HODGE'S FIELDS
The labourer working all the year round in the open air cannot but note to
some degree those changes in tree and plant which coincide with the
variations of his daily employment. Early in March, as he walks along the
southern side of the hedge, where the dead oak leaves still cumber the
trailing ivy, he can scarcely avoid seeing that pointed tongues of green
are pushing up. Some have widened into black-spotted leaves; some are
notched like the many-barbed bone harpoons of savage races. The hardy
docks are showing, and the young nettles have risen up. Slowly the dark
and grey hues of winter are yielding to the lively tints of spring. The
blackthorn has white buds on its lesser branches, and the warm rays of the
sun have drawn forth the buds on one favoured hawthorn in a sheltered
nook, so that the green of the coming leaf is visible. Bramble bushes
still retain their forlorn, shrivelled foliage; the hardy all but
evergreen leaves can stand cold, but when biting winds from the north and
east blow for weeks together even these curl at the edge and die.
The remarkable power of wind upon leaves is sometimes seen in May, when a
strong gale, even from the west, will so beat and batter the tender
horse-chestnut sprays that they bruise and blacken. The slow plough
traverses the earth, and the white dust rises from the road and drifts
into the field. In winter the distant copse seemed black; now it appears
of a dull reddish brown from the innumerable catkins and buds. The
delicate sprays of the birch are fringed with them, the aspen has a load
of brown, there are green catkins on the bare hazel boughs, and the
willows have white 'pussy-cats.' The horse-chestnut buds--the hue of dark
varnish--have enlarged, and stick to the finger if touched; some are so
swollen as to nearly burst and let the green appear. Already it is
becoming more difficult to look right through the copse. In winter the
light could be seen on the other side; now catkin, bud, and opening leaf
have thickened and check the view. The same effect was produced not long
since by the rime on the branches in the frosty mornings; while each
smallest twig was thus lined with crystal it was not possible to see
through. Tangled weeds float down the brook, catching against projecting
branches that dip into the stream, or slowly rotating and carried
apparently up the current by the eddy and back-water behind the bridge. In
the pond the frogs have congregated in great numbers; their constant
'croo-croo' is audible at some distance.
The meadows, so long bound by frost and covered with snow, are slowly
losing their wan aspect, and assuming a warmer green as the young blades
of grass come upwards. Where the plough or harrow has passed over the
clods they quickly change from the rich brown of fresh-turned soil to a
whiter colour, the dryness of the atmosphere immediately dissipating the
moisture in the earth. So, examine what you will, from the clod to the
tiniest branch, the hedge, the mound, the water--everywhere a step forward
has been taken. The difference in a particular case may be minute; but it
is there, and together these faint indications show how closely spring is
approaching.
As the sun rises the chaffinch utters his bold challenge on the tree; the
notes are so rapid that they seem to come all at once. Welcome, indeed, is
the song of the first finch. Sparrows are busy in the garden--the hens are
by far the most numerous now, half a dozen together perch on the bushes.
One suddenly darts forth and seizes a black insect as it flies in the
sunshine. The bee, too, is abroad, and once now and then a yellow
butterfly. From the copse on the warmer days comes occasionally the deep
hollow bass of the wood pigeon. On the very topmost branch of an elm a
magpie has perched; now he looks this way, and then turns that, bowing in
the oddest manner, and jerking his long tail up and down. Then two of them
flutter across the field--feebly, as if they had barely strength to reach
the trees in the opposite hedge. Extending their wings they float slowly,
and every now and then the body undulates along its entire length. Rooks
are building--they fly and feed now in pairs; the rookery is alive with
them. To the steeple the jackdaws have returned and fly round and round;
now one holds his wings rigid and slides down at an angle of sixty degrees
at a breakneck pace, as if about to dash himself in fragments on the
garden beneath.
Sometimes there come a few days which are like summer. There is an almost
cloudless sky, a gentle warm breeze, and a bright sun filling the fields
with a glow of light. The air, though soft and genial, is dry, and perhaps
it is this quality which gives so peculiar a definition to hedge, tree,
and hill. A firm, almost hard, outline brings copse and wood into clear
relief; the distance across the broadest fields appears sensibly
diminished. Such freedom from moisture has a deliciously exhilarating
effect on those who breathe so pure an atmosphere. The winds of March
differ, indeed, in a remarkable manner from, the gales of the early year,
which, even when they blow from a mild quarter, compel one to keep in
constant movement because of the aqueous vapour they carry. But the true
March wind, though too boisterous to be exactly genial, causes a joyous
sense of freshness, as if the very blood in the veins were refined and
quickened upon inhaling it. There is a difference in its roar--the note is
distinct from the harsh sound of the chilly winter blast. On the lonely
highway at night, when other noises are silent, the March breeze rushes
through the tall elms in a wild cadence. The white clouds hasten over,
illuminated from behind by a moon approaching the full; every now and then
a break shows a clear blue sky and a star shining. Now a loud roar
resounds along the hedgerow like the deafening boom of the surge; it
moderates, dies away, then an elm close by bends and sounds as the blast
comes again. In another moment the note is caught up and repeated by a
distant tree, and so one after another joins the song till the chorus
reaches its highest pitch. Then it sinks again, and so continues with
pauses and deep inspirations, for March is like a strong man drawing his
breath full and long as he starts to run a race.
The sky, too, like the earth, whose hedges, trees, and meadows are
acquiring fresher colours, has now a more lovely aspect. At noon-day, if
the clouds be absent, it is a rich azure; after sunset a ruddy glow
appears almost all round the horizon, while the thrushes sing in the wood
till the twilight declines. At night, when the moon does not rise till
late, the heavens are brilliant with stars. In the east Arcturus is up;
the Great Bear, the Lesser Bear, and Cassiopeia are ranged about the Pole.
Procyon goes before the Dog; the noble constellation of Orion stretches
broad across the sky; almost overhead lucent Capella looks down. Aries
droops towards the west; the Bull follows with the red Aldebaran, and the
Pleiades. Behind these, Castor and Pollux, and next the cloudlike,
nebulous Cancer. Largest of all, great Sirius is flaming in the south,
quivering with the ebb and flow of his light, sometimes with an emerald
scintillation like a dewdrop on which a sunbeam glances.
The busy summer, with its haymaking, reaping, and continuous succession of
harvest work, passes too swiftly for reflection both for masters and men.
But in the calm of autumn there is time again to look round. Then white
columns of smoke rise up slowly into the tranquil atmosphere, till they
overtop the tallest elms, and the odour of the burning couch is carried
across the meadows from the lately-ploughed stubble, where the weeds have
been collected in heaps and fired. The stubble itself, short and in
regular lines, affords less and less cover every year. As the seed is now
drilled in, and the plants grow in mathematically straight lines, of
course when the crop is reaped, if you stand at one side of the field you
can see right across between the short stubbs, so that a mouse could
hardly find shelter. Then quickly come the noisy steam ploughing engines,
after them the couch collectors, and finally the heaps are burnt, and the
strong scent of smoke hangs over the ground. Against these interruptions
of their haunts and quiet ways what are the partridges to do? Even at
night the place is scarcely their own, for every now and then as the
breeze comes along, the smouldering fires are fanned into bright flame,
enough to alarm the boldest bird.
In another broad arable field, where the teams have been dragging the
plough, but have only just opened a few furrows and gone home, a flock of
sheep are feeding, or rather picking up a little, having been, turned in,
that nothing might be lost. There is a sense of quietness--of repose; the
trees of the copse close by are still, and the dying leaf as it drops
falls straight to the ground. A faint haze clings to the distant woods at
the foot of the hills; it is afternoon, the best part of an autumn day,
and sufficiently warm to make the stile a pleasant resting-place. A dark
cloud, whose edges rise curve upon curve, hangs in the sky, fringed with
bright white light, for the sun is behind it, and long, narrow streamers
of light radiate from the upper part like the pointed rays of an antique
crown. Across an interval of blue to the eastward a second massive cloud,
white and shining as if beaten out of solid silver, fronts the sun, and
reflects the beams passing horizontally through the upper ether downwards
on the earth like a mirror.
The sparrows in the stubble rise in a flock and settle down again. Yonder
a solitary lark is singing. Then the sun emerges, and the yellow autumn
beams flood the pale stubble and the dark red earth of the furrow. On the
bushes in the hedge hang the vines of the bryony, bearing thick masses of
red berries. The hawthorn leaves in places have turned pale, and are
touched, too, towards the stalk with a deep brown hue. The contrast of the
two tints causes an accidental colour resembling that of bronze, which
catches the eye at the first glance, but disappears on looking closer.
Spots of yellow on the elms seem the more brilliant from the background of
dull green. The drooping foliage of the birch exhibits a paler yellow; the
nut-tree bushes shed brown leaves upon the ground. Perhaps the beech
leaves are the most beautiful; two or three tints are blended on the
topmost boughs. There is a ruddy orange hue, a tawny brown, and a bright
green; the sunlight comes and mingles these together. The same leaf will
sometimes show two at least of these colours--green shading into brown, or
into a ruddy gold. Later on, the oaks, in a monochrome of buff, will rival
the beeches. Now and then an acorn drops from the tree overhead, with a
smart tap on the hard earth, and rebounds some inches high. Some of these
that fall are already dark--almost black--but if opened they will be found
bored by a grub. They are not yet ripe as a crop; the rooks are a good
guide in that respect, and they have not yet set steadily to work upon
this their favourite autumn food. Others that have fallen and been knocked
out of the cup are a light yellow at the base and green towards the middle
and the point; the yellow part is that which has been covered by the cup.
In the sward there is a small hole from out of which creeps a wasp at
intervals; it is a nest, and some few of them are still at work. But their
motions are slow and lack vivacity; before long, numbers must die, and
already many have succumbed after crawling miserably on the ground which
they spurned a short while since, when with a brisk buzz they flew from
apple to plum.
In the quiet woodland lane a covey of partridges are running to and fro on
the short sward at the side, and near them two or three pheasants are
searching for food. The geometrical spiders--some of them look almost as
big as a nut--hang their webs spun to a regular pattern on the bushes. The
fungi flourish; there is a huge specimen on the elm there, but the flowers
are nearly gone.
A few steps down the lane, upon looking over a gate into a large arable
field where the harrow has broken up the clods, a faint bluish tinge may
be noticed on the dull earth in the more distant parts. A second glance
shows that it is caused by a great flock of woodpigeons. Some more come
down out of the elms and join their companions; there must be a hundred
and fifty or two hundred of them. The woodpigeon on the ground at a
distance is difficult to distinguish, or rather to define individually--the
pale blue tint seems to confuse the eye with a kind of haze. Though the
flock take little notice now--knowing themselves to be far out of
gunshot--yet they would be quickly on the alert if an attempt were made to
approach them.
Already some of the elms are becoming bare--there are gaps in the foliage
where the winds have carried away the leaves. On the bramble bushes the
blackberries cluster thickly, unseen and ungathered in this wild spot. The
happy hearts that go a-blackberrying think little of the past: yet there
is a deep, a mournful significance attached to that joyous time. For how
many centuries have the blackberries tempted men, women, and children out
into the fields, laughing at scratched hands and nettles, and clinging
burrs, all merrily endured for the sake of so simple a treasure-trove.
Under the relics of the ancient pile-dwellings of Switzerland, disinterred
from the peat and other deposits, have been found quantities of blackberry
seeds, together with traces of crabs and sloes; so that by the dwellers in
those primeval villages in the midst of the lakes the wild fruits of
autumn were sought for much as we seek them now; the old instincts are
strong in us still.
The fieldfares will soon be here now, and the redwings, coming as they
have done for generations about the time of the sowing of the corn.
Without an almanack they know the dates; so the old sportsmen used to
declare that their pointers and setters were perfectly aware when
September was approaching, and showed it by unusual restlessness. By the
brook the meadows are green and the grass long still; the flags, too, are
green, though numbers of dead leaves float down on the current. There is
green again where the root crops are flourishing; but the brown tints are
striving hard, and must soon gain the mastery of colour. From the barn
comes the clatter of the winnowing machine, and the floor is covered with
heaps of grain.
After the sun has gone down and the shadows are deepening, it is lighter
in the open stubbles than in the enclosed meadows--the short white stubbs
seem to reflect what little light there is. The partridges call to each
other, and after each call run a few yards swiftly, till they assemble at
the well-known spot where they roost. Then comes a hare stealing by
without a sound. Suddenly he perceives that he is watched, and goes off at
a rapid pace, lost in the brooding shadow across the field. Yonder a row
of conical-roofed wheat-ricks stand out boldly against the sky, and above
them a planet shines.
Still later, in November, the morning mist lingers over gorse and heath,
and on the upper surfaces of the long dank grass blades, bowed by their
own weight, are white beads of dew. Wherever the eye seeks an object to
dwell on, there the cloud-like mist seems to thicken as though to hide it.
The bushes and thickets are swathed in the vapour; yonder, in the hollow,
it clusters about the oaks and hangs upon the hedge looming in the
distance. There it no sky--a motionless, colourless something spreads
above; it is, of course, the same mist, but looking upwards it apparently
recedes and becomes indefinite. The glance finds no point to rest on--as
on the edges of clouds--it is a mere opaque expanse. But the air is dry,
the moisture does not deposit itself, it remains suspended, and waits but
the wind to rise and depart. The stillness is utter: not a bird calls or
insect buzzes by. In passing beneath the oaks the very leaves have
forgotten to fall. Only those already on the sward, touched by the frost,
crumble under the footstep. When green they would have yielded to the
weight, but now stiffened they resist it and are crushed, breaking in
pieces.
A creaking and metallic rattle, as of chains, comes across the arable
field--a steady gaze reveals the dim outline of a team of horses slowly
dragging the plough, their shapes indistinctly seen against the hedge. A
bent figure follows, and by-and-by another distinct creak and rattle, and
yet a third in another direction, show that there are more teams at work,
plodding to and fro. Watching their shadowy forms, suddenly the eye
catches a change in the light somewhere. Over the meadow yonder the mist
is illuminated; it is not sunshine, but a white light, only visible by
contrast with the darker mist around. It lasts a few moments, and then
moves, and appears a second time by the copse. Though hidden here, the
disk of the sun must be partly visible there, and as the white light does
not remain long in one place, it is evident that there is motion now in
the vast mass of vapour. Looking upwards there is the faintest suspicion
of the palest blue, dull and dimmed by mist, so faint that its position
cannot be fixed, and the next instant it is gone again.
But the teams at plough are growing momentarily distinct--a breath of air
touches the cheek, then a leaf breaks away from the bough and starts forth
as if bent on a journey, but loses the impetus and sinks to the ground.
Soon afterwards the beams of the sun light up a distant oak that glows in
the hedge--a rich deep buff--and it stands out, clear, distinct, and
beautiful, the chosen and selected one, the first to receive the ray.
Rapidly the mist vanishes--disappearing rather than floating away; a
circle of blue sky opens overhead, and, finally, travelling slowly, comes
the sunshine over the furrows. There is a perceptible sense of warmth--the
colours that start into life add to the feeling. The bare birch has no
leaf to reflect it, but its white bark shines, and beyond it two great
elms, the one a pale green and the other a pale yellow, stand side by
side. The brake fern is dead and withered; the tip of each frond curled
over downwards by the frost, but it forms a brown background to the dull
green furze which is alight here and there with scattered blossom, by
contrast so brilliantly yellow as to seem like flame. Polished holly
leaves glisten, and a bunch of tawny fungus rears itself above the grass.
On the sheltered sunny bank lie the maple leaves fallen from the bushes,
which form a bulwark against the north wind; they have simply dropped upon
the ivy which almost covers the bank. Standing here with the oaks overhead
and the thick bushes on the northern side it is quite warm and genial; so
much so that if is hard to realise that winter is at hand. But even in the
shortest days, could we only get rid of the clouds and wind, we should
find the sunshine sufficiently powerful to make the noontide pleasant. It
is not that the sun is weak or low down, nor because of the sharp frosts,
that winter with us is dreary and chill. The real cause is the prevalence
of cloud, through which only a dull light can penetrate, and of
moisture-laden winds.
If our winter sun had fair play we should find the climate very different.
Even as it is, now and then comes a break in the masses of vapour
streaming across the sky, and if you are only sheltered from the wind (or
stand at a southern window), the temperature immediately rises. For this
reason the temperatures registered by thermometers are often far from
being a correct record of the real weather we have had. A bitter frost
early in the morning sends the mercury below zero, but perhaps, by eleven
o'clock the day is warm, the sky being clear and the wind still. The last
register instituted--that of the duration of sunshine, if taken in
connection with the state of the wind--is the best record of the
temperature that we have actually felt. These thoughts naturally arise
under the oaks here as the bright sunlight streams down from a sky the
more deeply blue from contrast with the brown, and buff, and yellow leaves
of the trees.
Hark! There comes a joyous music over the fields--first one hound's, note,
then two, then three, and then a chorus; they are opening up a strong
scent. It rises and falls--now it is coming nearer, in a moment I shall
see them break through the hedge on the ridge--surely that was a shout!
Just in the very moment of expectation the loud tongues cease; I wait,
listening breathlessly, but presently a straggling cry or two shows that
the pack has turned and are spread wide trying to recover. By degrees the
sounds die away; and I stroll onwards.
A thick border of dark green firs bounds the copse--the brown leaves that
have fallen from the oaks have lodged on the foliage of the firs and are
there supported. In the sheltered corner some of the bracken has partly
escaped the frost, one frond has two colours. On one side of the rib it is
green and on the other yellow. The grass is strewn with the leaves of the
aspen, which have turned quite black. Under the great elms there seems a
sudden increase of light--it is caused by the leaves which still remain on
the branches; they are all of the palest yellow, and, as you pass under,
give the impression of the tree having been lit up--illuminated with its
own colour. From the bushes hang the red berries of the night shade, and
the fruit on the briars glistens in the sun. Inside the copse stand
innumerable thistles shoulder high, dead and gaunt; and a grey border
running round the field at the bottom of the hedge shows where the tall,
strong weeds of summer have withered up. A bird flutters round the topmost
boughs of the elm yonder and disappears with a flash of blue--it is a jay.
Here the grass of the meadow has an undertone of grey; then an arable
field succeeds, where six strong horses are drawing the heavy drill, and
great bags of the precious seed are lying on the furrows.
Another meadow, where note a broken bough of elder, the leaves on which
have turned black, while still on its living branches they are green, and
then a clump of beeches. The trunks are full of knot-holes, after a dead
bough has fallen off and the stump has rotted away, the bark curls over
the orifice and seemingly heals the wound more smoothly and completely
than with other trees. But the mischief is proceeding all the same,
despite that flattering appearance; outwardly the bark looks smooth and
healthy, but probe the hole and the rottenness is working inwards. A
sudden gap in the clump attracts the glance, and there--with one great
beech trunk on this side and another on that--is a view opening down on
the distant valley far below. The wood beneath looks dwarfed, and the
uneven tops of the trees, some green, some tinted, are apparently so close
together as to hide aught else, and the shadows of the clouds move over it
as over a sea. A haze upon the horizon brings plain and sky together
there; on one side, in the far distance a huge block, a rude vastness
stands out dusky and dimly defined--it is a spur of the rolling hills.
Out in the plain, many a mile away, the sharp, needle-like point of a
steeple rises white above the trees, which there shade and mingle into a
dark mass--so brilliantly white as to seem hardly real. Sweeping the view
round, there is a strange and total absence of houses or signs of
habitation, other than the steeple, and now that, too, is gone. It has
utterly vanished--where, but a few moments before it glowed with
whiteness, is absolutely nothing. The disappearance is almost weird in the
broad daylight, as if solid stone could sink into the earth. Searching for
it suddenly a village appears some way on the right--the white walls stand
out bright and clear, one of the houses is evidently of large size, and
placed on a slight elevation is a prominent object. But as we look it
fades, grows blurred and indistinct, and in another moment is gone. The
whole village has vanished--in its place is nothing; so swift is the
change that the mind scarcely credits the senses.
A deep shadow creeping towards us explains it. Where the sunlight falls,
there steeple or house glows and shines; when it has passed, the haze that
is really there, though itself invisible, instantly blots out the picture.
The thing may be seen over and over again in the course of a few minutes;
it would be difficult for an artist to catch so fleeting an effect. The
shadow of the cloud is not black--it lacks several shades of that--there
is in it a faint and yet decided tint of blue. This tone of blue is not
the same everywhere--here it is almost distinct, there it fades; it is an
aerial colour which rather hints itself than shows. Commencing the descent
the view is at once lost, but we pass a beech whose beauty is not easily
conveyed. The winds have scarcely rifled it; being in a sheltered spot on
the slope, the leaves are nearly perfect. All those on the outer boughs
are a rich brown--some, perhaps, almost orange. But there is an inner mass
of branches of lesser size which droop downwards, something after the
manner of a weeping willow; and the leaves on these are still green and
show through. Upon the whole tree a flood of sunshine pours, and over it
is the azure sky. The mingling, shading, and contrast of these colours
give a lovely result--the tree is aglow, its foliage ripe with colour.
Farther down comes the steady sound of deliberate blows, and the upper
branches of the hedge falls beneath the steel. A sturdy labourer, with a
bill on a pole, strikes slow and strong and cuts down the hedge to an even
height. A dreadful weapon that simple tool must have been in the old days
before the advent of the arquebus. For with the exception of the spike,
which is not needed for hedge work, it is almost an exact copy of the
brown bill of ancient warfare; it is brown still, except where sharpened.
Wielded by a sinewy arm, what, gaping gashes it must have slit through
helm and mail and severed bone! Watch the man there--he slices off the
tough thorn as though it were straw. He notes not the beauty of the beech
above him, nor the sun, nor the sky; but on the other hand, when the sky
is hidden, the sun gone, and the beautiful beech torn by the raving winds
neither does he heed that. Rain and tempest affect him not; the glaring
heat of summer, the bitter frost of winter are alike to him. He is built
up like an oak. Believe it, the man that from his boyhood has stood
ankle-deep in the chill water of the ditch, patiently labouring with axe
and bill; who has trudged across the furrow, hand on plough, facing sleet
and mist; who has swung the sickle under the summer sun--this is the man
for the trenches. This is the man whom neither the snows of the North nor
the sun of the South can vanquish; who will dig and delve, and carry
traverse and covered way forward in the face of the fortress, who will lie
on the bare ground in the night. For they who go up to battle must fight
the hard earth and the tempest, as well as face bayonet and ball. As of
yore with the brown bill, so now with the rifle--the muscles that have
been trained about the hedges and fields will not fail England in the hour
of danger.
Hark!--a distant whoop--another, a blast of a horn, and then a burst of
chiding that makes the woods ring. Down drops the bill, and together,
heedless of any social difference in the common joy, we scramble to the
highest mound, and see the pack sweep in full cry across the furrows.
Crash--it is the bushes breaking, as the first foam-flecked, wearied horse
hardly rises to his leap, and yet crushes safely through, opening a way,
which is quickly widened by the straggling troop behind. Ha! down the lane
from the hill dashes another squadron that has eroded the chord of the arc
and comes in fresher. Ay, and a third is entering at the bottom there, one
by one, over the brook. Woods, field, and paths, but just before an empty
solitude, are alive with men and horses. Up yonder, along the ridge,
gallops another troop in single file, well defined against the sky, going
parallel to the hounds. What a view they must have of the scene below! Two
ladies who ride up with torn skirts cannot lift their panting horses at
the double mound. Well, let us defy 'wilful damage' for once. The gate,
jealously padlocked, is swiftly hoisted off its hinges, and away they go
with hearty thanks. We slip the gate on again just as some one hails to us
across the field to wait a minute, but seeing it is only a man we calmly
replace the timber and let him take his chance. He is excited, but we
smile stolidly. In another minute the wave of life is gone; it has swept
over and disappeared as swiftly as it came. The wood, the field, and lane
seem painfully--positively painfully--empty. Slowly the hedger and ditcher
goes back to his work, where in the shade under the bushes even now the
dew lingers.
So there are days to be enjoyed out of doors even in much-abused November.
And when the wind rises and the storm is near, if you get under the lee of
a good thick copse there is a wild pleasure in the frenzy that passes
over. With a rush the leaves stream outwards, thickening the air, whirling
round and round; the tree-tops bend and sigh, the blast strikes them, and
in an instant they are stripped and bare. A spectral rustling, as the
darkness falls and the black cloud approaches, is the fallen leaves in the
copse, lifted up from their repose and dashed against the underwood. Then
a howl of wrath descends and fills the sense of hearing, so that for the
moment it is hard to tell what is happening. A rushing hiss follows, and
the rain hurtles through the branches, driving so horizontally as to pass
overhead. The sheltering thorn-thicket stirs, and a long, deep, moaning
roar rises from the fir-trees. Another howl that seems to stun--to so fill
the ears with sound that they cannot hear--the aerial host charges the
tree-ranks, and the shock makes them tremble to the root. Still another
and another; twigs and broken boughs fly before it and strew the sward;
larger branches that have long been dead fall crashing downwards; leaves
are forced right through the thorn-thicket, and strike against the face.
Fortunately, so fierce a fury cannot last; presently the billows of wind
that strike the wood come at longer intervals and with less vigour; then
the rain increases, and yet a little while and the storm has swept on. The
very fury--the utter _abandon_--of its rage is its charm; the spirit rises
to meet it, and revels in the roar and buffeting. By-and-by they who have
faced it have their reward. The wind sinks, the rain ceases, a pale blue
sky shows above, and then yonder appears a majesty of cloud--a Himalaya of
vapour. Crag on crag rises the vast pile--such jagged and pointed rocks as
never man found on earth, or, if he found, could climb--topped with a peak
that towers to the heavens, and leans--visibly leans--and threatens to
fall and overwhelm the weak world at its feet. A gleam as of snow glitters
on the upper rocks, the passes are gloomy and dark, the faces of the
precipice are lit up with a golden gleam from the rapidly-sinking sun. So
the magic structure stands and sees the great round disk go down. The
night gathers around those giant mounts and dark space receives them.