges.
"Aw," said the ancient, picking up his sticks, and delivering his
philosophy of the _summum bonum_ with intense gusto. "The vinest theng
of all be a horn o' ale and a lardy-cake!"
"S'pose I must be gettin' on," said Hedges presently, and stuffing some
hay, which had worked out, into his boot again--for he used hay instead
of stockings--he got up, and with Ruck walked down the road.
"A pair of skinvlints," said the wunt-catcher, looking after them. "One
night up to West Farm they was settling a dealing job between um. Zo
thur wur a fire, for the snow wur on the ground. Ruck he says, `A fire
be a terrable waste, you. Let's put he out.' Zo they doughted the
fire, and both got their feet thegither in a zack."
By a stile the two farmers thus careful of their fuel were gossiping
before parting. "Tell ee what," said Ruck, in a mysterious tone; "this
here dark hoss as Val Browne be training for the autumn yent no go. He
doan't know, and it bean't no good to tell un--these yer quality be so
uppish. But thur be a screw loose somewhere; his trainer be a bad un.
Doan't ee put a crownd on un."
"Aw, to be zure," said Hedges. "That there Guss Basset will catch it
zum ov these yer days. Squire's kippur says a' be allus in th' wood
a-poaching."
Then they parted, and a curious sight it was. First one would go a few
paces, and then stop and talk, and presently come back to the stile
again. Then both would walk away, and turn when ten yards distant and
gossip, till by degrees they met at the stile once more. Not till this
process had been repeated at least five times did they finally separate.
Later in the afternoon Geoffrey strolled out from Thorpe Hall into the
park, and sat down under the shade of a huge beech-tree, on the verge of
the wood, whence he could just see the roof of Greene Ferne in the
meadows far below. There he reclined and pondered--"Where thy treasure
is, there will thy heart be also."
"Tu-whit--tu-what!" came the sound of a scythe being sharpened in a mead
below.
Presently he became aware of a heavy footstep approaching; the massive
trunk of the beech hid him from sight. It was a milker going to the
pen. Geoffrey heard him turn his bucket bottom upwards and sit down
upon it.
"Danged ef it bean't vour, I knaws," he muttered. "The sun's over
Kingsbury steeple. Wurs Rause (Rose): bean't hur a-coming?"
Then he began to sing, as milkers do to their cows.
"Thee's got a voice like a wood-pigeon," said a woman whom Geoffrey
heard get over the gate at the corner of the wood. "Thee mumbles,
Tummas, like a dumble-dore in a pitcher!"
Geoffrey peeped round the tree, and saw a stout girl in short
petticoats, corduroy gaiters, brown hair, and dark eyes.
_Tummas_: Doan't thee say nought: I hearn thee in church like a charm o'
starlings.
_Rause_: Thee go on to milking.
_Tummas_: I wunt. Come and zet on my knee.
_Rause_: I'll zee thee in the pond vust with thee gurt vetlocks
uppermost.
_Tummas_: Aw, wooll ee?
_Rause_: Eez, ee wooll.
_Tummas_: Bist a-goin to haymaking to year?
_Rause_: Eez, in the Voremeads to-morrer.
_Tummas_: Zum on um means to gie out and axe for a crownd more. Gwain
to strike, doan't ee zee?
_Rause_: A passel o' fools.
_Tummas_: Arl on um ull join. They be going to begin at Mrs Estcourt's
vust down to Greene Ferne. Her be sure to gie in to um, cos her's a
'ooman.
_Rause_: Odd drot um!
_Tummas_: I zay, Rause.
_Rause_: Eez, you.
_Tummas_: When be we a-goin to do it?
_Rause_: What dost mean?
_Tummas_: Up to church.
_Rause_: Thee axe Bob vust--he'll mash thee.
_Tummas_: I'll warm his jacket ef he puts a vinger on ee. Let's go up
to paason.
_Rause_: Get on with thee.
Geoffrey heard a sound of struggling and two or three resonant kisses.
_Tummas_: Wooll ee come?
_Rause_: Go on whoam with thee.
_Tummas_: Danged ef I'll stand it! I wunt axe thee no more! Look ee
here!
_Rause_: What's want?
_Tummas_: Woot, or wootn't?
Off went Rause at a run, and Tummas clattering after. Thought the
listener, "Was ever the important question put in straighter terms?
Woot, or wootn't? Will you, or won't you?"
Tu-whit--tu-what! Steadily the scythe was swung, and the swathe fell in
rows behind it.