156 AN ANGLER AT LARGE 



the brown thatch, the little wreaths of opal 

 smoke, the superb elms that dominate all the 

 valley was now but a valley of shadows, formless, 

 unguessable. Only the black hedges might be 

 traced against the pallor of field and hill, and the 

 elms, indefinite but unconquered, surged violet- 

 edged over the sky-line. The pollards, too, 

 seemed soft round clouds that had come to rest 

 by the water. On Ottley Down the clump lay 

 like a couched lion, rather terrible of aspect. It 

 was as if some great beast of the night had come 

 early to the hill's edge, and now waited for utter 

 darkness before it descended upon the village. 



On the rail of the wooden bridge I leaned and 

 stared after the sun, and thanked God that I am 

 not as other men are, such men as, at that same 

 moment, might be clearing their way remorselessly, 

 with a fair thing upon their arm, towards a buffet. 

 On the bridge one had no company but oneself. 

 One had elbow-room, at any rate. Had a certain 

 fair thing been with me, I had been well content, 

 but she was gone to bed like a sensible woman. 



And I listened to the sounds of the night. 



There are more of these by the stream than 

 elsewhere, on the road, or in the fields. There 

 stealthy, dry little noises come out of the hedges 

 where the field people go about their business. 

 A goat-sucker may purr, a horse snort, a cow low, 



