Part 13

The first time I heard it was one February—shortly after I had taken the cottage—the season above all others when the brooks and falls and mountain springs are over-full of water, that hurries along at a great pace, tumbling over rocks, dropping down into green wells and grottos below, always galloping down hill till finally it reaches the ever-rushing river in the valley.

By day, each brook seems merely to be chatting sociably to the banks and the long harts-tongue ferns as it passes down, and you only hear one at a time. But after dark, when most other sounds have ceased, the voices of the streams seem to grow marvellously in volume.

I was lying awake one night with the windows open, listening literally to the sound of many waters, and trying to disentangle them.

First I heard the spring outside my garden gate as it scrambled down from the hillside above, splashing the overhanging greenery with light spray, and finally pouring out of a little trough—dark brown wood, closely enamelled with green mosses—into a rocky pool, where it ceases its swirl for half a minute, just while it gets its breath, before rushing on down the hill, finding its own way around, or over, all sorts of obstacles, and resenting any interference of man.

Soon I could distinguish a second brook, that serves a cottage a quarter of a mile further along the lane, before it winds about and enters my lower orchard. This had overflowed in the orchard, and was having quite a gay time, running skittishly out of the orchard gate and into another lane, instead of pursuing its proper course.

Next I was able to detach the conversation of the small waterfall that drops about a hundred feet from an overhanging ledge of rock into a green cave under the hill, where mosses of wonderful size abound, and yellow flags stand guard at the entrance, with creeping jenny and forget-me-nots just outside.

The sound always seems to increase as you listen, and soon I detected the noise of the river as it tears over successive weirs. If the tide is low it is often a roar when you stand on the river bank beside a weir; but up here on the heights the noise is softened to a purling sound, that runs like a never-ceasing ground-bass or pedal note amid the fluctuating tones of the nearer streams.

Other and more distant murmurings floated in at the window; but one could never allocate them all, for, excepting in the hottest weather, this is in truth “a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills.”

I was thinking of this, when suddenly the babbling of the water was drowned in the sound of wonderful bells that rose upon the night air. It was not from our village church; that possesses only one bell, whose sound, unfortunately, resembles nothing so much as a cracked iron shovel struck with a pair of tongs: and there is no other bell for miles around.

And yet there was no mistaking it. I could distinctly hear the joyous clashing and clanging of bells in a tall steeple.

It was no brazen banging; rather, some fairy music, like the carillon at Malines (which I am proud to remember I once played, though, alas! I shall never play it again).

I listened in amazement; soon was added the sound of voices, like subdued distant singing in some vast cathedral, while the bells still clashed outside. Yet it was never close at hand; it always seemed to float to me from a distance.

I was sure I was not asleep, for I knew where I was, and decided to get up and go to the window, when—the dog barked—(probably he could hear a fox prowling around outside). Instantly the spell was broken. I opened my eyes; there was no sound but the murmuring and burbling of the brooks.

Like a sensible person, I of course decided that I had been dreaming.

Yet again and again have I heard the clanging bells, with often the sound of an organ and singing wafted through the open window. It always comes when the streams are most impetuous and when I am in that lotus-flowering land that lies between awakeness and sleep.

The music is always enthrallingly happy, and my only regret is that the bells and the singers do not come a trifle nearer, so that I could catch every note and jot it all down for future reference.

I related my experiences to one or two people; but this was all the information they seemed able to give me:

“If I were you, I should run down to Margate for a week or so, and leave all work behind. Go to a nice bright boarding-house, where there are lots of people, and enjoy yourself; and forget about that wretched cottage. You’ve been overdoing it lately. I had another friend just like you—got a little peculiar, you know, and then—well, I won’t tell you any more; don’t want to make you nervous, of course, but—her mother never got over it, and _so_ well-connected, too—kept three motors. You take my advice. I’ll send you the name of a charming boarding-house I know,” etc.

Then I kept my own counsel, and decided that there were Little People living in the streams, just as I had always liked to picture them living in the flowers and under the mushrooms. And the music I heard was the Little People singing, and ringing all the harebells and foxglove bells that grow along the banks of the brooks.

I concluded that no one had ever heard them but myself. But, to my surprise, one day I found that others did know about these Little People!

I was reading “The Forest,” by Stewart E. White, where he describes his impressions and experiences as he lay awake at night in a tent on the banks of a Canadian river, when I came upon the following, that in many points coincides with my own sensations:—

“In such circumstances you will hear what the boatmen call the voices of the rapids. Many people never hear them at all. They speak very soft and low, and distinct, beneath the steady roar and dashing, beneath even the lesser tinklings and gurglings whose quality superimposes them over the louder sounds. In the stillness of your hazy half-consciousness they speak; when you bend your attention to listen, they are gone, and only the tumults and the tinklings remain.

“But in the moments of their audibility they are very distinct. Just as often an odour will awake all a vanished memory, so these voices, by the force of a large impressionism, suggest whole scenes. Far off are the cling-clang-cling of chimes and the swell-and-fall murmur of a multitude _en fête_, so that subtly you feel the gray old town, with its walls, the crowded market-place, the decent peasant crowd, the booths, the mellow church building with its bells, the warm, dust-moted sun. Or, in the pauses between the swish-dash-dashings of the waters, sound faint and clear voices singing intermittently, calls, distant notes of laughter, as though many canoes were working against the current; only the flotilla never gets any nearer, nor the voices louder. The boatmen call these mist people the Huntsmen, and look frightened.... Curiously enough, by all reports, they suggest always peacefulness—a harvest field, a street fair, a Sunday morning in a cathedral town, careless travellers—never the turmoils and struggles. Perhaps this is the great Mother’s compensation in a harsh mode of life.

“Nothing is more fantastically unreal to tell about, nothing more concretely real to experience, than this undernote of the quick water. And when you do lie awake at night, it is always making its unobtrusive appeal. Gradually its hypnotic spell works. The distant chimes ring louder and nearer as you cross the borderland of sleep. And then outside the tent some little woods noise snaps the thread. An owl hoots, a whippoorwill cries, a twig cracks beneath the cautious prowl of some night creature—at once the yellow sunlit French windows puff away—you are staring at the blurred image of the moon spraying through the texture of your tent.”

Since reading this, I have spoken of the matter to others with more courage; and although the majority do not seem to have come across them, I have discovered several people who have heard the Little People singing.

Some, indeed, have been kind enough to attempt to give me a lucid explanation of what they are pleased to call a very simple natural phenomenon, and they prattle of enharmonics and sound vibrations, of nodes and super-tones, in a very impressive manner. One tells me the whole thing is merely a psychological emotion vibrating in sympathy with the acoustical environment.

I dare say.

* * * * *

Personally, I would just as soon leave it unelucidated. There are certain moods in which I do not want such things as nature, and love, and beauty, and self-sacrifice explained. It is enough for me that they are, and that I have been permitted to enjoy them.

* * * * *

And although I know that the Little People are not necessarily wearing gauze wings and white frocks and stars in their hair, as I pictured them in my first childhood, I still like to think that even in the brooks something is singing, something rejoicing, something giving thanks for the gift of life.

XI

The Funeral of the Hero

IT was three months after the funeral of the Village Hero. Now I come to think of it, I haven’t mentioned the funeral before.

The hero, a porter at the little railway station, enlisted very early in the campaign. Our village—in the main—did nobly in the way of early enlistment.

A quiet, retiring young fellow, he had never singled himself out for any sort of notoriety, though I, personally, had always remarked on his unvarying courtesy and his willingness to do everything he could to assist passengers.

The news of his death was the first thing to bring the War actually home to our isolated corner of the world.

People had known he was ill, because his wife had been summoned to a military hospital some weeks before, when his condition was pronounced critical. But no one had really anticipated the worst—till it came. And then the word passed quickly from cottage to cottage: “Poor Aleck’s gone!”

“Ay! You don’t say so! Ain’t it just like they Huns to go and kill off the best of the bunch,” said one woman who never had a good word for the lad during his lifetime.

One and all agreed forthwith that proper respect must be shown to “the remains”; and those who didn’t intend to inconvenience themselves by fighting, felt they were serving their country nobly by seeing that poor Aleck had a handsome funeral.

The news of his death reached the village on Friday. On Saturday the older members of the family selected the spot for his grave in the little churchyard, as, of course, he must be buried near his home.

By Sunday all the relatives to the remotest generation wore deep mourning to church—thanks to the superhuman efforts of the village dressmaker, and numerous ready-mades purchased in the nearest town.

The Rector was in a nursing-home in London at the time, but the curate, though only newly arrived, preached a moving sermon, extolling the courage of the young man who had died “with his face to the foe, braving the falling shells and raining bullets in order to defend his country.”

The sentiment was right—Aleck was willing to do all that; but in reality he never got beyond a training camp on the east coast, where, the air proving too bleak for him after the mildness of the west, he had gone down with pneumonia. The new curate didn’t know that, however, and everybody said it was a beautiful sermon, and went and told the poor mother about it, as she had been too grief-stricken to go to church.

So far the widow had not written herself; but that wasn’t surprising; she would be too broken down with trouble. Willing heads and hands did all they could, however, to anticipate her wishes.

They telegraphed to the former curate (now the vicar of a crowded Lancashire parish) and asked if he would conduct the funeral; he had known the deceased from boyhood. He wired back: “Yes; send day and hour.”

They sent to uncles and aunts and cousins throughout Great Britain: all who could arrived post haste on Monday. And what a gathering it was of outstanding members of the clan! Those who hadn’t recognised each other’s existence for years now forgot their ancient feuds, while one and all discovered such good qualities in the poor lad, and were so anxious to insist on the nearness of their relationship, that his death did not seem altogether in vain.

I myself wrote a note to the widow, only waiting to post it till I could get her address.

Miss Bretherton, the Rector’s niece, hurried home from London to do what she could to comfort the parents, who were aloof from the general excitement and knew only the sorrow of the occasion.

While waiting for further details to arrive, people made wreaths, and discussed how best the engine could be draped in black.

As there was no letter by Tuesday morning, and the vicar in Lancashire had again asked for particulars, the self-constituted committee of management decided to send a wire to the widow. After composing—and then discarding—twenty-six different messages, till the post-office was threatened with a famine in telegram forms, the post-mistress came to their assistance, and suggested that the wording should be as brief and as straightforward as possible, to save misunderstanding—and expense. Eventually they were all persuaded to agree to the following:

“What train will the coffin come by? Reply paid.”

In about an hour the widow answered:

“Whose coffin? Don’t know what you mean. Aleck nearly well.”

* * * * *

The whole village has had three points under discussion ever since.

I. Who was it said he _was_ dead?

II. Can a man be made to pay for his own grave being dug when he refuses to occupy it?

III. And what is to become of the mourning anyhow?

XII

Just a Little Piece of Griskin

I WAS reminded of the funeral when I arrived at the valley station one spring morning, by the fact that it was “the remains” who opened the carriage door for me and helped us out with our things.

He was home for a few days’ leave, looking very smart and upright in his uniform; and he saluted (even though he permitted himself to smile) when I gave him a half-crown, telling him to buy himself a wreath.

* * * * *

The white-painted garden gate had been placed wide open by way of welcome. We had left behind us, in town, weather that called itself the end of March, but in reality ought to have been January; we arrived at the little cottage to find that the calendar had taken a leap forward, for here it was like the end of April. On the grey stone walls beside the gate clumps of wallflowers were in bloom—masses of pale primrose flowers mixed with those of a rich rose-purple variety; only these two sorts had been planted in the chinks of this particular wall. I am sure the dear things nodded at us as we entered.

All over the garden were more wallflowers bursting by the thousand into bloom. Some beds were a mixture of clear bright yellow flowers, combined with the sort that are a deep mahogany, looking as though they were made of velvet; other beds had a pretty rose-pink variety; while on the top of more walls, and in corners and patches about the garden, were the old-fashioned “streaky” kinds, all aglow with brown and yellow.

The long bed in front of the porch, given over to cowslips, oxlips, polyanthus, auriculas, and suchlike homely flowers, was very gay. The polyanthus were a delightful medley of claret colour, pink, brown, crimson, orange, yellow, most of them looking as though the edges of the petals had been buttonholed around with silk of a contrasting colour. It seemed as though the flowers in this bed fairly tip-toed as we came along the path, and stretched their necks as high as ever they could, from out of their crinkled leaves, to show how remarkably fine they were.

In the narrow beds under the cottage windows double daffodils made plenty of colour, and at the edge were clumps of primroses—various shades of pink and crimson. These had seeded over into the path, with the result that baby primrose-plants were coming up cheerily between the rough flagstones. The ordinary yellow primrose was starring the grass all about the orchard, where wild daffodils were swaying by the hundred. The white flowers of the blackthorn were like snowdrifts on the hedges.

It was so wonderful, after the bleak, cheerless aspect of town, to come upon this world of smiling growing things. The soft air, sweeping over the hills, brought the scent of ploughed fields and newly-turned earth, of bursting buds and opening blossoms, with the ozone of the sea, and the salt of the weed that lies on the rocks around the lighthouse in the far-away distance.

There seemed to be an all-pervading peace that laid hold of one’s very soul; and yet you could not say it was really quiet, for birds were giving rival concerts in every tree, and quite a number were devoting their energies to saying insulting things to the newcomers and the small dog who had taken the liberty of encroaching on their ancient heritage. They are not sufficiently grateful for the fact that I leave my woods uncut, and undisturbed, as bird sanctuaries.

Lambs were bleating in the valley meadows; the spring gurgled cheerfully outside the gate as it tumbled out of the spout into the pool below.

We stood in the garden for a moment to take a good breath, and drink in as much of the beauty as we could, when Virginia just touched my arm and looked towards a long belt of trees—mostly oak and fir—that runs down one side of the garden and orchards, linking the larch woods up above us with the birch and hazel coppice down below—the coppice where the nightingales sing, and the tiny wrens and the tomtits build, and where the little dormouse lives, who comes out from among the undergrowth, with no apparent fear, when I stand in the wood-path and softly whistle.

This barricade of trees was originally left standing when the rest of the ground was cleared, to screen the house from the winter gales. But we have named it the Squirrels’ Highway.

Sure enough, as we stood there silent and motionless, down came one little bushy tail from the upper woods, followed by another, probably his wife. They leapt from branch to branch, and from tree to tree, nibbling a young oak shoot here, sniffing delicately at a few leaves somewhere else.

Little bright eyes looked down and saw the strangers; but they had seen them before, and no harm ever resulted—only lovely feasts of nuts laid out on the tops of walls—so they just ran on down their own highway, seeming as light as feathers, and leaping and springing with indescribable grace.

At last they got to the high wall that divides the lower orchard from the birch and hazel coppice, and they played along that wall, bright spots of reddy-brown against the dark green of the ivy and the purple tone of the swelling birch buds. All seemed gaiety and happiness, till a third little bushy tail popped up over the wall from the coppice—and then there were fireworks indeed! I expect they were relations who were not on cordial terms! We left them having a whole-hearted hand-to-hand fight—which, I must say, seems a much more satisfactory way of settling a difference than either Zepp or submarine methods.

* * * * *

Indoors the table had been laid for tea, preparatory to our arrival, by Mrs. Widow, who, as already mentioned, is the custodian of the house in my absence. She gives an old-world curtsy that is very disarming, and says, “I’m main glad to see you back again, miss, and I hope you’ll find everything to your liking.”

That, however, is as it may be.

Nevertheless, there is something about the way that table is always laid that rejoices my heart, even though I might not wish to have my meals set in that pattern every day. The large white cloth may not present the glass-like surface of the town-laundered tablecloth, but at least it is white, and—like the cottage sheets and towels and pillow-cases—it holds the scents of the hillside garden where it was hung out to dry; and though the creases are somewhat ridgy and insistent, and the cloth has been ironed a trifle askew, I know several people who would rather have tea off this tablecloth than the most elaborate dinner and the finest napery that London hotels can produce.

Knives and forks are placed with great precision around the table at intervals, a cup and saucer and plate beside each, the crockery never by any chance matching! In the mathematical centre a loaf of farmhouse bread stands on a kitchen plate, flanked on one side—to the East, as it were—by a large white jug holding a quart of milk, and to the West, by the sugar basin. The big brown teapot stands at the South Pole; and a pudding-basin of new-laid eggs, laid by the widow’s own fowls, are waiting, at the North Pole, to be cooked. A small plate bearing a dinner knife and half a pound of butter (which is never put into the proper butter dish) is placed at the South-West; this is balanced at the South-East by a pot of home-made jam and a tablespoon. Watercress and lettuce may grace the table, though this will be according to the season; but summer or winter, one feature is never omitted, and that is a large kitchen jug full of flowers, gathered by Mrs. Widow from her own garden.

On the day I am writing about, the jug had a brave handful of daffodils, a few sprays of red ribis, dark-brown wallflowers, some small ivy, with some short-stemmed polyanthus suffocating in the centre of the big bunch. And it is wonderful how much you can get crammed into one jug when you try!

* * * * *

Abigail, having none of my weak-minded leanings towards “the primitive,” scornfully whisked the whole lot off the table, as soon as Mrs. Widow had gone back to her own cottage, and re-laid it on modern lines.

We did not hurry over the meal. Virginia got on a lengthy dissertation as to the crying need for fish forks with magnetised prongs that would just draw the bones out of the fish, without any preliminary search and scrutiny. I suggested a radium tip to the prongs—I could think of nothing that seemed more suitable—but she said _that_ might demolish fish and all, in which case one would get no more personal satisfaction out of the creature than one does when having to eat it with its full complement of bones intact.

I then ventured a suggestion that forks made like an ordinary magnet would do, if the fish were given steel drops in regular doses for a few weeks before being caught, so as to get its bones susceptible to the magnet. But Virginia was very lofty, as she always is, about my scientific explanations. I never heard her solution of the problem, because the telegram boy arrived at the moment, with a wire for Abigail, saying that her mother had broken her arm (a genuine case this time!).

So she left by the next train, bewailing the fact that her mother could not get compensation from anyone, as she had given up a post of housekeeper but three months before; if she had only been in the situation still she could have claimed £300 a year for life, Abigail thought—provided the arm could only be induced to remain broken.

Some people, especially her relatives, were always unfortunate, she said, while others were just the reverse. There was a cousin of a friend of hers; he had been out of work for a year or so before he got a job, and then the very first day he met with an accident at the works and had to have his leg amputated; and there he is now, a gentleman for life, comfortably settled on his compensation. Her people never had luck like that. It did seem hard!

* * * * *

“Are you awake?” Virginia’s voice lilted up the stairs next morning.