Sabine Baring-Gould

“ As you grew weaker, and more unable to endure worry, in would have come the captain, to exhort and expound, and stir and whip up your weary soul into a caper of screaming terror. You would have longed for death as an escape from the smells and the smoke, and the crude blue, and the draught, and the knots in your mattress, and the Missionary Magazines, and the pigs in the yard, and the benzoline lamp. ”

“ Why is there so much wretchedness, so much inequality in the world?"
"Why was Giles' giraffe's leg broken?"
Arminell looked at him with surprise, suspecting that instead of answering her, he was about to turn off the subject with a joke.
"The world," said Saltren, "is like Giles' Noah's Ark, packed full—over full—of creatures of all kinds, and packed so badly that they impinge on, bruise, and break each other. Not only is the giraffe's leg broken, but so are the rim of Noah's hat, and the ear of the sheep, and the tusk of the elephant. ”

“ The church bells were ringing, the Sunday-school had at last been reduced to order, arranged in line, and wriggled, sinuous, worm-like, along the road and up the avenue to the church porch. Lady Lamerton, brandishing her sunshade as a field-marshal's baton, kept the children in place, and directed the head of the procession.
But with what heart-burnings, what envies, what excited passions did that train sweep on its way. Some of the children had got more comfits than others, and despised those less favoured by luck, and others comfitless envied the more successful. ”

“ He remained silent, for long, looking at the dead man, his own face scarcely less white, his muscles hardly less rigid, his features as set, and more drawn. There was no sunlight in the narrow valley where they stood under the great slate cleave, but above at the edge of the opposite hill were gorse bushes so covered with golden bloom that they seemed to be but one yellow flower, and on them the evening sun rested lovingly. Above, ghost-like in the blue sky, was a filmy disc—the moon, only perceivable from the deep valley, unseen by those who stood in the sunlight. ”

“ Do we not love and venerate the little mermaid, because, instead of howling or whining, and holding up her bleeding soles to extract commiseration from all, she dropped her skirts over them, and danced and warbled, and flushed as the rose, so that none supposed she leaped with pain, and sang to still her heart, and flushed with stress of anguish? So is it with all who have gone through the great discipline of culture; they no more expose their wounds and cry out for sympathy than they expose deformities. ”

“ I know that sometimes I wake after having dreamed of some amiable and innocent person in an odious light, and though I fight against the impression all day, I cannot view that person without repugnance. Captain Saltren was aware that he had dreamed, that he had believed in the reality of the mirage conjured up by his fancy, had regarded that crimson-covered book as the revelation of the Everlasting Gospel, and though his mind assented to the fact that he had been deceived, he was unable to drive away the glamour of the delusion that clung to him. ”

“ When James Welsh sprang from the table, and held out his hand, Lord Lamerton was in that condition of bamboozlement that he did not know what to do, whether to mount the table and address the audience, or to walk away; whether to accept the proffered hand, or to refuse it. He felt as does a boy who has been blindfolded and set in the midst of a room to be spun about, struck, and bidden catch his persecutors, but who finds himself unable to touch one. ”

“ The Angel in the Apocalypse stood with one foot on the land, and the other in the sea; so Court stood half in the rich cultivated garden of the Western Paradise, and half in the utter desolation of treeless moor. To south and west lay woodlands and pasture, parks and villages, tufts of Scotch fir, cedars, oak and elm and beech, with rooks cawing and doves cooing, and the woodpecker hooting among them; to the east and north lay the haunt of the blackcock and hawk and wimbrel, and tracts of heather flushed with flower, and gorse ablaze with sun, and aromatic as incense. ”

“ The entrance was just high enough for Arminell to pass in without stooping. The depth of the cave was not great, ten feet. The sun shone in, making the nook cheerful and warm. Again Arminell looked down at the pond.
"How different the water seems according to the position from which we look at it. Seen from one point it blazes with reflected light, and laughs with brilliance; seen from another it is infinitely sombre, light-absorbing, not light-reflecting. It is so perhaps with the world, and poor Jingles contemplates it from an unhappy point." ”

“ THE PRIVILEGED CLASS.
"Is it not a sad reflection," said Lady Lamerton on the return of his lordship, "that the men who influence others are those of one idea, in a word, the narrow? Because they are borné in mental vision, ignorant and prejudiced, they throw the whole force of their wills in one direction, they become battering rams, and the harder their heads the heavier the blows they deal. If we have knowledge, breadth of vision, charity, we cease to be certain, are no longer bigots, and our power of impressing others fails in proportion to our liberality. ”

“ To descend to the counter from the Oxford schools was a great descent; but Jingles was like a vessel in stress of weather, throwing overboard all her lading. Away must go his Greek, his Latin, his logic, his position as an University scholar, that of a gentleman, his self-esteem, certainly, his self-respect to some extent, his ambition altogether.
But why not? He was not born to be a gentleman; it was by a happy accident that he had been given an education that furnished him with most accomplishments which adorn a man of birth and standing. ”

“ Miss Inglett looked at him with unfeigned surprise. "As you said to me, so say I to you, and excuse the freedom. Mr. Saltren has everything to make life happy, education, comfortable quarters, kind friends, an assured future, an ideally perfect lot, absolutely deficient in disturbing elements."
"Now you judge by the outside. I admit to the full that Lord Lamerton has done everything he could think of to do me good, but can one man calculate what will suit another? Will a bog plant thrive in loam, or a heath in clay?"
"You do not think that what has been done for you is well done?" ”

“ When a ship is storm-tossed, escape is possible in a boat, when a house is on fire there are feather-beds into which we can leap; but when the earth is insecure, then we have nowhere to which we can flee, nothing to which we can look.
With Captain Saltren, his religious convictions were what was most stable. Everything else glided before him as a dream, but he kept his feet on those things that belonged to the spiritual world, as if they were adamantine foundations. And now he was being, like an aeronaut, caught away, and these shifted under his eyes ”

“ The magic begins to work once more, the little fingers weave a spell that lays hold of heart and brain, and conjures up a new world of fantasy. The flowers re-open and flush with colour, the balmy air fans our jaded faces, again the songs of angels reach our ears, the clouds dispel, the manna falls, Eve resumes her beauty, not the old beauty of childlike innocence and freshness, but that of ripened womanhood, of sweet maternity, of self-command and self-devotion. ”

“ Gorgeous that hair was in the evening sun, it seemed itself to be on fire, to be incandescent in every hair, and her attitude as she stood on the step was grand, her vigorous, graceful form, her splendid proportions were shown in perfection, with bosom expanded, and her hands behind her head collecting and tying and twisting the fire that rained off it. The evening sun was full on her, and filled her eyes that she could see nothing; but her handsome face was shown illuminated as a lamp against the cold grey walls of the corn-chamber. ”

“ It is rather hard on us, Julia. There are other worms in the sour paste of life, other monsters in the drop of dirty water we call Society, who are at liberty to turn about, and stretch themselves, bound or coil as they list; only we—we must live and wriggle between two plates of glass, illuminated and made translucent by the most powerful known light, denied that privilege which belongs to the humble—opacity."
"Is it the injured pines that have put you out of spirits to-night, Lamerton?" ”

“ May I ask if you are going to church, Miss Inglett?"
"I have done the civil by attending the Sunday-school, and the articles disapprove of works of supererogation. I am going to worship under the fresh green leaves, and to listen to the choir of the birds—blackbird, thrush and ouzel. I am too ruffled in temper to sit still in church and listen to the same common-places in the same see-saw voice from the pulpit. Do you know what it is to be restless, Mr. Saltren, and not know what makes you ill at ease? To desire greatly something, and not know what you long after?" ”

“ Is not—to take a crucial case—marriage itself a grand transformation scene that closes the idyl of youth, and opens the drama of middle age? We live for a while in a fairy world, the flowers blaze with the most brilliant colours, the air is spiced as the breezes of Ceylon, angels converse with men, and sing æthereal music, manna floats down from heaven, containing in itself all sweetness ”

“ We, Tryphœna, guard the marches, we occupy the debatable ground, and we have to be perpetually on the alert, to make blaze of beacons, blow cow's-horns, and rattle drums at the least approach or signs of approach of barbarism. Of course we are touchy, tenacious of our right, sensitive about our skirts, and must bluster and deal blows to protect them. We hold the banat, the military frontier between culture and savagery, and it is because of us that the noblemen and gentlemen of England can dwell at home at ease. ”

“ Giles Inglett, how would you like to go back to potato pasty and cold boiled junk of bacon? To an early dinner, and swipes instead of claret? To getting your clothes at a slop-shop, instead of being fitted by a tailor? To being without books and magazines and reviews? Are you aware that you have earned not one of the luxuries or even comforts of civilized life? That they have come to you undeserved as does free Grace? Upon my word, you make my blood splutter! Shall I tell you what would have been the end of you had not Lord Lamerton come to the rescue? ”

“ We are engaged all our lives in the erection of magnificent temples about ourselves, and in embroidering gold-besprent curtains, and in the burning of frankincense, and in the kindling and feeding of lamps, in these tabernacles; and what is behind the veil? Do we know? Do we ever look? We paint and plate with gold ideal representations of the god within on the propylæum of our temple, but what resemblance does this figure bear to the reality? Do we know? Do we care to know? Will we not rather put out our eyes than compare them? ”

“ How often had she supposed that happiness was impossible apart from the amenities of life, that in the middle class, with its imperfect culture and narrow aims, there could be no true felicity; that in the lowest classes, where there was no refinement of taste, no polish of mind, no discipline of intellect, life must be insupportable in its wretchedness. But now she saw that happiness was of general distribution and was not to be arrogated as a prerogative of one class alone, that, indeed, it seemed to lose its freshness, its gaiety in proportion as knowledge increased and culture advanced. ”

“ How is it that when we do a kindness we endeavour to minimise it? We disguise the fact that what we do costs us something, that it gives us trouble, that it draws down on us irksome responsibilities? It is not that we are ashamed of ourselves for doing kindnesses, that we think it unmanly to be unselfish, but rather that we fear to embarrass the person who receives favours at our hands.
Mr. Welsh had really sacrificed much that day for Arminell. ”

“ A little while ago we saw Giles Saltren humiliated and crushed, passing through the flame of disappointment and disenchantment, the purgatorial flame that in this life tries every man. In that fire the young man's self-esteem and self-reliance had shrivelled up and been reduced to ash. ”

“ There used to be a contrivance, Tryphœna, I remember you had it once, like a pair of bell-ropes. You put your fingers into rings, and up came your train in a series of loops and folds, on the principle of the Venetian blind. But somehow you were always pulling up your skirt just too late, after it had been be-trampled and be-muddled. Now from what I have observed, the skirts and trains of the aristocracy are imbued with an imparted vitality from their persons, for all the world like the tail of a peacock, which it elevates when it steps about in the dirt. ”

“ Looking up from inside the cottage was like looking into a London fog. There was a great gap where the chimney had stood, the roof was stripped of its covering and the principals were inclined out of their proper positions.
"Well," said Macduff. "Have you come on her?"
"We haven't come on nothing but Arkie Tubb," answered one of the men. "There's a lot of rummage more to be cleared away."
"Look sharp about it," said the agent. "If she be buried, the only chance of life for her is to be dug out at once." ”

“ Lady Lamerton bowed stiffly to Jingles. She was dressed in the deepest mourning, and looked pale and delicate. At a sign from her the little fellow withdrew. She indicated a chair, but Saltren, who had risen, did not reseat himself. She did not speak, but waited for what he had to say, and she remained standing.
"My lady," said the young man, "my conscience would not suffer me to depart, probably never again to revisit Orleigh, without coming here to express to you in few words what I feel in every fibre of my heart. ”