May (the Shepherd):—
There will I make thee beds of roses
With a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle.
A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Then live with me, and be my love!
Margaret (the Lady):—
If that the World and Love were young,
And truth in every shepherd’s tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee, and be thy love!
VIII
A-Nutting
“Thistledown for thoughts,” said May Fisher, laughing, as she tried to seize the glossy balls floating by on the idle air of the lane.
“Thoughts are of little value, then,” said Felix St. Bees.
“Except to the goldfinches,” said Margaret; “see how busy they are.”
It was a lovely afternoon: white fleecy clouds lingered in the upper atmosphere, so gauze-like in texture as scarcely to diminish the sun’s rays when they passed over. The golden mist of ripe September filled the hollows and hung over the distant ridges, softening with haze the outlines of the hills. The fierce stress of midsummer heat was gone, leaving instead a luxurious warmth that lured them into the fields. Margaret had succeeded in persuading old Andrew Fisher to let May return to Greene Ferne. Rude as he was, Margaret’s beauty stirred the expiring spirit of gallantry, and he yielded. Although he would not let May go back at once in her company, he fixed a day for her return. Margaret explained to him that St. Bees did not need his money, having plenty; and the old man—prompted too by avarice—sent a gruff kind of apology, and asked Felix to call again. Felix, however, had had his dignity upset by the blackthorn cudgel hurled at his head, and naturally waited awhile before repeating his visit. Geoffrey still stayed at Thorpe Hall, for the shooting now, and Valentine at Hollyock Cottage. They had all started that afternoon to go a-nutting in Thorpe Wood.
The wood was approached by a winding thick-hedged lane. As they slowly advanced a bevy of goldfinches went before them, rising from the thistles, for they love the seeds in the down, with a “fink” of remonstrance, settling again to start up once more, and finally, out of patience at the interruption, taking flight to the tall ash-trees, to wait till the intruders had passed on.
“We must have some sticks with crooks to pull the boughs down,” said May, “or we shall not reach half the nuts.”
So the gentlemen took out their pocketknives, and searched for suitable sticks. Felix cut one of hazel, twice as long as himself; Valentine another of ash; Geoffrey carelessly slashed off the first willow-bough he came to, and trimmed it.
“Yours will not do,” said Margaret to him. “The willow is too weak—it will split.”
“Will mine answer?” asked Valentine, showing a stout piece of ash.
“Yes, that is tougher. Why don’t you get an ash, Geoffrey?”
“I shall trust in my first choice,” said Geoffrey, just a trifle annoyed even by so slight a matter; for when men’s minds are strung with love and jealousy the least thing nettles them.
“I think it will do,” said May, anxious to smooth it over.
As they went on down the lane the blackbirds every now and then sprang from the bushes with a loud cry; the song-thrushes, less wild, sat on the spray till they came close. Stray blue butterflies wandered wonderingly in and out, with a dainty tripping flight—wonderingly, because they had but lately entered to the summer world, and found so much to see they could not stay long in one place. Bryony leaves, shaped like the shields of ancient Norman knights, trailed a pale buff scarf across the bushes. Bryony berries, some red and some a metallic shining green, clustered in grape-like bunches. Blackberries ripening; haws reddening on the thorn; yellow fronds of brake fern on the tall stems rising beside the brambles. No sound save the dry grasshoppers singing in the grass, and leaping before their footsteps; and the robin’s plaintive notes from the ash. So they went on and into the silence of the wood. The soft warmth brooded over it—the winds were still. High up in the beeches spots of red gold were widening slowly, and the acorns showed thickly on the oaks. Then past narrow “drives,” or tracks going through the woods, bounded on each side with endless walls of ashpoles with branches of pole green; carpeted with dark-green grass and darker moss luxuriating in the dank shade, and roofed with spreading oak-spray. These vistas seemed to lead into unknown depths of forest. They paused and looked down one, feeling an indefinite desire of exploration; and as they looked in the silence a leaf fell, brown and tanned, with a trembling rustle, and they saw its brown oval dot the rank green grass, upon whose blades it was upborne. On again, and out into a broad glade, where the rabbits had been at play, and raced to their hiding-places. Here were clumps of beeches, brown with innumerable nuts; straight-grown Spanish chestnuts, with spiny green balls of fruit; knotted oaks; and tall limes, already yellow and filled by
