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Stretton (Complete)
Stretton (Complete)
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This ebook edition has been proofed, corrected and compiled to be read with without errors!
***
An excerpt from the beginning of the:
Chapter 1.
Does Nature sympathise with disaster? Of all poets' fancies, that is the most foolish. Is "the wind to be howling in turret and tree" whenever disaster, and sin, and terror are walking abroad? We should have fine weather, I trow, were that the case.
The crystal purity of a perfect evening at the end of April was settling down over the beautiful valley which lies between Shrewsbury and Ludlow; on the one hand, the Longmynd rolled its great sheets of grouse-moor and scarps of rock up, fold beyond fold; while, on the other, the sharp peak of Caradoc took the evening, and smiled upon his distant brother, the towering Plinlimmon; while Plinlimmon, in the West, with silver infant Severn streaming down his bosom, watched the sinking sun after Caradoc and Longmynd had lost it; and when it sank, blazed out from his summit a signal to his brother watchers, and, wrapping himself in purple robes, slept in majestic peace.
Down below in the valley, among the meadows, the lanes, and the fords, it was nearly as peaceful and quiet as it was aloft on the mountain-tops; and under the darkening shadows of the rapidly leafing elms, you could hear, it was so still, the cows grazing and the trout rising in the river. Day was yet alive in some region aloft in the air, loftier than the summits of Plinlimmon or Caradoc, for the democratic multitude of the stars had not been able as yet to show themselves through the train of glorious memories which the abdicated king had left behind him. The curfew came booming up the valley sleepily, and ceased. It was a land lapped in order and tradition; good landlords, good tenants, well-used labourers, if ever there were such in late years in England. Surely a land of peace!
Who comes here, along the path, through the growing clover? Who is this woman who walks swiftly, bareheaded under the dew? Who is this strange-looking woman, with an Indian shawl half-fallen off her shoulders, with clenched fists, one of which she at times beats on her beautiful head? Can it be Mrs. Evans, of the Castle, or her ghost? Or is it her in the flesh, and has she gone mad?
Such were the questions put to one another by a young pair of lovers, who watched her from beneath a plantation where they were innocently rambling. The young man said, "That is a queer sight for a fellow courting," and the young woman said, "There was too much love-making there, I doubt." And the young man said, "How about the banns next Sunday?" And the young woman said, "Have your own way about it, and don't plague me," which I suppose meant "Yes."
We must follow this awful, swift-walking figure of poor Mrs. Evans, and watch her.
She was an exceedingly beautiful woman, in exact age forty-one, with that imperial dome-like head, and splendid carriage of that same head, which the Merionethsbire people say is a specialité of the Merediths, though I have seen it elsewhere. If you had told her that she had Celtic blood in her veins, she would probably have denied it; but she was certainly behaving in a most Celtic manner now. Anything more un-Norman than her behaviour now, cannot be conceived. The low, inarticulate moans--the moans which mean so much more than speech--the wild, swift walk, the gesticulation, the clenched fists, all told of Celtic excitability; yet she was no Celt. It is only the old, stale story of Hibernis ipsis Hiberniores. She was behaving like a Celt because she had been brought up among them; but there was a depth of anger and fury in her heart which must have come from the conquering race.
As she neared her husband's Castle, she grew more calm, adjusted her shawl, and put her hair straight; for she feared him, gentle as he was. He would have lain down so that she should walk over him; but he would have been angry with her had he seen her in her late disorder. And she had never seen his wrath but once, and that was towards his own son; and she did not care to face it, for it was as deep and passionate as his love. So she bound up her hair, left off clenching her fists, pulled her shawl straight, and, stepping in by the flower-garden, let herself in by the postern, and appeared before him, as he stalked up and down the library.
"Is it over, darling of my heart?" he said.
"It is all over," she said, spreading her ten white fingers before her.
"And how is she?" he asked.
"She is dead!" answered Mrs. Evans.
"Dead! dead! dead!" she was going on hysterically, when he caught her in his arms and kissed her into quiescence.
***
An excerpt from the beginning of the:
Chapter 1.
Does Nature sympathise with disaster? Of all poets' fancies, that is the most foolish. Is "the wind to be howling in turret and tree" whenever disaster, and sin, and terror are walking abroad? We should have fine weather, I trow, were that the case.
The crystal purity of a perfect evening at the end of April was settling down over the beautiful valley which lies between Shrewsbury and Ludlow; on the one hand, the Longmynd rolled its great sheets of grouse-moor and scarps of rock up, fold beyond fold; while, on the other, the sharp peak of Caradoc took the evening, and smiled upon his distant brother, the towering Plinlimmon; while Plinlimmon, in the West, with silver infant Severn streaming down his bosom, watched the sinking sun after Caradoc and Longmynd had lost it; and when it sank, blazed out from his summit a signal to his brother watchers, and, wrapping himself in purple robes, slept in majestic peace.
Down below in the valley, among the meadows, the lanes, and the fords, it was nearly as peaceful and quiet as it was aloft on the mountain-tops; and under the darkening shadows of the rapidly leafing elms, you could hear, it was so still, the cows grazing and the trout rising in the river. Day was yet alive in some region aloft in the air, loftier than the summits of Plinlimmon or Caradoc, for the democratic multitude of the stars had not been able as yet to show themselves through the train of glorious memories which the abdicated king had left behind him. The curfew came booming up the valley sleepily, and ceased. It was a land lapped in order and tradition; good landlords, good tenants, well-used labourers, if ever there were such in late years in England. Surely a land of peace!
Who comes here, along the path, through the growing clover? Who is this woman who walks swiftly, bareheaded under the dew? Who is this strange-looking woman, with an Indian shawl half-fallen off her shoulders, with clenched fists, one of which she at times beats on her beautiful head? Can it be Mrs. Evans, of the Castle, or her ghost? Or is it her in the flesh, and has she gone mad?
Such were the questions put to one another by a young pair of lovers, who watched her from beneath a plantation where they were innocently rambling. The young man said, "That is a queer sight for a fellow courting," and the young woman said, "There was too much love-making there, I doubt." And the young man said, "How about the banns next Sunday?" And the young woman said, "Have your own way about it, and don't plague me," which I suppose meant "Yes."
We must follow this awful, swift-walking figure of poor Mrs. Evans, and watch her.
She was an exceedingly beautiful woman, in exact age forty-one, with that imperial dome-like head, and splendid carriage of that same head, which the Merionethsbire people say is a specialité of the Merediths, though I have seen it elsewhere. If you had told her that she had Celtic blood in her veins, she would probably have denied it; but she was certainly behaving in a most Celtic manner now. Anything more un-Norman than her behaviour now, cannot be conceived. The low, inarticulate moans--the moans which mean so much more than speech--the wild, swift walk, the gesticulation, the clenched fists, all told of Celtic excitability; yet she was no Celt. It is only the old, stale story of Hibernis ipsis Hiberniores. She was behaving like a Celt because she had been brought up among them; but there was a depth of anger and fury in her heart which must have come from the conquering race.
As she neared her husband's Castle, she grew more calm, adjusted her shawl, and put her hair straight; for she feared him, gentle as he was. He would have lain down so that she should walk over him; but he would have been angry with her had he seen her in her late disorder. And she had never seen his wrath but once, and that was towards his own son; and she did not care to face it, for it was as deep and passionate as his love. So she bound up her hair, left off clenching her fists, pulled her shawl straight, and, stepping in by the flower-garden, let herself in by the postern, and appeared before him, as he stalked up and down the library.
"Is it over, darling of my heart?" he said.
"It is all over," she said, spreading her ten white fingers before her.
"And how is she?" he asked.
"She is dead!" answered Mrs. Evans.
"Dead! dead! dead!" she was going on hysterically, when he caught her in his arms and kissed her into quiescence.
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