220 THE SOUTH COUNTRY 



the map the road sets out straight for a town far north; 

 but in two miles the hospitality of a great house seems to 

 draw it aside, then of "The Plough "; emerging again it 

 wanders awhile before returning to its northward line; 

 and this it does time after time, and as often as it pauses 

 a lesser road runs out of it to the great road across the 

 river. There are scores of such parallel roads — some- 

 times the lesser is in part, or entirely, a footpath — in 

 England, and in avoiding the dust, the smell, the noise, 

 the insolence of the new traffic, the lesser are an invalu- 

 able aid. This one proceeds without rise or fall through 

 the green river levels, but looks up to a ridge of white- 

 scarred purple moor away from the stream, with oak and 

 thatched cottages below the heather. It creeps in and 

 out like an old cottage woman at a fair and sees every- 

 thing. It sees all the farms and barns. It sees the portly 

 brick house and its gardens bounded by high fruit walls 

 and its walnut-trees in front, on the bank of a golden 

 brook that sings under elms and sallows; the twenty-four 

 long white windows, the decent white porch, the large 

 lawns, the pond and its waterfowl sounding in the reeds, 

 the oaks and acacias, the horse mowing the lawn lazily, 

 the dogs barking behind the Elizabethan stables. It sees 

 the broad grassy borders — for this is not a road cut by a 

 skimping tailor — and the woods of oak and ash and hazel 

 which the squirrel owns, chiding, clucking and angrily 

 flirting his tail at those who would like to share his nuts. 

 At every crossing road these grassy borders, which are in 

 places as broad as meadows so that cattle graze under 

 their elms, spread out into a green; and round about are 

 yellow thatched cottages with gardens full of scarlet 

 bean flowers and yellow dahlias; and a pond reflects the 



