life than I did when I wrote you last. And I can't help being pleased
that Ellaline's adored one won't be able to leave his manoeuvres, to
make her his own, till a fortnight or so later than she expected. That
is, I can't help being glad, as the doctor thinks you ought to stop at
Champel-les-Bains till after the first week of September, and we
_couldn't_ be together, even if I were back in Paris. You swear you
didn't hypnotize him to say that? I would enjoy more peace of mind,
while careering through England in Apollo, if I were certain.
Oh, that reminds me, I forgot to tell you what fun it was christening
Apollo. I quite enjoyed it, and felt immensely important. Don't you
think "Apollo" an appropriate name for such a magnificent car as I've
described to you? The Sun God--Driver of the Chariot of the Sun? Sir
Lionel likes it; but he says he isn't sure "The Cloud" wouldn't be a
more appropriate name, because the car costs such a lot that "she" has a
silver lining. I began by calling her "it," but he won't let me do that.
He doesn't much mind my being amateurish, but he hates me to be
disrespectful.
I am so dazzled by the motor and enchanted with the sport of
motoring--as well as seeing things even more lovely than I hoped
for--that I'm not worrying over Dick Burden and his mysterious hints
about himself as a detective. Besides, when he and his aunt came to tea
(you'll remember I told you in a scrap of a note that it was the day Sir
Lionel went to Warwickshire, and how vexed Mrs. Senter was to find him
gone), Mr. Dick made himself quite pleasant. He wasn't impertinent, or
too admiring, or anything which a well-brought-up young Englishman ought
not to be. Indeed, I thought by his manner that he wanted tacitly to
apologize for his bad behaviour when we first met; so probably, when I
fancied he looked wicked that night at Ennis's Rooms, it _was_ because
he wanted to sneeze. You have taught me to give everybody, except young
men, the benefit of the doubt; but I don't see why one shouldn't give it
to young men, too. I think they're rather easier to forgive, somehow,
than women. Is that why they're dangerous? But D. B. could never be
dangerous to me, in the sense of falling in love.
His aunt certainly wishes to throw us together; I suppose on account of
Ellaline's money. She doesn't like girls, I'm sure, but would always be
ready, on principle, to give first aid to heiresses. It is something to
be thankful for that she hasn't grafted herself on to our party, as I
feared she might; and though they're both going to stop at some country
house near Southsea, and they "hope we may meet," I dare say I shan't be
bothered by them again while I'm in England. I don't intend to worry.
_La donna é automobile!_
I haven't properly described our start, or told you about the things
I've seen _en route_, and I promised to tell you everything; so I'll go
back to the beginning of the trip.
There was Apollo, throbbing with joy of life in front of the hotel door,
at nine o'clock of a perfect English morning. There were statuesque,
Ritzy footmen, gazing admiringly at the big golden-yellow car (that was
one of the reasons I thought she should be named after the Sun God, she
is so golden). There was Charu Chunder Bose, alias Young Nick, who would
think it a sin against all his gods to dress as a chauffeur, and who
continues to garb himself as a self-respecting Bengali--Young Nick, with
his sleepy eyes, and his Buddha-when-young smile, about as appropriate
on a motor-car as a baby crocodile. There was Sir Lionel waiting to tuck
us in. There were we two females in neat gray motor dust-cloaks, on
which the Dragon insisted; Mrs. Norton in a toque, which she wore as if
it were a remote and dreaded contingency; your Audrie in a duck of an
early Victorian bonnet, in which she liked herself better than in
anything else she ever had on before. There, too, was our luggage, made
to fit the car, and looking like the very last word of up-to-dateness--if
you know what that look is.
Of course, it wasn't the first time I'd been out in the car, for I think
I told you, the day Apollo was christened I had a spin; but it rained,
and we went only through the Park. That was nothing. This morning we
were bidding good-bye to London, and our pulses were beating high for
the Tour. Young Nick drove on the christening day, but this time Sir
Lionel took the driver's seat, with the brown idol beside him; and I saw
instantly, by the very way he laid his hand on the steering-wheel, with
a kind of caress--as a horse-lover pats a beloved mare's neck--that he
and the golden car were in perfect sympathy.
We were starting early, because Sir Lionel had planned a good many
things for us to see before dark; but early as it was, Piccadilly and
Knightsbridge were seething with traffic. Motor-'buses like mad
hippopotamuses; taxi-cabs like fierce young lions; huge carts like
elephants; and other vehicles of all sorts to make up a confused medley
of wild animals escaped from the Zoo. It looked appalling to mingle
with, but our own private Dragon drove so skilfully, yet so carefully,
that I never bit my heart once. Always the car seemed sentient, steering
its way like a long, thin pike; then when the chance came, flashing
ahead, dauntless and sure.
We went by a great domed palace--Harrod's Stores--and then over Putney
Bridge, passing Swinburne's house, whose outside is as deceiving as an
oyster-shell that hides a pearl; through Epsom, Charles the Second's
"Brighton" (which I've been reading about in a volume of Pepys Sir
Lionel has given me), to Leatherhead, along the Dorking Road, slowing up
for a glimpse of Juniper Hall, glowing red as a smouldering bonfire
behind a dark latticed screen of splendid Lebanon cedars. I dare say
it's a good deal changed since dear little Fanny Burney's day, for the
house looks quite modern; but then neither buildings nor the people who
live in them show their age early in England.
Close under Box Hill we glided; and Sir Lionel pointed out a little path
leading up on the left to George Meredith's cottage. Just a small house
of gray stone it is (for I would get out and walk up part way to see it
from far off, not to intrude or spy); and there that great genius shines
out, a clear, white light for the world, like a beacon or a star.
Evidently Surrey air suits geniuses. Do you remember reading about
Keats, that he wrote a lot of "Endymion" at Burford Bridge? It was only
a little after ten o'clock when we passed the quaint-looking hotel
there, but already at least a dozen motors were drawn up before it. I
wanted to go in and ask if they show the room Lord Nelson used; but we
had too many things to see.
Of course, I am always wishing for you, but I began to wish the hardest
just as we came into this green, brackeny, fairyland of Surrey. It's the
kind of country you love best; although I must say it was never planned
for motors. Winding through those green tunnels which are the Surrey
lanes, I felt as if, in some quaint dream, I were motoring on a
tight-rope, expecting another car to want to pass me on the same
rope--which naturally it couldn't!
It would have been much worse, though, if Young Nick had been driving.
That little, smooth brown face of his looks as if its idol-simper hid no
human emotions, and I believe if people and animals were perfectly flat,
like paper dolls, so that they would do no harm to his car, he wouldn't
mind how many he drove over. Luckily, however, they _aren't_ flat, and
the only thing earthly he adores, after his master, is his motor; so he
is nice and cautious for its sake. But the Dragon thinks of everyone,
and says there's no pleasure for him in motoring if he leaves a trail of
distress or even annoyance along the road as he passes. He slows down at
corners; he goes carefully round them; he almost walks Apollo in places
where creatures of any kind may start out unexpectedly; and he blows our
pleasant musical horn as if by instinct, never forgetting, as I'm sure I
should do.
As we twisted and turned through the Surrey lanes, between Dorking and
Shere, little children in red cloaks and tams appeared from behind
hedges, looking like blowing poppies as they ran. And blue-eyed,
gold-brown haired girls in cottage doorways, under hanging bowers of
roses, were as decorative as Old Chelsea china girls. The red tiles of
their roofs, as I turned back for one more glimpse, would already be
half hidden in waves of green, but would just show up like beds of
scarlet geraniums buried in leaves.
Shere was almost too beautiful to be real, with its rows of Elizabethan
cottages whose windows twinkled at us with their diamond-shaped,
diamond-bright panes, sparkling under their low, thatch-eyebrows, from
between black oak beams. The Tudor chimneys were as graceful as the
smoke wreaths that lazily spiraled above them, and the whole effect
was--was--well, inexpressibly Birket Foster. I used to think he
idealized; but then, I'd never seen anything of England but London, and
didn't know how all English trees, cottages, and even clouds, are
trained to group themselves to suit artists of different schools.
I kept wishing that you'd made me study architecture and botany, instead
of languages and music. In justice to oneself, one ought, when
travelling in England, to have at least a bowing acquaintance with every
sort of architecture, and all families of flowers, to say nothing of
trees, so that one might exclaim, as snobs do of royalties and
celebrities: "Oh, _she_ was the great granddaughter of So-and-So." "He
married Lady This-and-That." Also, I find I need much more knowledge of
literature than I have. This country is divided off into a kind of
glorious chessboard, each square being sacred to some immortal author,
playwright, or poet. The artists press them close, without overcrowding;
and history lies underneath--history for every square inch.
"Twelve coffin deep," I quoted Kipling to myself, as my mind panted
along Roman roads, and the Pilgrim's Way.
"Why, was there a cemetery there?" asked Mrs. Norton, looking mildly
interested.
She, by the way, doesn't much care for ruins. She says they're so
untidy.
You and I travelled till our money threatened to give out in the noble
cause of sight-seeing, but I never realized history quite so potently
even in Italy as I do in England. Yet that's not strange, when you think
how tiny England is, compared with other countries, and how things have
gone on happening there every minute since the Phoenicians found it a
snug little island. Its chapters of history have to be packed like
sardines, beginning down, down, far deeper than Kipling's "twelve
coffins."
One Surrey village telleth another, just to slip through in a motor-car,
though none could ever be tiresome in the telling; but if one stopped to
hear the real story of each one, how different they would all be! There
would be grand chapters of fighting, and mysterious chapters of
smuggling--oh, but long ones about smuggling, since most of the manors
and half the old cottages have "smugglers' rooms," where the lace and
spirits used to be hidden, in their secret journey from Portsmouth to
London. It's difficult to believe in these thrilling chapters now, in
the rich, placid county, where the only mystery floats in the veil of
blue mist that twists like a gauze scarf around the tree trunks in the
woods, and the only black spots are the dark downs in the distance, with
the sky pale gold behind them.
You would love motoring, not only for what you do see, but for what you
nearly see, and long to see, but can't--just as Dad used to say "Thank
God for all the blessings I've never had!" Why, every road you don't go
down looks fantastically alluring, just twice as alluring as the one you
are in. You grudge missing anything, and fear, greedily, that there may
be better villages with more history beyond the line of your route. It's
no consolation when Mrs. Norton says, "Well, you can't see everything!"
You _want_ to see everything. And you wish you had eyes all the way
round your head. It would be inconvenient for hair and hats, but you
could manage somehow.
We had to go through Petworth, a most feudal-looking old place, reeking
of history since the Confessor, and mentioned in the Domesday Book (I do
so respect towns or houses mentioned in the Domesday Book!), and if it
had been the right day we could have seen Lord Leconsfield's collection
of pictures, some of the best in England; but it was the wrong day, so
we sailed on out of Surrey into Sussex, and arrived at Bignor.
All I knew about Bignor was that I must expect something amazing there.
Sir Lionel asked me not to read about it in the books of which we have a
travelling library in the car--one at least for each county we shall
visit. He said he "wanted Bignor to be a surprise" for me; and it is odd
the way one finds oneself obeying that man! Not that one's afraid of
him, but--well, I don't know why exactly, but one just does it. We
didn't stop in the village, though there was the quaintest grocery shop
there you can imagine, perfectly mediæval; and in the churchyard yew
trees grand enough to make bows for half the archers of England--if
there were any in these days. We went on to quite a modern-looking
farmhouse, and Sir Lionel said, "I am going to ask Mrs. Tupper if she
will give us a little lunch. If she says 'yes,' it's sure to be good."
"I don't know any Tuppers, Lionel," objected Mrs. Norton. "Who are
they?"
"Relatives of Martin Tupper, if that name recalls anything to your
mind," said he.
Mrs. Norton had a vague idea that she had been more or less brought up
on extracts from Martin Tupper, and seemed to associate him with
Sundays, when, as a child, she hadn't been allowed to play. But that
didn't explain how Lionel happened to know connections of his in a
Sussex farmhouse. Besides, he couldn't possibly have seen them for more
than fifteen years.
"That is true, and I only saw them once, even then," he admitted. "But
Mrs. Tupper had been here for a good many years, engaged in the most
delightful work, which you will hear about by and by; and I'm sure she
is here still, and will be for many more years to come, because I don't
want to imagine the place without her."
Mrs. Norton said no more, and her brother knocked on the door of the
farmhouse, which stood hospitably open. In a minute, a dear old
white-haired lady appeared, and instantly her face lighted up.
"Why, if it isn't Mr. Pendragon--I mean Sir Lionel--come back to see us
again!" said she.
Sir Lionel grew red with pleasure, at being remembered by her, for
apparently he hadn't at all expected it. He seems to forget that he is a
celebrity, and generally doesn't like being reminded of the fact, but he
was pleased that Mrs. Tupper had read about him in the papers from time
to time, and had never forgotten his face.
She said she would be delighted to provide us with lunch, if we didn't
mind a simple one; and then she would have gone on to say something
which would have given the "surprise" away, if Sir Lionel hadn't stopped
her.
We had delicious country things to eat, with real Surrey cream and apple
dumplings. They did taste good after the elaborate French cooking in
London, by way of contrast! Then, when we had finished, Sir Lionel said,
"Now, Mrs. Tupper, can you take us for a stroll round the farm?"
That didn't sound exciting, did it? We walked out, and it seemed a very
nice farm, but nothing remarkable. As we wandered toward some sheds, in
a field of mangolds, Sir Lionel made us look up at a big hill, and said,
"There was a Roman camp there. If you'd stood where you stand now, on a
quiet night in those times, you could have heard the clanking of armour
or the soldiers quarrelling over their dice. Here Roman Stane Street
ran, and chariots used to stop to bring the latest news from Rome to the
owner of the villa."
"Was there a villa?" asked Mrs. Norton, who thinks it polite to ask her
brother questions, whether she is interested or not.
"Let's take a look into this shed," said he, by way of answer. And,
there, protected by that rough roof, was a great stretch of splendid
mosaic pavement. It was done in circular compartments of ornamentation,
and in one was a beautiful head of Ganymede--in another, Winter. Alas, I
shouldn't have known what they were if I hadn't been told, but I would
have known that they were rare and wonderful.
This was the "surprise." This was the secret of Bignor; but it wasn't
nearly all. There were lovely broken pillars, and lots more pavements,
acres of mosaic, it seemed; for the villa had been large and important,
and must have been built by a rich man with cultivated taste. He knew
how to make exile endurable, did that Roman gentleman! Standing in his
dining-hall, I could imagine him and his fair lady-wife sitting at
breakfast, looking out from between white, glittering pillars at the
Sussex downs, grander than those of Surrey, reminding me of great, brave
shoulders raised to protect England. Now we knew what Mrs. Tupper's
"delightful work" was! For forty-nine years she has cleaned the mosaic
pavement of the vanished Roman villa, all of which were discovered by
the grandfather of the present owner of the farm. Never once has she
tired of looking at the mosaics, because, as she explained to us, "one
doesn't tire of what is beautiful." There speaks true appreciation,
doesn't it? Only a born lover of the beautiful could have said that so
simply.
There was an Italian, a man from Venice, repairing the mosaic. He could
hardly speak a word of English, and beamed with a sudden smile when I
asked him some question in his native tongue. We talked awhile, and I
translated several things he said to Sir Lionel and his sister. I'm
ashamed to confess, dear, that I was pleased to show off my poor little
accomplishment, and proud because I knew one thing which our famous man
didn't. Wasn't that low of me?
"Well, you weren't disappointed in my surprise, I think?" said Sir
Lionel, when we were starting away at last.
I just gave him one look. It really wasn't necessary to answer.
As we flashed on, through country always exquisite, and over perfect
roads, I could think of nothing but Bignor, until suddenly, after
passing through a long aisle of great beeches, like an avenue in a
private park, a tremendous bulk of stone looming at me made me jump, and
cry out, "Oh!"
Sir Lionel turned his head long enough for half a smile. "Arundel
Castle," he said.
It's lucky for me that Mrs. Norton doesn't know much about any part of
England except her own home, and the homes of her particular friends, or
else she would always be explaining things to me, and I should hate
that. It would be like having purple hot-house grapes handed out to one
impaled on the prongs of a plated silver fork. I should have wanted to
slap her, if _she_ had told me I was looking at Arundel Castle, but I
was grateful to her brother for the information. This was a wickedness
in me; but if you knew how I felt, having started out from the Ritz
expecting a quiet day's run through one or two of the garden counties of
England, to come like this, bang into the midst of Roman villas, and
under the shadow of a tenth-century castle-keep, maybe you'd excuse my
morals for being upset.
You can't have centuries roll away, like a mere cloud of dust raised by
your motor, and be perfectly normal, can you? I tried to seem calm,
because I hate to be gushing and school-girlish (for Ellaline's sake, I
_suppose_, as it can't make any difference what her Dragon thinks of
me), but I'm pretty sure he saw that I was rather "out of myself" over
all his surprises.
He stopped the motor, and we sat for a long time gazing up at the towers
beyond the green and silver beeches--a pile of battlemented stone,
looking like the Middle Ages carved in granite, yet more habitable
to-day than ever before.
We had lunched early, and had plenty of time, so we walked through the
park, which made me feel that England must be rather big, after all, to
have room for thousands of such parks--even much larger ones--and all
its great cities--and miles and miles of farms and common land, and mere
"country."
When we lived in New York, you and Dad and I, we used to joke about the
way we should feel in England if we should ever go to visit Dad's
ancestral Devonshire. We used to pretend that, after being accustomed to
the vast distances of America, we should be afraid of tumbling off the
edge of England; but so far I find that I don't dread that imminent
peril. Just now England seems so vast that my only fear is I mayn't have
time to reach the Roman Wall.
The Duke's midges bit us a good deal, in the park, so we didn't linger,
but went back to Apollo, where Young Nick's remarkable appearance had
attracted a crowd of boys and girls from Arundel town. They stood in the
road gaping at him, with that steady, unblinking stare English children
and French grown-ups have, while the brown image sat motionless in the
car, as scornfully oblivious of his critics as if he'd been the idol he
looked.
Poor Sir Lionel hates the attention his extraordinary little chauffeur
excites, for, in spite of his long expatriation, he loathes being
conspicuous in any way as heartily as other Englishmen do. But (Mrs.
Norton has told me) he saved Young Nick from being murdered by someone
who was a "family enemy." Since then--it was when Nick was scarcely more
than a child--the brown image has worshipped the Dragon, and refused to
be separated from him. When Sir Lionel proposed providing for him well,
and leaving him behind, Nick made no complaints, but began industriously
to starve himself to death. So, of course, he had to be brought to
England, and his master just makes the best of him, costume, features,
broomstick legs, and all.
We had tea in a picture of Turner's: for Littlehampton, with its tidal
river, its harbour and pier, its fishing boats and shining sails, its
windmill, its goldy-brown sands, and its banked violet clouds, was a
genuine Turner. Of course, he wouldn't have painted the Beach Hotel, in
spite of its nice balconies, but we were glad it was there, and it
didn't spoil the picture.
By that time, it was nearly half-past five, but we had hours of daylight
before us, so we stopped for a look at Climping Church (don't you love
the "ing" that shows a place has kept its Saxon name?) with its splendid
Norman doorway and queer, long windows, shaped like open pods of peas
beautifully ornamented round their edges. Thank goodness, there was
nothing "perp" about it! I get so tired of "perp" things in guide books.
Slinden we glanced at, too, a most idyllic village, garrisoned with the
noblest beeches I ever saw. Hilaire Belloc, whose "Path to Rome" we
liked so much, stayed at Slinden, writing delightful things about
Sussex. I mean to get and read all I can, because, even in the glimpse
I've had, I can see that Sussex has a character, as well as a charm,
individually its own. The Downs give it, and make you feel that a true
man of Sussex would be frank, warm-hearted, simple and brave, with
old-fashioned ways which, with a pleasant obstinacy, he would be loath
to change. I heard Mrs. Tupper quote two or three quaint proverbs which
were new to me, but Sir Lionel said they were old, almost, as the Sussex
downs, and as racy of the soil. I always associated Brighton with
Sussex, which made it seem a sophisticated county: but you see, _true_
Sussex--the Downs--stands all independent and sturdy, between the
pleasure-places by the sea and the snug Weald.
The faces we passed didn't look like faces descended from smugglers,
they seemed so kind and good; but then, of course, smuggling was quite a
respectable industry in Sussex, where the secretive formation of the
coast clearly showed that Providence had meant it to epict. I love the
Sussex downs, I like the Sussex faces, and I admire the Sussex church
spires--tall and pointed, covered with lichened shingles.