Читать книгу Greene Ferne Farm - Richard Jefferies - Страница 4

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 détour, 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.