“Tell me a story—tell me a story—”
Again within the cot, and the wind fell at purple twilight, then rose again roaring, and the flame bent this way and bent that. Quiet together—still together.
“What is fire?”
“What is beauty?”
“What is music?”
April air, April wood. Rang the axe, bent and straightened the faggot gatherer. Showers came up, but thick fir trees gave shelter. Rain stopped. Being upon a little eminence in the wood they saw the great bow, the seven-coloured bridge.
April rain, April greenery, April sunshine. The axe rang, the tree fell. They rested from toil, leaning against the sunken mass, and waiting so, became aware of the movement of horses, coming nearer through the wood, and presently of voices. Sit quietly behind branches of felled tree, and let all go by, at a little distance, five or six of them!
But they came nearer and nearer, brushing through the wood, a hawking party from a great house the other side a line of low hills, cutting off a distance by leaving the road and crossing this piece of earth. Nearer and nearer, and presently it was seen that they would pass the felled tree. The woodchopper and the faggot gatherer sat still.
A big man, no longer young, with a beak of a nose and a waggish yet formidable mouth, a quite young man and a young woman, and the other two falconer and helper, carrying the hawks. They would go pacing by. But the big man always spoke, sitting his big horse, to woodchoppers and ditchers and thatchers, charcoal burners and the like! It was as though one stopped to observe a robin or wren or blackbird. “Cousin bird, what have you to say to the so-much-more-than-bird observing you?” So now he drew rein and gave greeting.
“Hey, woodchopper, a fine day for felling!”