To that conservative orb of light and
heat there must have been a peculiar satisfaction in looking down a few
hours earlier upon the battlements and gables of Oldenhurst, whose base
was deeply embedded in the matured foundations and settled traditions
of an English county. For the rising sun had for ten centuries found
Oldenhurst in its place, from the heavy stone terrace that covered the
dead-and-forgotten wall, where a Roman sentinel had once paced, to
the little grating in the cloistered quadrangle, where it had seen a
Cistercian brother place the morning dole. It had daily welcomed the
growth of this vast and picturesque excrescence of the times; it had
smiled every morning upon this formidable yet quaint incrustation
of power and custom, ignoring, as Oldenhurst itself had ignored, the
generations who possessed it, the men who built it, the men who carried
it with fire and sword, the men who had lied and cringed for it, the
King who had given it to a favorite, the few brave hearts who had died
for it in exile, and the one or two who had bought and paid for it. For
Oldenhurst had absorbed all these and more until it had become a story
of the past, incarnate in stone, greenwood, and flower; it had even
drained the life-blood from adjacent hamlets, repaying them with tumuli
growths like its own, in the shape of purposeless lodges, quaintly
incompetent hospitals and schools, and churches where the inestimable
blessing and knowledge of its gospel were taught and fostered.
Pages:
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117