R. D. Blackmore

“ Of course I have done very foolish things once and again throughout my life, but perhaps I never did any thing more absurd than during the whole of that day. To begin with, I was up before the sun, and down at the mill, and along the plank, which I had removed overnight, but now replaced as my bridge to the pine-wood pile. Then I gazed with eager desire and fear—which was the stronger I scarcely knew—for the yellow under-gleam, to show the safety of my treasure. There it lay, as safe as could be, massive, grand, and beautiful, with tones of varying richness as the ripples varied over it. ”

“ Sadly was I perpending this, slower and slower at every step, while the shadows of the trees grew longer, and the voice of birds was lower, and the babble of the brook began to sink into the lisping of a cradled child, as the draught of the valley hushed it; and falling into harmony with all these signs, my breath was beginning to abate me, when along a trough of sliding mist like a trysting track for the dusk, appeared the form of my friend Kuban. Courage at once arose within me, and spirit of true patronage. To men and women I may be nought, but to him I am a hero. ”

“ Beneath his gaze the dew-fogs dipped, and crept to the hollow places; then stole away in line and column, holding skirts, and clinging subtly at the sheltering corners, where rock hung over grass-land; while the brave lines of the hills came forth, one beyond other gliding.
Then the woods arose in folds, like drapery of awakened mountains, stately with a depth of awe, and memory of the tempests. Autumn's mellow hand was on them, as they owned already, touched with gold, and red, and olive; and their joy towards the sun was less to a bridegroom than a father. ”

“ The winter (as I said before) had been a very mild one; and now the spring was toward so that bank and bush were touched with it. The valley into which I gazed was fair with early promise, having shelter from the wind and taking all the sunshine. The willow-bushes over the stream hung as if they were angling with tasseled floats of gold and silver, bursting like a bean-pod. Between them came the water laughing, like a maid at her own dancing, and spread with that young blue which never lives beyond the April. ”

“ With one sheer fall of a hundred fathoms the stern cliff meets the baffled sea—or met it then, but now the level of the tide is lowering. Air and sea were still and quiet; the murmur of the multitudinous wavelets could not climb the cliff; but loops and curves of snowy braiding on the dark gray water showed the set of tide and shift of current in and out the buried rocks.
Standing in the void of fear, and gazing into the deep of death, Frida loved the pair of sea gulls hovering halfway between her and the soft gray sea. ”

“ John lay on the ground by a barrow of heather, where a little gullet was, and I crept to him, afraid of the noise I made in dragging my legs along, and the creak of my cord breeches. John bleated like a sheep to cover it—a sheep very cold and trembling.
Then just as the foremost horseman passed, scarce twenty yards below us, a puff of wind came up the glen, and the fog rolled off before it. And suddenly a strong red light, cast by the cloud-weight downwards, spread like fingers over the moorland, opened the alleys of darkness, and hung on the steel of the riders. ”

“ As the river we float upon (with wine, and flowers, and music,) is nothing at the well-spring but a bubble without reason.
Feeling many things, but thinking without much to guide me, over the grass-plats laid between, I went up to Lorna. She in a shower of damask roses, raised her eyes and looked at me. And even now, in those sweet eyes, so deep with loving-kindness, and soft maiden dreamings, there seemed to be a slight unwilling, half confessed withdrawal; overcome by love and duty, yet a painful thing to see. ”

“ No wonder they want me in London, as an ornament for the stage, John.'
Now in after days, when I heard of Lorna as the richest, and noblest, and loveliest lady to be found in London, I often remembered that little scene, and recalled every word and gesture, wondering what lay under it. Even now, while it was quite impossible once to doubt those clear deep eyes, and the bright lips trembling so; nevertheless I felt how much the world would have to do with it; and that the best and truest people cannot shake themselves quite free. ”

“ Oh, Captain Scudamore, how foolish I have been!”
“Don't say so, don't think it, don't believe it for a moment,” said Scudamore, scarcely knowing what he said, as she burst into a storm of sobbing. “Oh, Dolly, Dolly, you know you meant no harm. You are breaking your darling heart, when you don't deserve it. I could not bear to look at you, and think of it, this morning. Everybody loves you still, as much and more than ever. Oh, Dolly, I would rather die than see you cry so terribly.”
“Nobody loves me, and I hate myself. I could never have believed I should ever hate myself. ”

“ The place has no great beauty, as of a sea-side spring in Devonshire, but more of cheer and life about it than their ferny grottoes. The bright water breaks from an elbow of rock, in many veins all uniting, and without any cliff above them; and then, after rushing a very few yards through set stone and loose shingle, loses its self-will upon the soft sand, and spreads a way over a hundred yards of vague wetness and shallow shining.
The mild sun of April was glancing on this, and the tide just advancing to see to it, when the shadow of a slim figure fell on the stones before Sir Philip. ”

“ The moon was gliding calmly on her southern road, and being in her humble summer state, she could scarcely top the big pear-tree which stood before my window. The room was full of light and shade, in bars, in patches, and in triangles, with no strong contrast in and out, but fused, like silver-wire netting, or water parted by the weir-posts, and rejoining under them. And there, in this faint flow of light and wavering ebb of shadow, I saw my Kitty, sitting calmly, and gazing at me steadfastly. ”

“ Fine gush of irony, serried antithesis, placid assumption of the point at issue, then logic as terse and tight as the turns of a three–inch screw–jack, withering indignation at those who wonʼt think exactly as we do, the sunrise glow of metaphor, the moonlight gleam of simile, the sparkling stars of wit, and the playful Aurora of humour—alas, all these are like water on a duckʼs back when the heart wonʼt let the brain go. If we cannot appreciate their beauty, because our opinions are different, how can we hope to do so when we donʼt care what any opinions are? ”

“ It was the morn when the tall and shapely tower of Magdalen is crowned with a fillet of shining white, awaiting the first step of sunrise. Once a year, for generations, this has been the sign of it—eager eyes, and gaping mouths, little knuckles blue with cold, and clumsy little feet inclined to slide upon the slippery lead. All are bound to keep together for the radiant moment; all are a little elated at their height above all other boys; all have a strong idea that the sun, when he comes, will be full of them ”