What would Lydia say, when she knew--when she came?
From her latest letter it was not clear to him on what day she would
reach home. After making his inspection he would ride on to Green Cottage
and inquire. He dreaded to meet her; and yet he was eager to defend
himself; his mind was already rehearsing all that he would say.
A long lane, shaded by heavy trees, made an abrupt turning, and he saw
before him the Mainstairs village--one straggling street of wretched
houses, mostly thatched, and built of "clay-lump," whitewashed. In a
county of prosperous farming, and good landlords, where cottages had
been largely rebuilt during the preceding century, this miserable
village, with various other hamlets and almost all the cottages attached
to farms on the Melrose estate, were the scandal of the countryside.
Roofs that let in rain and wind, clay floors, a subsoil soaked in every
possible abomination, bedrooms "more like dens for wild animals than
sleeping-places for men and women," to quote a recent Government report,
and a polluted water supply!--what more could reckless human living,
aided by human carelessness and cruelty, have done to make a hell of
natural beauty?
Over the village rose the low shoulder of a grassy fell, its patches of
golden fern glistening under the October sunshine; great sycamores, with
their rounded masses of leaf, hung above the dilapidated roofs, as though
Nature herself tried to shelter the beings for whom men had no care; the
thatched slopes were green with moss and weed; and the blue smoke wreaths
that rose from the chimneys, together with the few flowers that gleamed
in the gardens, the picturesque irregularity of the houses, and the
general setting of wood and distant mountain, made of the poisoned
village a "subject," on which a wandering artist, who had set up his
canvas at the corner of the road, was at the moment, indeed, hard at
work.
Pages:
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320