122 IDLEHURST : 



at a bend in the road ; indulging a fancy which some- 

 times comes in turning away from such a feast, from 

 Mrs. Lydia's music, or from a rich sunrise, a fancy that 

 the lost beauty will all be found again presently, to 

 the note and the hue, in the centre wherefrom it is a 

 vibration. 



It was a very light and still evening, and the village 

 street when I reached it was murmurous with a 

 sauntering crowd, buying, gossiping at corners, 

 dropping in and out of the public-houses, the 

 Stand-up and the Crocodile ; a crowd happy 

 enough in its own way, with the week's wages in 

 hand and the Sabbath already begun. Some of the 

 men are by this time washed and in their better 

 clothes, recreating, like my friend of the accordion, 

 who acts Pan to this Arcady for want of a better, and 

 fills the street with jerky strophes. There are too 

 many of the girls from the cottages, the order which 

 does not "go out to service," the home-drudges and 

 the "up-street" gadabouts, enjoying their principal 

 promenade, strolling arm-in-arm deep in circum- 

 stantial secrets, or formed in line at the edge of the 

 pavement to badiner with the contemporary youth, 

 who balance on their heels in the roadway, spit, and 

 exercise repartee, with minute-gun explosions of horse- 

 laughter. 



