But to those who there were born (and never thought about it), in the days of age or ailment, or of better fortune even in a brighter climate, how at the sound of an ancient name, or glimpse of faint resemblance, or even on some turn of thought untraced and unaccountable—again the hills and valleys spread, to aged vision truer than they were to youthful eyesight; again the trees are rustling in the wind as they used to rustle; again the sheep climb up the brown turf in their snowy zigzag. A thousand winks of childhood widen into one clear dream of age.
CHAPTER II.
COOMBE LORRAINE.
“How came that old house up there?” is generally the first question put by a Londoner to his Southdown friend leading him through the lowland path. “It must have a noble view; but what a position, and what an aspect!”
“The house has been there long enough to get used to it,” is his host’s reply; “and it is not built, as they are where you live, of the substance of a hat.”
That large old-fashioned house, which looks as if it had been much larger, stands just beneath the crest of a long-backed hill in a deep embrasure. Although it stands so high, and sees much less of the sun than the polestar, it is not quite so weather-beaten as a stranger would suppose. It has some little protection, and a definite outline for its grounds, because it was built on an old and extensive settlement of the chalk; a thing unheeded in early times, but now very popular and attractive, under the name of “landslip.” Of these there are a good many still to be traced on the sides of the Sussex hills, caused (as the learned say) by the shifting of the green-sand, or silt, which generally underlies the more stable chalk. Few, however, of them are so strongly marked and bold as this one, which is known as “Coombe Lorraine.” It is no mere depression or irregular subsidence, but a sheer vertical drop, which shows as if a broad slice had been cut out from the chine to the base of the highland.
Here, in the time of William Rufus, Roland de Lorraine, having a grant from him, or from the Conqueror, and trusting the soil to slide no more, or ignorant that it had ever slidden, built himself a dwelling-place to keep a look-out on his property. This abode, no doubt, was fitted for warlike domesticity, being founded in the fine old times when every gentleman was bound to build himself a castle.
It may have been that a little jealousy of his friend, De Braose (who had taken a larger grant of land, although he was of newer race, and had killed fewer men than Sir Roland), led this enterprising founder to set up his tower so high. At any rate, he settled his Penates so commandingly, that if Bramber Castle had been in sight, he might have looked down its chimneys as freely as into his villeins’ sheepcotes. Bramber Castle, however, happened to be round the corner.
This good knight’s end, according to the tradition of the family, was not so thoroughly peaceful as a life of war should earn. One gentle autumnal evening, Sir Roland and his friend and neighbour, William de Braose, were riding home to a quiet supper, both in excellent temper and spirits, and pleasant contempt of the country. The harvest-moon was rising over breadths of corn in grant to them, and sheep and cattle tended by their villeins, once the owners. Each congratulated the other upon tranquil seizin, and the goodwill of the neighbourhood; when suddenly their way was stopped by a score of heavy Englishmen.