Nobody comes near this
place. A vague country lane, or rather track; goes past the wet soil of
it, plunges into the valley beyond, and after serving a windmill joins
the high road to Canterbury. Well, that vague track is the ancient
British road, as old as anything in this Island, that took men from
Winchester to the Straits of Dover. That earthwork is the earthwork (I
could prove it, but this is not the place) where the British stood
against the charge of the Tenth Legion, and first heard, sounding on
their bronze, the arms of Caesar. Here the river was forded; here the
little men of the South went up in formation; here the Barbarian broke
and took his way, as the opposing General has recorded, through devious
woodland paths, scattering in the pursuit; here began the great history
of England.
Is it not an enormous business merely to stand in such a place? I think
so.
I know a field to the left of the Chalons Road, some few miles before
you get to Ste. Menehould. There used to be an inn by the roadside
called "The Sign of the Moon." It has disappeared. There used to be a
ramshackle windmill beyond the field, a mile or so from the road, on an
upland swell of land, but that also has gone, and had been gone for some
time before I knew the field of which I write. It is a bare fold of land
with one or two little scrubby spinneys alongside the plough.
Pages:
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82