' AMARYLLIS AT THE FAIR ' 275 



which the immense city of London permits itself to be 

 poisoned. (It is not much better, for it destroys the 

 digestion.) This, too, with wheat at thirty shilhngs the 

 quarter, a price which is in itself one of the most wonderful 

 things of the age. The finest bread ought to be cheap. 



' " They be forty-folds," said Mr. Iden, helping himself 

 to half a dozen. " Look at the gravy go up into um like 

 tea up a knob of sugar." . . .' * 



The good bread, good potatoes, good swede greens, and 

 good mutton, are a matter for our joy as long as human 

 beings remain corrupt and carnivorous. Yet he could not 

 drum the women into 'good, solid, straightforward eating ' ; 

 they must have herrings for tea, snacks of pastry, vinegar 

 with greens, and so on. Rhubarb and black currants he 

 had every day in the season, and used to sweeten his hands 

 with the black-currant leaves. Jefferies himself liked 

 food and drink, if we may judge from his satisfaction with 

 the great eating of the labourers in ' Greene Feme Farm ' ; 

 with Hilary's way with a partridge, and his ' lamb is never 

 good eating without sunshine ' ; with the many pleasures 

 of eating, if it be only home-made bread and butter in 

 ' Bevis ' ; with the joint and tart and ale in ' Hodge and 

 His Masters ' ; with the mullet and the juicy steak and 

 ale in ' The Dewy Mom ' ; and his love of ale and contempt 

 for lentils in ' Amaryllis.' In these matters he has at 

 times a fervour and a large sacred enjoyment almost 

 beyond Charles Lamb's. 



After dinner, Iden muses by the fire, finishing his bread 

 and cheese, grumbling over the Standard ; then he drowses, 

 his face resting on his hand, his head against the wainscot 

 of the wall, where the varnish is worn away and even 

 hollowed : 



' This human mark reminded one of the grooves worn 

 by the knees of generations of worshippers in the sacred 

 steps of the temple which they ascended on all-fours. 

 It was, indeed, a mark of devotion, as Mrs. Iden and others, 

 not very keen observers, would have said, to the god of 



* A maty His at the Fair. 



18—2 



