The White Peacock

estate, covered the western slope, and the cultivated land was bounded on the east by the sharp dip of the brook course, a thread of woodland broadening into a spinney and ending at th

they raced down in riot to the very edge of southern Nethermere, surrounding our house. From the eastern hill crest

ted by woods, the dens of rabbits,

le. Its ramifications were stupendous; it was more like a banyan than a British oak. How was the good squire to nourish himself and his lady, his name, his tradition, and his thirteen lusty branches on his meagre

w lean, unable to eat the defiled herbage. Then the farm became the home of a keeper, and th

iring farmer, protected them with gun and notices to quit. How he glowed with than

, early one Monday morning, as the high meadow broke into life

ting guest as he took another gun, whi

ene. It was the outpost in the wilderness. It was an unde

land for next to nothing-next to nothing-at a rent re

yourself," replied the farmer. The

ou want?"

e off?" was the

rd-and it would come to-what did Halkett tell

an't live

myself, and I can't drink alone-so if I am to enjoy my glass.-

on like it

with Halkett, and I'll come down and have a look at you. We al

-

ap up with a laugh for the first fresh kiss of dawn, but slowly, quietly, unexpectantly lies watching the waking of each new day. The blue mist, like memory in the eyes of a neglected wife, never goes from the wooded hill, and only at noon creeps from the near hedges. There is no bird to put a song in the throat of morning; only the crow's

s; of Schopenhauer and William James. We had been friends for years, and he was accustomed to my talk. But this autumn fruited the first crop of intimacy between us. I talked a great deal of poetry to him, and of rudimentary metaphysics. He was v

a quiet companionship is very grateful. Autumn creeps through everything. The little damsons in the pudding taste of

ass lush blackberries may be discovered. Then one notices that the last bell hangs from the ragged spire of fox-glove. The talk is of people, an odd book; of one's hopes-and the future; of Canada, where work is strenuous, but not life; where the plains are wide, and one is not lapped in a soft valley, like an apple that falls in a secluded orchard. The mist steals o

-

Our feet rattled through black patches of devil's-bit scabius; we skirted a swim of thistle-down, which glistened when the moon touched it. We stumbled on through wet, co

t. Several of the windows had been bricked in, giving a pitiful impression of blindness; the places where the plaster had fallen off the walls showed blacker in the shadow. We pushed open the gate, and as we walked down the path, weeds and dead plants brushed our ankles. We looked in at a window. The room was lighted also by a window from the other side, through which the moonlight streamed on to the flagged floor, dirty, littered

-timbered, neat, and cosy. Here and there we saw feathers, bits of animal wreckage, even the remnants of a cat, which we hastily examined by the light of a match. As we entered the stable there was an ugly noise, and three great rats half rushed at us and threatened us with their vicious teeth. I shuddered, and hurried back, stumbling over a bucket, rotten with rust, and so filled with weeds that I thought it part of the jungle. There

bitterly, "is what t

our time

ne thing and another. As it is, we depend on the milk-round, and on the carting which I do for the council. You can't cal

to live,"

father won't move-and he

hat abo

le at home. As for my future, it can look af

ire," said

ound, "this is pulling the nipple out of your lips

er the hillside we could see an army of rabbits bu

lds, he exclaimed, "Hullo!"-and hurried forward. I followed him, and observed the dark figure of a man rise from the he

vestigating the litt

you for that s

lack-faced fellow. "An' I should like ter know

g-hand over my snare-and the

Annable, turning s

an' you can hand it ov

sound won't kill me"-the

d George, stepping up

nding stock still, and looking un

oth you an' 'im. You'll get

e to get hold of the man's coat. Instantly he went s

flinging round him as if he had been a demon, as he strode away. I got up, pressing my chest where I had been struck. George was lying in the hedge-bottom. I turned him over

ly stunned

il!" I a

sn't

N

knock

me t

nst the back of his head, saying, "My head does sing!" He tried to get up,

"let's see if we

"we needn't tell them

, and wishing that my knuckles were more bruised than they were-though that was bad enough. I got up

, "covered with

ubled by the shame and con

said, standing st

d about the fields for a tim

egun to fret Nethermere. They swung down on to the glassy mill-pond, shaking the moonlight in flecks across the deep shadows; the night rang with the clacking of their wings on the water

anything?" he asked

N

t all-not

N

d-ni

-

ng the round of his fields as was his custom, to his grief and horror found two of his sheep torn and dead in the hedge-bottom

eard yelping in the fields of Dr. Collins of the Abbey, about dawn. Th

ling theatre that had halted at Westwold. While they sat open-mouthed in the theatre, gloriously nicknamed the "Blood-Tub," watching heroes die with much writhing and heaving, and strugg

h brushwood, and in the sunny afternoon we collected piles of bracken, browning to the ruddy winter-brown now. He slept there for a week, but that week aged his mother l

r the dark hills. Now and then a sheep coughed, or a rabbit rustled beneath the brambles, and Gyp whined. The mist crept over the gorse-bus

and nets," said George, as we sat

id I. "Did you

t, all of a shiver, and a whippet dog after it. I gave the whippet a punch in the n

id you

st now. Father could get along without me, and mo

n't you

ts at home that one would miss. Besides, you feel somebody in you

ou're

ks think of you, and everything round you keeps the same, and so you can't change yourself-because everything you look at brings up th

I, "your comfort

ll and did

you out of your

out of those coloured marble mosaics in the hall, you have to fit in your own set, fit into your own pattern, because you're put there from the first. But you don't want

t believe her. Whe

wind, that was why I was getting all the apples, and it rocked us, me right up at the top, she sitting half way down

have contr

ever thought of it b

hat sou

-on our way of life. I thought she

have shown h

hen I could se

s me you'r

t it is rotten to find that there isn't

a new tun

the gras

o you think

othing to mother. Not yet,-a

thing has happ

?" he

ing dec

an happen-unless the

" I

d not

ake things ha

worse fool, Cyril," he

The grey blurs among the blackness of the bushes were r

ear her sing as she moved about, before you are washed at night, when the fire's warm

" I said.

e, but turned su

the sheaves, it felt like having your arm ro

I, "you'll mesh yourself in t

not having h

g-thinking" he confessed-"I seem to

u scheme forgetting what you want

m, wouldn't you want to go on dreaming?" a

of the time when my friend should not follow the harrow on our own snug valley side, and when Lettie's room next mine should be closed to hide its emptine

on still shone sickly in the west. The world shrank from the morning. It was then that the last of the summ

In the dim light I saw their grey shadows move among the gorse bushes. Then a dog leaped, and I flung my stone with all my might. I hit. There came a high-pitched howling yelp of pain; I saw the brute make off, and went after him, dodging the prickly bushes, leaping the trailing brambles. The gunshots rang out again, and I heard the men

s, were packed with loose stones, and trailed with hanging brambles. We climbed down the steep bank of the brook, and entered the quarries by the bed of the stream. Under the groves of ash and oak a pale primrose still lingered, glimmering wanly beside the h

and I pulled a bunch of mountain-ash berries, and stood tapping them against my knee. I was startled by a snarl and a little scream. Running forward, I came upon one of the old, horse-shoe lime kilns that stood at the head of the quarry. There, in the mouth of one

ly! But he is d

y. She shuddered violently, and s

ere she had knelt on the wound which I had given the dog, and pressed

you?" I ask

he had no strength, and I hit him back with my

wash y

sn't it horrible! Oh, I

athing her arm in the

whole bru

said I, looking at a score on

! Can you get that off my sk

h my handkerchief as w

can go to the Kennels. Do-you o

ng up at me, a smile comin

come

aughed. "You lo

r away. She linked her arm

na Doone," she said

o it," said I, referri

l-ugh, I daren't think of it.

nt, ruby berries. She stroked them softly against her lip

nted to put red b

lks of the berries under her combs. Her hair was not heavy or long enough to have held them. Then, with the ruby bunches glowing through the black mist of curls, she looked up at me, brightly,

id I, "you'

, and the low laughte

urage and recklessness she had into t

always got your soul in your eyes,

nd her great seriousness look

s, and you cherish them. You think the flesh of the apple is nothing, nothing. You only car

words. She stooped down, and the chaplet fell from her hair, and only one bunch of berries remained. The ground around us was strewn with th

for necklaces before supper;-to be the envy of the others at school next day! There was as much pleasure in a beech necklace then as there is in the whole autumn

any with nuts

o, three. You have them. N

y, trail clouds of sorrow; they are born with "the gift of sorrow"; "sorrows" they proclaim "alone are real. The veiled grey angels of sorrow work out slowly the beautiful shapes. Sor

nnels which had been the scene of so much animation in the time of Lord Byron. They were empty now, overgrown with weeds. The barred windows of the cottages were grey with dust; there was n

Emily. "Let me fasten t

, looking quickly over he

a black kettle and a tea-cup. She was so surprised to see me th

ice from inside. "Are ter goin'

and stood holding her bare arms to warm them. Her chief garment consisted of a skirt with grey bo

he girl. She, however, hastily seized the k

ed-brown hair was all frowsy from the bed. In the folds of her skirt clung a swarthy urchin with a shockingly short shirt. He stared at us with

look at th' 'ouse. Th' childers not be

it off the tasty corner, and resumed the task with the other hand. When we entered he tried to draw his shirt over his knees, which caused the fat to fall wasted. A fat baby, evidently laid down from the breast, lay kicking on the squab, purple in the face, while another lad was pushing bread and butter into its mouth. The mother swept to the sofa, poked out the bread and butter, pushed her finger into the baby's throat, lifted the child up, punched its back, and was highly relieved when it began to yell. Then she administered a few sound spanks to the naked buttocks of the crammer. He bega

id, but he had slid under the ta

put her bonny baby again to her breast

oman, wincing at the same time, and putting her hand to

s." She drew her brows together and pursed her lips, saying to the child, "Naughty

e concerns in process when we entered;-save, however, that th

n', tha's 'ad it?" cried S'

lied Sam from u

ther, giving a blind prod un

then!" per

ery, and at last the knitting was found at the back of

to her parent. Her heart was torn for her knitting, the fruit of her labours; it was a red woollen cuff

she wailed. "I know it's

e, croaked out in a vo

ypine, whose br

lion by pricki

n to shake with

made it all up," she whisper

what 'B

," grun

ckie; an' I'll ma' '

sked S'r A

y duck," persi

no treacle," said

e fire; the children

it yourself?"

eyes of astonishment, and sh

and shame. I was very serious, very insistent. She yielded me her hand again, biting her lips in imagination of the pain, and looking at me. While my eyes were looking into hers she had courage; when I was forced to pay attention to my cauter

children be

throwing the fast cooling

then I offered Sam, who had crept out o

he said, turning

pennies, so nothing

th a shout of rage, and, seizing a cup off the table, flung it at the fortunate Jack. It smashed against the fire-place. The mother grabbed at Sam, but he was gone. A gir

l coward," sa

p it--" she look

mind,"

o jump from it. You d

never

help it, not

ossibly disturb that young bacon-sucker?

iting the tip of

on at us. "Rabbit-tail, rabbit-tail," he cried, his bare little legs twinkling, and his little shirt fluttering in the cold morning air. Fortunately, at last