Stepping Westward

The wayside hedgerow, gay with its autumn tints, stretched its undulating length beside the rather stony lane that wound upwards from the high road, and lost itself amid a multiplicity of sheep-tracks on the down.

It was one of those mild days that here in the south country cheat the fancy with their likeness, not merely to spring, but to summer. The sky was blue and cloudless; the birds were singing; the banks were still starred with many flowers: crane’s-bill, mallow and scabious. Here and there the gorse was blooming afresh, and new blossoms of guelder-rose surmounted, incongruously enough, twigs with claret-coloured leaves that dropped at a touch. Here, indeed, the finger of autumn had left its trace, and all along the hedge were tokens of its magic. Such miracles of colour as the conjurer had wrought this year are rarely to be seen: such goldens and ambers, such scarlets and crimsons; stretching away beyond the hedge were fields still silvery with night-dews, and woods shining with the incomparable burnish of the season.

Sol Bowditch, the hedger, had no eyes for any of these beauties, however; under the strokes of thatuncompromising bill-hook of his the glories of the hedge were shorn. Bending his vigorous young body backwards, he threw all his strength into the task, and with each rhythmical swing of his sturdy arm a fresh victim fell. Now a branch of maple that seemed to shower stars as it dropped; now a jagged wild-rose, heavily laden with ruby provender which later on might have made many a starving bird happy; now a hazel-twig with a few belated nuts still clinging to their shrivelled wrappings; now, with quick sharp strokes, making short work of hawthorn and privet; again tearing, rather than cutting with his hook, long-tufted tendrils of jewelled bryony or hoary traveller’s-joy.

Thus was beauty laid low and nature’s kindly forethought set at nought. Farmer House cared little for the poetical aspect of things, and still less for the wants of the singing-birds; being apt, indeed, to speak of all wild creatures in a lump as “dratted varmint.” It was Sol Bowditch’s duty to please Farmer House, and so between them the birds’ winter store was trampled under foot or scattered to the winds.

Sol Bowditch was a stranger, having recently tramped hither all the way from Bridport in search of work; but though he had travelled on foot and carried his worldly goods in a small bundle, he was unquestionably an honest and respectable young fellow. No one who looked at his brown face and clear eyes could doubt that fact, and as for the manner in which he wielded his bill-hook it was, as the farmer said, a treat to see him.

It wanted yet an hour or two of dinner-time when Sol, having paused a moment to finish tearing away an obstinate tangle of bryony, was startled by the approaching sound of wheels; and, looking up, saw the rim of the green hood of a carrier’s cart slowly rounding the corner of the lane from the point where it descended from the down. The horse was apparently very old, for it proceeded slowly; and the vehicle creaked and jolted as if it too were ancient. As it jogged nearer Sol saw that it contained but a single occupant, that of the girl-driver, and when it came nearer yet he observed that she was young and pretty; her face, with its clear, yet delicate colouring, framed in curling brown hair, standing out against the background of the old green “shed” like a picture, as he said to himself. The girl’s eyes rested on him for a moment as she jogged past, and he jerked his head at her sideways in a manner which implied as plainly as words: “Good day.” She nodded back at him brightly, yet modestly, and the vehicle, which was, as Sol observed, filled with packages of various sizes, went rattling on its downward way, the horse stumbling and sliding every now and then, and being admonished in a high, clear treble.