Amaryllis

“ Through the silent cold of January, the moist cold of February, the east winds and hurricane rains of March, Amaryllis worked on in her garret, heedless of nipped fingers and chilled feet.
Sometimes she looked out of the window and watched Iden digging in the garden underneath, planting his potatoes, pruning his trees and shrubs, or farther away, yonder in the meadow, clearing [162] out the furrows that the water might flow better—"trenching," as he called it. ”

“ Before the repulsion between father and son became so marked, Amaryllis had often been with her grandfather in the garden and round the meadows at Coombe Oaks, and seen him gather the yellow tulips, the broad-petalled roses, and in autumn the bright scarlet bramble leaves. The brown leaves of the Spanish chestnut, too, pleased [90] him; anything with richness of colour. The old and grey, and withered man gathered the brightest of petals for his old and grey, and forgotten books. ”

“ Convalescence is like walking in sacks; a short waddle and a fall.
"I can tell 'ee of a vine thing, measter," said Bill Nye, "as I knows on; you get a pint measure full of snails——"
"There, do hold your tongue, it's enough to make anyone ill to think of," said Amaryllis, angrily, and Bill was silent as to the cod-liver oil virtues of snails. Amaryllis went to fetch a glass of milk for Amadis. ”

“ There as she came round the first thing she saw was the daffodil, the beautiful daffodil Amaryllis had discovered. Beside herself with indignation—what was the use of flowers or potatoes?—Mrs. Iden stepped on the border and trampled the flower under foot till it was shapeless. After this she rushed indoors again and upstairs to her bedroom, where she locked herself in, and fumbled about in the old black oak chest of drawers till she found a faded lavender glove. ”

“ The vague crowd were so immensely eager to pay their despicable court to the Spade-Guinea Man, not one of them stopped away; the old, the young, the lame, the paralytic, all found means to creep in to Grandfather Iden's annual dinner. His only son and natural heir was alone absent. How eagerly poor Amaryllis glanced from time to time at that empty chair, hoping against hope that her dear father would come in at the Psalms, or even at the sermon, and disappoint the venomous, avaricious hearts of the enemies around her. ”

“ If we were to stay to analyse deeply, perhaps we should find that Amaryllis was working for a mother of her own imagination, and not for the mother of fact.
Anyone who sits still, writing, drawing, or sewing, feels the cold very much more than those who are moving indoors or out. It was bitterly cold in the gaunt garret, the more so because the wind came unchecked through the wire network of the window in the next room. ”

“ Luce, the maid, had worked since six, and would go on hours longer. [248]
Alere Flamma was smoking and sipping Goliath ale in the summer-house; he could eat, and drink, and walk about as a man should.
Amaryllis was as strong as a young lioness; he had seen her turn the heavy cheese-tub round as if it were a footstool.
He alone was weak, pale, contemptible; unable to eat strong meat; unable to drink strong drink; put down to sip milk as an infant; unable to walk farther than Plum Corner in the garden; unable to ride even; a mere shadow, a thing of contempt. ”

“ They left the apple-bloom behind them, and going down the gravel-path passed the plum trees—the daffodils there were over now—by the strawberry patch which Iden had planted under the parlour window; by the great box-hedge where a thrush sat on her nest undisturbed, though Amaryllis's dress brushed the branches; by the espalier apple, to the little orchard-gate.
The parlour-window—there are no parlours now, except in old country houses; there were parlours in the days of Queen Anne; in the modern villas they have drawing-rooms. ”

“ MARYLLIS did not look back as she walked beside her grandfather slowly up the street, or she would have seen the company of relations watching them from the bow-window.
Iden went straight through the crowd without any hesitation on account of his age—angry as she was, Amaryllis feared several times lest the clumsy people should over-turn him, and tried her best to shield him. But he had a knack of keeping on his feet—the sort of knack you learn by skating—and did not totter much more than usual, despite the press.
The world gets on with very little amusement somehow. ”

“ Riding about in this rude chariot the old fellow had amassed considerable wealth—his reputation for money was very great indeed—and his son John would, of course, come in for it.
John felt sure of Mr. and Mrs. Iden, but about Amaryllis he did not know. The idea that she had dropped "summat" on his hat raised his spirits immensely.
Now Amaryllis was not yet beautiful—she was too young; I do not think any girl is really beautiful so young—she was highly individualized, and had a distinct character, as it were, in her face and figure. ”

“ How can you draw life itself? What is life? you cannot even define it. The swallow's wing has the motion of life—its tremble—its wonderful delicacy of vibration—the instant change—the slip of the air;—no man will ever be able to draw a flying swallow.
At the feet of this Gamaliel of Fleet Street, Amaryllis had sat much, from time to time, when the carpet-bag was packed and Alere withdrew to his Baden-Baden—i.e., to Coombe Oaks and apple-bloom, singing finch, and wild-flowers. ”

“ Amaryllis said.
"Also my husband can find it," the woman broke in. "Let the streets do their will with the woman of the streets. Bread and shelter are too precious to waste on the iniquitous this hour."
Amaryllis turned to Laodice.
"What wilt thou do?" she asked.
"The streets can offer me no more insult than is offered me in this house," she said slowly.
It was in her mind that there were certainly unprotected gates at which she could get out of the city and return to Ascalon.
At least the peril for her in this house was already too imminent for her to remain longer. ”

“ There was just a trifle of pink in his face, and he could walk to Plum Corner in the garden without clinging to Amaryllis's arm, or staying to steady himself and get his balance more than three or four times. He had even ventured a little way up the meadow-path, but it made him giddy to stoop to pick a buttercup. They told him he was better; he could eat a very little more, and sip a wine-glassful of Goliath.
Better! What a mockery to a man who could once row, and ride, and shoot, and walk his thirty miles, and play his part in any sport you chose! ”

“ The mixedness of things, the old, old human muddle, the meanness and stupidity and shortsightedness of humanity, the good salty taste of life in the healthy mouth, the spirituality of love, the strong earthy roots of appetite, man's lust of life, with circumstances awry, and the sharp wind blowing alike on the just and the unjust—all is there on the printed page of "Amaryllis at the Fair." ”

“ Iden could plant potatoes, and cut trusses of hay, and go through his work to appearance unmoved.
Amaryllis could not draw—she could not do it; her imagination refused to see the idea; the more she concentrated her mind, the louder she heard the ceaseless grinding and gnashing of teeth.
Potatoes can be planted and nails can be hammered, bill-hooks can be wielded and faggots chopped, no matter what the inward care. The ploughman is deeply in debt, poor fellow, but he can, and does, follow the plough, and finds, perhaps, some solace in the dull monotony of his labour. ”

“ When anything annoyed her or made her indignant her foot used to tap the floor, and her neck flush rosy, and her face grow dusky like the night. Then, striving to control herself, she would say to herself, "I will not be a Flamma."
Except her dear mother and one other, Amaryllis detested and despised the whole tribe of the Flammas, the nervous, excitable, passionate, fidgetty, tipsy, idle, good-for-nothing lot ”

“ Not, of course, all of them always together, sometimes all four, sometimes Alere, Amadis, and Amaryllis, sometimes only the last two.
The round summer-house was their Parliament House whenever the east winds sank and the flowers shone forth like sunshine; as the sun shines when [199] the clouds withdraw, so when the harsh east winds cease the May flowers immediately bloom and glow. ”

“ Chattering fools and wise men listening."
Accordingly the butler went out bare-headed—his head was as bare as Mont Blanc—and, with many a gracious smile, conveyed his master's wishes. The Behemoth, mopping and mowing, wiping his slobbery old mouth in the excess of his glorification, takes Amaryllis by the arm, and proceeds to draw her towards the mansion. ”

“ The Idens, in their little way, were Tories, too, right to the centre of the cerebellum; the Flammas were hot Republicans. Now Amaryllis, being a girl, naturally loved her father most, yet she was a wilful and rebellious revolutionist. Amaryllis, who would not be a Flamma, had imbibed all the Flamma hatred of authority from her mother. [118]
To her the Pamments were the incarnation of everything detestable, of oppression, obstruction, and mediæval darkness. She knew nothing of politics; at sixteen you do not need to know to feel vehemently, you feel vehemently without knowing. ”

“ Poor Amaryllis! They promised well, and she wanted half a sovereign now. If a prophet assured a man that the picture he could not now dispose of would be worth a thousand pounds in fifty years, what consolation would that be to him? ”

“ TEADILY they came over from the town, dunning Iden and distracting Amaryllis in her garret. She heard the heavy footsteps on the path to the door, the thump, thump with the fist (there was neither knocker nor bell, country fashion) ; more thumping, and then her mother's excuses, so oft repeated, so wearisome, so profitless. "But where is he?" the creditor would persist. ”

“ Thirty-two sovereigns it was in all—one for each—but the thirty-third was always a spade-guinea, which was presented to the individual who had best pleased him during the year.
A genial sort of custom, no doubt, but fancy the emulation and the heart-burning over the spade-guinea! For the fortunate winner usually considered himself the nearest to the Will.
Amaryllis' cheeks began to burn at the thought that she should have to take his horrible money. ”

“ Never no good on to nobody, thaay thengs. You can't eat 'em, can you, like you can potatoes?"
"But it's lovely. Here it is," and Amaryllis stepped on the patch tenderly, and lifted up the drooping face of the flower.
"Ah, yes," said Iden, putting his left hand to his chin, a habit of his when thinking, and suddenly quite altering his pronunciation from that of the country folk and labourers amongst whom he dwelt to the correct accent of education. "Ah, yes; the daffodil was your great-uncle's favourite flower."
"Richard?" asked Amaryllis. ”

“ To sport with Amaryllis in the shade?
Milton.
Dear Amaryllis (you mentioned in “Lycidas”) ,
I’m no philanderer, truly I’m not,
But in this office it’s sticky and viscid as
Crab-apple jelly and ten times as hot. ”

“ A month hence, my Amaryllis, and we shall be wedded."
Amaryllis flung herself into his arms. "If only I am not ploughed! But, darling Strephon, I have a request to make of you. I implore you to sit in the gallery to-morrow throughout the examination, and so, looking up to your face, I shall gain fresh courage."
"Sweet, I will do so," cried Strephon. "And—you know the deaf-and-dumb alphabet, I think? If so, and an answer has slipped your memory, perhaps——"
"Nay," said Amaryllis, firmly. "'Tis unnecessary. And we must run no risks." ”

“ But I reckon that picture o' Miss Amaryllis is lyin' in a grave somewhere on the other side o' the ocean. Mighty near every woman has somethin' pretty about her; one'll have pretty eyes and another'll have a pretty color, but Miss Amaryllis was pretty every way. I ricollect once I was passin' along Main Street, one County Court day, and the old judge's carriage was standin' in front o' Tom Barker's dry-goods store, and Miss Amaryllis was leanin' back against the cushions, and her hand was layin' on the carriage door, and she had a ring on one of her fingers with a yeller stone in it ”

“ If good-breeding and graceful refinement are ever most proper, they are always so. It is not sufficient that Amaryllis is amiable and elegant in her whole deportment to strangers and to her acquaintance ”

“ March wind to call her father from his potato planting to see the daffodil; the picture of Iden pretending to sleep in his chair that he may watch the mice; the description of the girl Amaryllis watching the crowd of plain, ugly men of the countryside flocking along the road to the fair; the description of Amadis the invalid, in the old farm kitchen among the stalwart country folk—all these pictures and a dozen others in the book are painted with a masterly hand. Pictures! the critical reader may complain. Yes, pictures of living men and women. ”

“ She met the vans and gipsies slowly leaving the site of the fair, the children running along with bare brown feet. She went under the archæologically interesting gateway, and knocked at the door of Tiras Wise, shoemaker, "established 200 years."
Tiras Wise of the present generation was thin and nervous, weary of the centuries, worn out, and miserable-looking. Amaryllis, strong in the possession of a golden sovereign, attacked him sharply for his perfidious promises; her boots promised at Christmas were not mended yet. ”

“ Here was Amaryllis, full of poetic feeling and half a painter at heart, full of generous sentiments—what a nature to be ground down in the sordidness of married poverty!
Here was Amadis, extremely poor, quite feeble, and unable to earn a shilling, just talking of seeing the doctor again about this fearful debility, full too, as he thought at least, of ideas—what a being to think of her!
Nothing ever happens in the fitness of things. If only now he could have regained the health and strength of six short months ago—if only that, but you see, he had not even that. He might get better ”