THE DOWNS 113 



seems to graze by its double ; the furze bushes, rabbit- 

 gnawed in unconscious imitation of the fantastically 

 clipped yews of some trim old pleasaunce, reflect 

 themselves with picturesque fidelity on the tawny 

 brown of the natural lawn they dot. Mowed close 

 enough it is by the cutting breeze, but the teeth of the 

 sheep must bite closer still, for they seem to pick up 

 a comfortable living somehow. Is it reality or fancy 

 that exhibits their clodhopping guardian posing himself 

 on the sky line of the cliff in an attitude that would 

 tempt a sculptor P Assuredly there is poetry that 

 harmonises with his surroundings in the floating fall 

 of his coarse grey blouse as it coquettes with the 

 playful winds. It was no admiration of the beautiful 

 that made him seek that vantage post of his, but if 

 you join him there you will say the rarest taste could 

 not have chosen better. There is a bit of sea scenery 

 that Gudin, in our idea perhaps the most effective of 

 recent sea painters, would travel leagues to paint as we 

 see it now. A bold, bluff headland strikes the eye, its 

 pure white surface throwing back with a painful inten- 

 sity of light the full flush of the noonday sun. It is flung 

 out from the deep blue background of a waveless sea, 

 that melts imperceptibly in the vague distance into a 

 sky as blue ; not the transparent southern blue of the 

 Bay of Naples or Sea of Marmora, but with a dash 

 of English grey stirred through its colouring, thereby 

 gaining in effect what it loses in brilliancy. Here and 

 there a bright bit of sail catches the sun and breaks 

 the surface the reach lies rather off the great path- 



9 



