The actual decay of the house had been prevented by my dear father; and the roof, windows, masonry1, and carpentry had all been kept in repair. But short of indications of actual ruin, there are many manifestations2 of poverty and neglect which impress with a feeling of desolation. It was plain that not nearly a tithe3 of this great house was inhabited; long corridors and galleries stretched away in dust and silence, and were crossed by others, whose dark arches inspired me in the distance with an awful sort of sadness. It was plainly one of those great structures in which you might easily lose yourself, and with a pleasing terror it reminded me of that delightful4 old abbey in Mrs. Radcliffe’s romance, among whose silent staircases, dim passages, and long suites5 of lordly, but forsaken6 chambers7, begirt without by the sombre forest, the family of La Mote8 secured a gloomy asylum9.
My cousin Milly and I, however, were bent10 upon an open-air ramble11, and traversing several passages, she conducted me to a door which led us out upon a terrace overgrown with weeds, and by a broad flight of steps we descended12 to the level of the grounds beneath. Then on, over the short grass, under the noble trees, we walked; Milly in high good-humour, and talking away volubly, in her short garment, navvy boots, and a weather-beaten hat. She carried a stick in her gloveless hand. Her conversation was quite new to me, and resembled very much what I would have fancied the holiday recollections of a schoolboy; and the language in which it was sustained was sometimes so outlandish, that I was forced to laugh outright13 — a demonstration14 which she plainly did not like.
Her talk was about the great jumps she had made — how she “snow-balled the chaps” in winter — how she could slide twice the length of her stick beyond “Briddles, the cow-boy.”
With this and similar conversation she entertained me.
The grounds were delightfully15 wild and neglected. But we had now passed into a vast park beautifully varied16 with hollows and uplands, and such glorious old timber massed and scattered17 over its slopes and levels. Among these, we got at last into a picturesque18 dingle; the grey rocks peeped from among the ferns and wild flowers, and the steps of soft sward along its sides were dark in the shadows of silver-stemmed birch, and russet thorn, and oak, under which, in the vaporous night, the Erl-king and his daughter might glide19 on their a?rial horses.
In the lap of this pleasant dell were the finest blackberry bushes, I think, I ever saw, bearing fruit quite fabulous20; and plucking these, and chatting, we rambled21 on very pleasantly.
I had first through of Milly’s absurdities22, to which, in description, I cannot do justice, simply because so many details have, by distance of time, escaped my recollection. But her ways and her talk were so indescribably grotesque23 that she made me again and again quiver with suppressed laughter.
But there was a pitiable and even a melancholy24 meaning underlying25 the burlesque26.
This creature, with no more education than a dairy-maid, I gradually discovered had fine natural aptitudes27 for accomplishment28 — a very sweet voice, and wonderfully delicate ear, and a talent for drawing which quite threw mine into the shade. It was really astonishing.
Poor Milly, in all her life, had never read three books, and hated to think of them. One, over which she was wont29 to yawn and sigh, and stare fatiguedly for an hour every Sunday, by command of the Governor, was a stout30 volume of the sermons of the earlier school of George III., and a drier collection you can’t fancy. I don’t think she read anything else. But she had, notwithstanding, ten times the cleverness of half the circulating library misses one meets with. Besides all this, I had a long sojourn31 before me at Bartram–Haugh, and I had learned from Milly, as I had heard before, what a perennial32 solitude33 it was, with a ludicrous fear of learning Milly’s preposterous34 dialect, and turning at last into something like her. So I resolved to do all I could for her — teach her whatever I knew, if she would allow me — and gradually, if possible, effect some civilising changes in her language, and, as they term it in boarding-schools, her demeanour.
But I must pursue at present our first day’s ramble in what was called Bartram Chase. People can’t go on eating blackberries always; so after a while we resumed our walk along this pretty dell, which gradually expanded into a wooded valley — level beneath and enclosed by irregular uplands, receding35, as it were, in mimic36 bays and harbours at some points, and running out at others into broken promontories37, ending in clumps38 of forest trees.
Just where the glen which we had been traversing expanded into this broad, but wooded valley, it was traversed by a high and close paling, which, although it looked decayed, was still very strong.
In this there was a wooden gate, rudely but strongly constructed, and at the side we were approaching stood a girl, who was leaning against the post, with one arm resting on the top of the gate.
This girl was neither tall nor short — taller than she looked at a distance; she had not a slight waist; sooty black was her hair, with a broad forehead, perpendicular39 but low; she had a pair of very fine, dark, lustrous40 eyes, and no other good feature — unless I may so call her teeth, which were very white and even. Her face was rather short, and swarthy as a gipsy’s; observant and sullen41 too; and she did not move, only eyed us negligently42 from under her dark lashes43 as we drew near. Altogether a not unpicturesque figure, with a dusky, red petticoat of drugget, and tattered44 jacket of bottle-green stuff, with short sleeves, which showed her brown arms from the elbow.
“That’s Pegtop’s daughter,” said Milly.
“Who is Pegtop?” I asked.
“He’s the miller45 — see, yonder it is,” and she pointed46 to a very pretty feature in the landscape, a windmill, crowning the summit of a hillock which rose suddenly above the level of the tree-tops, like an island in the centre of the valley.
“The mill not going to-day, Beauty?” bawled47 Milly.
“No-a, Beauty; it baint,” replied the girl, loweringly, and without stirring.
“And what’s gone with the stile?” demanded Milly, aghast. “It’s tore away from the paling!”
“Well, so it be,” replied the wood nymph in the red petticoat, showing her fine teeth with a lazy grin.
“Who’s a bin48 and done all that?” demanded Milly.
“Not you nor me, lass,” said the girl.
“’Twas old Pegtop, your father, did it,” cried Milly, in rising wrath49.
“‘Appen it wor,” she replied.
“And the gate locked.”
“That’s it — the gate locked,” she repeated, sulkily, with a defiant50 side-glance at Milly.
“And where’s Pegtop?”
“At t’other side, somewhere; how should I know where he be?” she replied.
“Who’s got the key?”
“Here it be, lass,” she answered, striking her hand on her pocket.
“And how durst you stay us here? Unlock it, huzzy, this minute!” cried Milly, with a stamp.
Her answer was a sullen smile.
“Open the gate this instant!” bawled Milly.
“Well, I won’t.”
I expected that Milly would have flown into a frenzy51 at this direct defiance52, but she looked instead puzzled and curious — the girls’ unexpected audacity53 bewildered her.
“Why, you fool, I could get over the paling as soon as look at you, but I won’t. What’s come over you? Open the gate, I say, or I’ll make you.”
“Do let her alone, dear,” I entreated54, fearing a mutual55 assault. “She has been ordered, may be, not to open it. Is it so, my good girl?”
“Well, thou’rt not the biggest fool o’ the two,” she observed, commendatively, “thou’st hit it, lass.”
“And who ordered you?” exclaimed Milly.
“Father.”
“Old Pegtop. Well, that’s summat to laugh at, it is — our servant a-shutting us out of our own grounds.”
“No servant o’ yourn!”
“Come, lass, what do you mean?”
“He be old Silas’s miller, and what’s that to thee?”
With these words the girl made a spring on the hasp of the padlock, and then got easily over the gate.
“Can’t you do that, cousin?” whispered Milly to me, with an impatient nudge. “I wish you’d try.”
“No, dear — come away, Milly,” and I began to withdraw.
“Lookee, lass, ’twill be an ill day’s work for thee when I tell the Governor,” said Milly, addressing the girl, who stood on a log of timber at the other side, regarding us with a sullen composure.
“We’ll be over in spite o’ you,” cried Milly.
“You lie!” answered she.
“And why not, huzzy?” demanded my cousin, who was less incensed56 at the affront57 than I expected. All this time I was urging Milly in vain to come away.
“Yon lass is no wild cat, like thee — that’s why,” said the sturdy portress.
“If I cross, I’ll give you a knock,” said Milly.
“And I’ll gi’ thee another,” she answered, with a vicious wag of the head.
“Come, Milly, I’ll go if you don’t,” I said.
“But we must not be beat,” whispered she, vehemently58, catching59 my arm; “and ye shall get over, and see what I will gi’ her!”
“I’ll not get over.”
“Then I’ll break the door, for ye shall come through,” exclaimed Milly, kicking the stout paling with her ponderous60 boot.
“Purr it, purr it, purr it,” cried the lass in the red petticoat with a grin.
“Do you know who this lady is?” cried Milly, suddenly.
“She is a prettier lass than thou,” answered Beauty.
“She’s my cousin Maud — Miss Ruthyn of Knowl — and she’s a deal richer than the Queen; and the Governor’s taking care of her; and he’ll make old Pegtop bring you to a reason.”
The girl eyed me with a sulky listlessness, a little inquisitively61, I thought.
“See if he don’t,” threatened Milly.
“You positively62 must come,” I said, drawing her away with me.
“Well, shall we come in?” cried Milly, trying a last summons.
“You’ll not come in that much,” she answered, surlily, measuring an infinitesimal distance on her finger with her thumb, which she pinched against it, the gesture ending with a snap of defiance, and a smile that showed her fine teeth.
“I’ve a mind to shy a stone at you,” shouted Milly.
“Faire away; I’ll shy wi’ ye as long as ye like, lass; take heed63 o’ yerself;” and Beauty picked up a round stone as large as a cricket ball.
With difficulty I got Milly away without an exchange of missiles, and much disgusted at my want of zeal64 and agility65.
“Well, come along, cousin. I know an easy way by the river, when it’s low,” answered Milly. “She’s a brute66 — is not she?”
As we receded67, we saw the girl slowly wending her way towards the old thatched cottage, which showed its gable from the side of a little rugged68 eminence69 embowered in spreading trees, and dangling70 and twirling from its string on the end of her finger the key for which a battle had so nearly been fought.
The stream was low enough to make our flank movement round the end of the paling next it quite easy, and so we pursued our way, and Milly’s equanimity71 returned, and our ramble grew very pleasant again.
Our path lay by the river bank, and as we proceeded, the dwarf72 timber was succeeded by grander trees, which crowded closer and taller, and, at last, the scenery deepened into solemn forest, and a sudden sweep in the river revealed the beautiful ruin of a steep old bridge, with the fragments of a gate-house on the farther side.
“Oh, Milly darling!” I exclaimed, “what a beautiful drawing this would make! I should so like to make a sketch73 of it.”
“So it would. Make a picture — do! — here’s a stone that’s pure and flat to sit upon, and you look very tired. Do make it, and I’ll sit by you.”
“Yes, Milly, I am tired, a little, and I will sit down; but we must wait for another day to make the picture, for we have neither pencil nor paper. But it is much too pretty to be lost; so let us come again to-morrow.”
“To-morrow be hanged! you’ll do it to-day, bury-me-wick, but you shall; I’m wearying to see you make a picture, and I’ll fetch your conundrums74 out o’ your drawer, for do’t you shall.”
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1
masonry
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| n.砖土建筑；砖石 | |
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manifestations
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| n.表示，显示（manifestation的复数形式） | |
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tithe
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| n.十分之一税；v.课什一税，缴什一税 | |
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4
delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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suites
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| n.套( suite的名词复数 )；一套房间；一套家具；一套公寓 | |
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6
Forsaken
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| adj. 被遗忘的, 被抛弃的 动词forsake的过去分词 | |
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7
chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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mote
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| n.微粒；斑点 | |
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asylum
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| n.避难所，庇护所，避难 | |
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10
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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ramble
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| v.漫步，漫谈，漫游；n.漫步，闲谈，蔓延 | |
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12
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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outright
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| adv.坦率地；彻底地；立即；adj.无疑的；彻底的 | |
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14
demonstration
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| n.表明，示范，论证，示威 | |
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delightfully
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| 大喜，欣然 | |
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16
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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17
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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18
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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glide
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| n./v.溜，滑行；(时间)消逝 | |
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fabulous
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| adj.极好的；极为巨大的；寓言中的，传说中的 | |
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21
rambled
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| （无目的地）漫游( ramble的过去式和过去分词 )； （喻）漫谈； 扯淡； 长篇大论 | |
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22
absurdities
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| n.极端无理性( absurdity的名词复数 )；荒谬；谬论；荒谬的行为 | |
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23
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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25
underlying
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| adj.在下面的，含蓄的，潜在的 | |
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burlesque
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| v.嘲弄，戏仿；n.嘲弄，取笑，滑稽模仿 | |
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27
aptitudes
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| （学习方面的）才能，资质，天资( aptitude的名词复数 ) | |
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accomplishment
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| n.完成，成就，（pl.）造诣，技能 | |
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wont
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| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
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sojourn
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| v./n.旅居，寄居；逗留 | |
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perennial
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| adj.终年的；长久的 | |
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solitude
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| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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34
preposterous
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| adj.荒谬的，可笑的 | |
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receding
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| v.逐渐远离( recede的现在分词 )；向后倾斜；自原处后退或避开别人的注视；尤指问题 | |
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mimic
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| v.模仿，戏弄；n.模仿他人言行的人 | |
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promontories
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| n.岬，隆起，海角( promontory的名词复数 ) | |
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clumps
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| n.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的名词复数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的第三人称单数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
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39
perpendicular
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| adj.垂直的，直立的；n.垂直线，垂直的位置 | |
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40
lustrous
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| adj.有光泽的；光辉的 | |
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41
sullen
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| adj.愠怒的，闷闷不乐的，(天气等)阴沉的 | |
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42
negligently
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43
lashes
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| n.鞭挞( lash的名词复数 )；鞭子；突然猛烈的一击；急速挥动v.鞭打( lash的第三人称单数 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
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44
tattered
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| adj.破旧的，衣衫破的 | |
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45
miller
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| n.磨坊主 | |
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46
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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47
bawled
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| v.大叫，大喊( bawl的过去式和过去分词 )；放声大哭；大声叫出；叫卖（货物） | |
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bin
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| n.箱柜；vt.放入箱内；[计算机] DOS文件名:二进制目标文件 | |
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49
wrath
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| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
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50
defiant
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| adj.无礼的，挑战的 | |
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51
frenzy
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| n.疯狂，狂热，极度的激动 | |
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52
defiance
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| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
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53
audacity
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| n.大胆，卤莽，无礼 | |
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54
entreated
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| 恳求，乞求( entreat的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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55
mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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56
incensed
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| 盛怒的 | |
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57
affront
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| n./v.侮辱，触怒 | |
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58
vehemently
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| adv. 热烈地 | |
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59
catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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ponderous
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| adj.沉重的，笨重的，(文章)冗长的 | |
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61
inquisitively
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| 过分好奇地； 好问地 | |
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positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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64
zeal
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| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
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65
agility
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| n.敏捷，活泼 | |
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66
brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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receded
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| v.逐渐远离( recede的过去式和过去分词 )；向后倾斜；自原处后退或避开别人的注视；尤指问题 | |
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68
rugged
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| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
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eminence
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| n.卓越，显赫；高地，高处；名家 | |
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70
dangling
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| 悬吊着( dangle的现在分词 )； 摆动不定； 用某事物诱惑…； 吊胃口 | |
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71
equanimity
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| n.沉着，镇定 | |
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72
dwarf
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| n.矮子，侏儒，矮小的动植物；vt.使…矮小 | |
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sketch
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| n.草图；梗概；素描；v.素描；概述 | |
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74
conundrums
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| n.谜，猜不透的难题，难答的问题( conundrum的名词复数 ) | |
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