78 FIELD AND HEDGEROW. 



tiles, whose fastening pegs were visible. A great heap 

 of golden scales lay in one corner, the hops fresh from 

 the drying. Up to his waist in a pocket let through the 

 floor a huge giant of a man trod the hops down in the 

 sack, turning round and round, and now his wide 

 shoulders and now his red cheeks succeeded. The 

 music twirled him about as a leaf by the wind. With- 

 out the rich blue autumn sky ; within the fragrant odour 

 of hops, the hum of the threshing circling round like 

 the buzz of an immense bee. As the hum of insects 

 high in the atmosphere of midsummer suits and fits to 

 the roses and the full green meads, so the hum of the 

 threshing suits to the yellowing leaf and drowsy air of 

 autumn. The iteration of hum and monotone soothes, 

 and means so much more in its inarticulation than the 

 adjusted chords and tune of written music. Laughing, 

 the children romped round the ricks ; they love the 

 threshing and flock to it, they watch the fly-wheel 

 rotating, they look in at the furnace door when the 

 engine-driver stokes his fire, they gaze wonderingly at 

 the gauge, and long to turn the brass taps ; then with a 

 shout they rush to chase the unhappy mice dislodged 

 from the corn. The mice hide themselves in the petti- 

 coats of the women working at the ' sheening,' and the 

 cottager when she goes home in the evening calls her 

 cat and shakes them out of her skirts. By a blue 

 waggon the farmer stands leaning on his staff. He is 

 an invalid, and his staff", or rather pole, is as tall as him- 

 self ; he holds it athwart, one end touching the ground 

 beyond his left foot, the other near his right shoulder. 

 His right hand grasps it rather high, and his left down 

 by his hip, so that the pole forms a line across his body. 

 In this way he is steadied and supported and his whole 

 weight relieved, much more so than it would be with an 



