'I have never seen any planet or star through a telescope.' 'If you will come the first clear night, Lady Constantine, I will show you any number. I mean, at your express wish; not otherwise.' 'I should like to come, and possibly may at some time. These stars that
vary so much--sometimes evening stars, sometimes morning stars, sometimes
in the east, and sometimes in the west--have always interested me.' 'Ah--now there is a reason for your not coming. Your ignorance of the realities of astronomy is so satisfactory that I will not disturb it except at your serious request.' 'But I wish to be enlightened.' 'Let me caution you against it.' 'Is enlightenment on the subject, then, so terrible?' 'Yes, indeed.' She laughingly declared that nothing could have so piqued her curiosity as his statement, and turned to descend. He helped her down the stairs and through the briers. He would have gone further and crossed the open
corn-land with her, but she preferred to go alone. He then retraced his
way to the top of the column, but, instead of looking longer at the sun,
watched her diminishing towards the distant fence, behind which waited
the carriage. When in the midst of the field, a dark spot on an area of
brown, there crossed her path a moving figure, whom it was as difficult
to distinguish from the earth he trod as the caterpillar from its leaf,
by reason of the excellent match between his clothes and the clods. He
was one of a dying-out generation who retained the principle, nearly
unlearnt now, that a man's habiliments should be in harmony with his
environment. Lady Constantine and this figure halted beside each other
for some minutes; then they went on their several ways.
The brown person was a labouring man known to the world of Welland as
Haymoss (the encrusted form of the word Amos, to adopt the phrase of
philologists). The reason of the halt had been some inquiries addressed
to him by Lady Constantine.
'Who is that--Amos Fry, I think?' she had asked.
'Yes my lady,' said Haymoss; 'a homely barley driller, born under the
eaves of your ladyship's outbuildings, in a manner of speaking,--though
your ladyship was neither born nor 'tempted at that time.' 'Who lives in the old house behind the plantation?' 'Old Gammer Martin, my lady, and her grandson.' 'He has neither father nor mother, then?' 'Not a single one, my lady.' 'Where was he educated?' 'At Warborne,--a place where they draw up young gam'sters' brains like rhubarb under a ninepenny pan, my lady, excusing my common way. They hit so much larning into en that 'a could talk like the day of Pentecost;
which is a wonderful thing for a simple boy, and his mother only the
plainest ciphering woman in the world. Warborne Grammar School--that's
where 'twas 'a went to. His father, the reverent Pa'son St. Cleeve, made
a terrible bruckle hit in 's marrying, in the sight of the high. He were
the curate here, my lady, for a length o' time.' 'Oh, curate,' said Lady Constantine. 'It was before I knew the village.' 'Ay, long and merry ago! And he married Farmer Martin's daughter--Giles
Martin, a limberish man, who used to go rather bad upon his lags, if you
can mind. I knowed the man well enough; who should know en better!