Colin, the grass was grey and wet the sod
O’er which I heard her velvet footfall come;
But heaven, where yet no pallid crescent rode,
Flowered in fire behind the bloomless plum;
There stirred no wing nor wind, the wood was dumb,
Only blown roses shook their leaves abroad
On stems more tender than an infant’s thumb—
Soft leaves, soft hued, and curled like Cupid’s lip—
And each dim tree shed sweetness over me,
From honey-dews that breathless boughs let slip
In the orchard by the sea.Elinor Sweetman.
‘Ye bain’t sich very good company to-night, Richard,’ remarked Mr. Sharpe, laying down his knife and fork, and gazing critically at his nephew. ‘Nay, I can’t say as ye be. You have n’t opened your mouth since we sat down, except just to put a bit into it now and again, and not too often neither. Ye bain’t eatin’ nothing to speak on, an’ ye have n’t a word to throw to a dog. What’s amiss?’
‘Why—nothing,’ returned Richard, rousing himself with a startled look from the brown study into which he had fallen. ‘I suppose I am tired,’ he added, as an afterthought.
‘Ah, very like ye be,’ agreed the farmer commiseratingly. ‘It just depends on what a man’s used to how soon he gets knocked up. You be used to town, an’ travellin’, and that, and when you come back to the ploughin’ it tries you a bit to start wi’. ’T is just the other way wi’ I; I’m used to the country, d’ ye see, and when I do have to go to town—to Dorchester, or Weymouth, or any big place like that—Lard, I do get mortal tired! Walkin’ them streets, now, and lookin’ in at the shop-winders—dear heart alive, it makes me so weary as I could very nigh drop down in the middle of ’em! As for travellin’—goin’ in trains an’ sich-like—it do make me so stiff I can scarce lay legs to the ground when I do ’light from ’em. But I dare say you found it a hardish bit o’ work turnin’ up the big field yonder?’
His nephew made no response, and Isaac bawled out the question afresh.
The young man, who had been absently balancing a fork on his fore-finger, started, and replied hastily that he had n’t found it at all hard—at least—yes, perhaps rather hard, but very pleasant; and he liked the work.
Isaac took a farewell pull at his pint mug, set it down, and pushed his plate away.
‘Draw up to the fire, lad,’ he said, ‘and smoke your pipe quick, and then turn in—ye bain’t fit for nothin’ but bed.’
‘No, no,’ returned Richard hastily, as he rose, ‘I could not go to bed yet—it is not much past eight. I don’t think I’ll sit down by the fire—I’ll go out for a stroll to stretch my legs.’
‘Stretch your legs!’ commented his uncle indignantly. ‘Ha’n’t ye stretched them enough to-day already? You’ve a-worked hard enough for two men.’