Part 5 (1/2)
”If you love 'John Inglesant,'” said I, ”you must be getting old, Uncle Peter.”
”Oh, no,” he answered, comfortably lighting his pipe with a live coal of wood from the hearth, ”I am only growing up.”
AMONG THE QUANTOCK HILLS
My little Dorothea was the only one of the merry crowd who cared to turn aside with me from the beaten tourist-track, and give up the sight of another English cathedral for the sake of a quiet day among the Quantock Hills. Was it the literary a.s.sociation of that little corner of Somersets.h.i.+re with the names of Wordsworth and Coleridge that attracted her, I wonder? Or was it the promise that we would hire a dog-cart, if one could be found, and that she should be the driver all through the summer day? I confess my incompetence to decide the question. When one is fifteen years old, a live horse may be as interesting as two dead poets. Not for the world would I put Dorothea to the embarra.s.sment of declaring which was first in her mind.
When she and I got out of the railway carriage, in the early morning, at the humble station of Watchet, (barely mentioned in the guide-book,) our travelling companions jeered gently at our enterprise. As the train rumbled away from the platform, they stuck their heads out of the window and cried, ”Where are you going? And how are you going to get there?” Upon my honour, I did not know. That was just the fun of it.
But there was an inn at Watchet, though I doubt whether it had ever entertained tourists. The friendly and surprised landlady thought that she could get us a dog-cart to drive across the country; but it would take about an hour to make ready. So we strolled about the town, and saw the sights of Watchet.
They were few and simple; yet something, (perhaps the generous suns.h.i.+ne of the July day, or perhaps an inward glow of contentment in our hearts,) made them bright and memorable. There were the quaint, narrow streets, with their tiny shops and low stone houses. There was the coast-guard station, with its trim garden, perched on a terrace above the sea. There was the life-boat house, with its doors wide open, and the great boat, spick and span in the glory of new paint, standing ready on its rollers, and the record of splendid rescues in past years inscribed upon the walls. There was the circular basin-harbour, with the workmen slowly repairing the breakwater, and a couple of ancient looking schooners reposing on their sides in the mud at low tide. And there, back on the hill, looking down over the town and far away across the yellow waters of the Bristol Channel, was the high tower of St.
Dec.u.man's Church.
”It was from this tiny harbour,” said I to Dorothea, ”that a great friend of ours, the Ancient Mariner, set sail on a wonderful voyage. Do you remember?
”'The s.h.i.+p was cheered, the harbour cleared, Merrily did we drop Below the kirk, below the hill, Below the lighthouse top.'
”That was the kirk to which he looked back as he sailed away to an unknown country.”
”But, father,” said Dorothea, ”the Ancient Mariner was not a real person. He was only a character!”
”Are you quite sure,” said I, ”that a character isn't a real person? At all events, it was here that Coleridge, walking from Nether Stowey to Dulverton, saw the old sailor-man. And since Coleridge saw him, I reckon he lived, and still lives. Are we ever going to forget what he has told us?
”'He prayeth best, who loveth best All things both great and small; For the dear G.o.d who loveth us, He made and loveth all.'”
Just then a most enchanting little boy and his sister, not more than five years old, came sauntering down the gray street, hand in hand.
They were on their way to school, at least an hour late, round and rosy, careless and merry, manifest owners of the universe. We stopped them: they were dismayed, but resolute. We gave each of them a penny; they radiated wonder and joy. Too happy for walking, they skipped and toddled on their way, telling everyone they met, children and grown-up people, of the good fortune that had befallen them. We could see them far down the street, pausing a moment to look in at the shop-windows, or holding up their coppers while they stopped some casual pa.s.ser-by and made him listen to their story--just like the Ancient Mariner.
By this time the dog-cart was ready. The landlord charged me eighteen s.h.i.+llings for the drive to Bridgewater, nineteen miles away, stopping where we liked, and sending back the cart with the post-boy that evening. By the look on his face I judge that he thought it was too much. But I did not. So we climbed to the high seat, Dorothea took the reins and the whip, and we set forth for a day of unguide-booked pleasure.
What good roads they have in England! Look at the piles of broken stone for repairs, stored in little niches all along the way; see how promptly and carefully every hole is filled up and every break mended; and you will understand how a small beast can pull a heavy load in this country, and why the big draught-horses wear long and do good work. A country with a fine system of roads is like a man with a good circulation of the blood; the labour of life becomes easier, effort is reduced and pleasure increased.
Bowling along the smooth road we crossed a small river at Doniford, where a man was wading the stream below the bridge and fly-fis.h.i.+ng for trout; we pa.s.sed the farmhouses of Rydon, where the steam-thresher was whirling, and the wheat was falling in golden heaps, and the pale-yellow straw was mounded in gigantic ricks; and then we climbed the hill behind St. Audries, with its pretty gray church, and manor house half hidden in the great trees of the park.
The view was one of indescribable beauty and charm; soft, tranquil woods and placid fertile fields; thatched cottages here and there, sheltered and embowered in green; far away on the sh.o.r.e, the village of East Quantockshead; beyond that the broad, tossing waters of the Bristol Channel; and beyond that again, thirty miles away, the silver coast of Wales and the blue mountains fading into the sky. s.h.i.+ps were sailing in and out, toy-like in the distance. Far to the north-west, we could see the cliffs of the Devons.h.i.+re coast; to the north-east the islands of Steep Holm and Flat Holm rose from the Severn Sea; and around the point beyond them, in the little churchyard of Clevedon, I knew that the dust of Arthur Henry Hallam, whose friends.h.i.+p Tennyson has immortalized in ”In Memoriam,” was sleeping
”By the pleasant sh.o.r.e And in the hearing of the wave.”
High overhead the great white clouds were loitering across the deep-blue heaven. White b.u.t.terflies wavered above the road. Tall foxglove spires lit the woodland shadows with rosy gleams. Bluebells and golden ragwort fringed the hedge-rows. A family of young wrens fluttered in and out of the hawthorns. A yellow-hammer, with cap of gold, warbled his sweet, common little song. The colour of the earth was warm and red; the gra.s.s was of a green so living that it seemed to be full of conscious gladness. It was a day and a scene to calm and satisfy the heart.
At Kilve, a straggling village along the road-side, I remembered Wordsworth's poem called ”An Anecdote for Fathers.” The little boy in the poem says that he would rather be at Kilve than at Liswyn. When his father foolishly presses him to give a reason for his preference, he invents one:
”At Kilve there was no weather-c.o.c.k, And that's the reason why.”
Naturally, I looked around the village to see whether it would still answer to the little boy's description. Sure enough, there was no weather-c.o.c.k in sight, not even on the church-tower.