ht.
It was gravity itself, so tranquil; and it was a sort of intoxicating
laughter. From the top field that we crossed to go down to their
cottage, all the far sweep of those outstretched wings of beauty could be
seen. Very wonderful was the poise of the sacred bird, that moved
nowhere but in our hearts. The lime-tree scent was just stealing out
into air for some days already bereft of the scent of hay; and the sun
was falling to his evening home behind our pines and beeches. It was no
more than radiant warm. And, as we went, we wondered why we had not been
told before that Mrs. Herd was so very ill. It was foolish to
wonder--these people do not speak of suffering till it is late. To
speak, when it means what this meant loss of wife and mother--was to
flatter reality too much. To be healthy, or--die! That is their creed.
To go on till they drop--then very soon pass away! What room for states
between--on their poor wage, in their poor cottages?

We crossed the mill-stream in the hollow--to their white, thatched
dwelling; silent, already awed, almost resentful of this so-varying
Scheme of Things. At the gateway Herd himself was standing, just in from
his work. For work in the country does not wait on illness--even death
claims from its onlookers but a few hours, birth none at all, and it is
as well; for what must be must, and in work alone man rests from grief.
Sorrow and anxiety had made strange alteration already in Herd's face.
Through every crevice of the rough, stolid mask the spirit was peeping, a
sort of quivering suppliant, that seemed to ask all the time: "Is it
true?" A regular cottager's figure, this of Herd's--a labourer of these
parts--strong, slow, but active, with just a touch of the untamed
somewhere, about the swing and carriage of him, about the strong jaw, and
wide thick-lipped mouth; just that something independent, which, in great
variety, clings to the natives of these still remote, half-pagan valleys
by the moor.

We all moved silently to the lee of the outer wall, so that our voices
might not carry up to the sick woman lying there under the eaves, almost
within hand reach. "Yes, sir." "No, sir." "Yes, ma'am." This, and the
constant, unforgettable supplication of his eyes, was all that came from
him; yet he seemed loath to let us go, as though he thought we had some
mysterious power to help him--the magic, perhaps, of money, to those who
have none. Grateful at our promise of anoth