So I go slowly up the hill, till the valley lies beneath me like a
long green garden between its two banks of brown moor; and on through
a cheerful little green, with red brick cottages scattered all round,
each with its large neat garden, and beehives, and pigs and geese,
and turf-stack, and clipt yews and hollies before the door, and rosy
dark-eyed children, and all the simple healthy comforts of a wild
'heth-cropper's' home. When he can, the good man of the house works
at farm labour, or cuts his own turf; and when work is scarce, he
cuts copses and makes heath-brooms, and does a little poaching.
True, he seldom goes to church, save to be christened, married, or
buried: but he equally seldom gets drunk. For church and public
stand together two miles off; so that social wants sometimes bring
their own compensations with them, and there are two sides to every
question.
Hark! A faint, dreary hollo off the moor above. And then another,
and another. My friends may trust it; for the clod of these parts
delights in the chase like any bare-legged Paddy, and casts away
flail and fork wildly, to run, shout, assist, and interfere in all
possible ways, out of pure love.
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