And now to fear came wonder, and with wonder was despair.
Truly, was ever man so great a fool!
CHAPTER XXX
CONCERNING THE FATE OF BLACK GEORGE
A broad, white road; on either hand some half-dozen cottages with roofs of thatch or red tile, backed by trees gnarled and ancient, among which rises the red conical roof of some oast-house. Such, in a word, is Sissinghurst.
Now, upon the left-hand side of the way, there stands a square, comfortable, whitewashed building, peaked of roof, bright as to windows, and with a mighty sign before the door, whereon you shall behold the picture of a bull: a bull rolling of eye, astonishingly curly of horn and stiff as to tail, and with a prodigious girth of neck and shoulder; such a snorting, fiery-eyed, curly-horned bull as was never seen off an inn-sign.
It was at this bull that I was staring with much apparent interest, though indeed, had that same curly-horned monstrosity been changed by some enchanter's wand into a green dragon or griffin, or swan with two necks, the chances are that I should have continued sublimely unconscious of the transformation.
Yet how should honest Silas Hoskins, ostler, and general factotum of "The Bull" inn, be aware of this fact, who, being thus early at work, and seeing me lost in contemplation, paused to address me in all good faith?
"A fine bull 'e be, eh, Peter? Look at them 'orns, an' that theer tail; it's seldom as you sees 'orns or a tail the like o' them, eh?"
"Very seldom!" I answered, and sighed.