Miss Lees, who is somewhat of a naturalist, and has been out with the District Field Club on more than one “ladies’ day,” makes note of all these things. As the Gwendoline glides on, she observes beds of the water ranunculus, whose snow-white corollas, bending to the current, are oft rudely dragged beneath; while on the banks above, their cousins of golden sheen, mingling with the petals of yellow and purple loosestrife—for both grow here—with anemones, and pale, lemon-coloured daffodils—are but kissed, and gently fanned, by the balmy breath of Spring.
Easily guiding the craft down the slow-flowing stream, she has a fine opportunity of observing Nature in its unrestrained action—and takes advantage of it. She looks with delighted eye at the freshly-opened flowers, and listens with charmed ear to the warbling of the birds—a chorus, on the Wye, sweet and varied as anywhere on earth. From many a deep-lying dell in the adjacent hills she can hear the song of the thrush, as if endeavouring to outdo, and cause one to forget, the matchless strain of its nocturnal rival, the nightingale; or making music for its own mate, now on the nest, and occupied with the cares of incubation. She hears, too, the bold whistling carol of the blackbird, the trill of the lark soaring aloft, the soft sonorous note of the cuckoo, blending with the harsh scream of the jay, and the laughing cackle of the green woodpecker—the last loud beyond all proportion to the size of the bird, and bearing close resemblance to the cry of an eagle. Strange coincidence besides, in the woodpecker being commonly called “eekol”—a name, on the Wye, pronounced with striking similarity to that of the royal bird!
Pondering upon this very theme, Ellen has taken no note of how her companion is employing herself. Nor is Miss Wynn thinking of either flowers, or birds. Only when a large one of the latter—a kite—shooting out from the summit of a wooded hill, stays awhile soaring overhead, does she give thought to what so interests the other.
“A pretty sight!” observes Ellen, as they sit looking up at the sharp, slender wings, and long bifurcated tail, cut clear as a cameo against the cloudless sky. “Isn’t it a beautiful creature?”
“Beautiful, but bad;” rejoins Gwen, “like many other animated things—too like, and too many of them. I suppose, it’s on the look-out for some innocent victim, and will soon be swooping down at it. Ah, me! it’s a wicked world, Nell, with all its sweetness! One creature preying upon another—the strong seeking to devour the weak—these ever needing protection! Is it any wonder we poor women, weakest of all, should wish to—”
She stays her interrogatory, and sits in silence, abstractedly toying with the handles of the oars, which she is balancing above water.
“Wish to do what?” asked the other.
“Get married!” answers the heiress of Llangorren, elevating her arms, and letting the blades fall with a plash, as if to drown a speech so bold; withal, watching its effect upon her companion, as she repeats the question in a changed form. “Is it strange, Ellen?”
“I suppose not,” Ellen timidly replies; blushingly too, for she knows how nearly the subject concerns herself, and half believes the interrogatory aimed at her. “Not at all strange,” she adds, more affirmatively. “Indeed very natural, I should say—that is, for women who are poor and weak, and really need a protector. But you, Gwen—who are neither one nor the other, but instead rich and strong, have no such need.”
“I’m not so sure of that. With all my riches and strength—for I am a strong creature; as you see, can row this boat almost as ably as a man,”—she gives a vigorous pull or two, as proof, then continuing, “Yes; and I think I’ve got great courage too. Yet, would you believe it, Nelly, notwithstanding all, I sometimes have a strange fear upon me?”