She was bathing in the beauty of the morning—floating upheld on the dewy petals. A swimmer lies on the warm summer water, the softest of couches, extended at full length, the body so gently held that it undulates slightly with the faint swell. So soft is the couch it softens the frame, which becomes supple, flexible, like the water itself.
Felise was lying on the flowers and grass, extended under the sun, steeped in their sweetness. She visibly sat on the oak-trunk—invisibly her nature was reclining, as the swimmer on the sun-warmed sea. Her frame drooped as the soul, which bears it up, flowed outwards, feeling to grass, and flower, and leaf, as the swimmer spreads the arms abroad, and the fingers feel the water. She sighed with deep content, dissolving in the luxurious bath of beauty.
Her strong heart beating, the pulses throbbing, her bosom rising and regularly sinking with the rich waves of life; her supple limbs and roundness filled with the plenty of ripe youth; her white, soft, roseate skin, the surface where the sun touched her hand glistening with the dew of the pore; the bloom upon her—that glow of the morn of life—the hair more lovely than the sunlight; the grace unwritten of perfect form—these produced within her a sense of existence—a consciousness of being, to which she was abandoned; and her lips parted to sigh. The sigh was the expression of feeling herself to be.
To be! To live! To have an intense enjoyment in every inspiration of breath; in every beat of the pulse; in every movement of the limbs; in every sense!
The rugged oak-trunk was pleasant to her. She placed her hand on the brown, stained wood—stained with its own sap, for the bark had been removed. She touched it; and so full of life was her touch, that it found a pleasure in that rude wood. The brown boulder-stone in the lane, ancient, smoothed, and ground in times which have vanished like a cloud, its surface the colour of old polished oak, reflecting the sun with a dull gleam—the very boulder-stone was pleasant to her, so full of life was her sense of sight.
There came a skylark, dropping over the hedge, and alighted on a dusty level spot in the lane. His shadow shot a foot long on the dust, thrown by the level beams of the sun. The dust, in shadow and sunshine—the despised dust—now that the lark drew her glance to it, was pleasant to see.
All things are joyously beautiful to those who feel themselves to be; but it is only given to the chosen of nature to know this exceeding delight.
In herself rapt, the whole face of earth and sky ministered to her, each and all that made up the visible world was flung at her feet. They did homage—Felise, queen of herself, was queen of all.
It was love without a lover—love absorbed in itself. Her whole existence was quivering with love; this intensity of life was love. She was gathering from sunlight, azure sky and grassy fields, from dewy hills and all the morning, an immense strength to love. Her parted lips sighed—there was such store and warmth of love within them. Without a thought she thought deeply, pondering, weighed down on herself with weight of feeling. Her own intense existence absorbed her.
Till looking that way, she saw that there was now a broad space between the lower rim of the sun and the hill she meant to climb; then she got up, and went on. She had started in time to see the sun rise, from its summit, but had idled and dallied with flowers and green boughs on the way, and lost the sunrise.
II
The lane became more rugged; then there was a sudden dip, and in the hollow of the dip a streamlet ran across. A blackbird had been splashing in the water; and, as she came over the slope, rose up loudly calling. He perched on the hedge, looked towards her impudently from his dark eyes, half a mind to defy her, so bold was he in his beauty of blackest black and tawny bill. But as she stepped nearer he went off, again loudly calling and startling every bird in the field.
The streamlet was so shallow the small flints were only half submerged, and the water was but a few inches wide. The sand which the blackbird had disturbed floated quickly away, leaving it perfectly pure. Felise stooped, dipped her fingers, and watched the drops fall sparkling from them. She felt the water; she liked to touch all things—the sunlight shone the brighter on her hand because it was wet.
Beyond the streamlet the lane rose rapidly, rugged and narrow; the hedges ceased, and only a hawthorn-bush here and there appeared on the banks. Presently it became a deep white groove, worn in chalk.
Felise stepped quickly now, and in a few minutes reached the foot of the hill, where the lane left the straight line, and went up the Downs aslant, so that wagons might be drawn up, which they could not have been had the track been straight.
The moment Felise’s foot touched the sward, she began to run up the hill, making direct for the ridge, like a hare, or a bee bent for the thyme above. Her arched insteps, like springs, threw her forwards; her sinews strung and strong, lifted her easily. Her weight did not press the turf—it was for the time suspended between her swift bounds. Rejoicing, her deep chest opened, the pliant ribs, like opening fingers, made room for cubic feet of purest atmosphere. The air inhaled lifted her; she was lighter
