Larder

“ All in a lordly garden ground
Is weeding hemp a maid,
A Lark addresses her and asks,
Why sad, and why afraid?
‘O how can I then joyful be,
Thou pretty little lark?
My lover they have ta’en from me,
And shut in dungeon dark. ”

“ To the naturalist who walks abroad at early dawn, there are few sights more pleasing than the soaring of a lark. As the first ray of sunshine dispels the glistening dew-drop and gently falls to earth, the lark, warmed by its soft touch, mounts high in air, and joyfully proclaims to all the advent of a new day. ”

“ An old fellow with a very long grey beard came to meet her, and told her that if she would be his servant and do everything he bade her, she might live, if not he would kill her. So she did all he bade her. In the mornings he took his ladder out of his pocket, and set it up against the mountain and climbed to the top by its help, and then he drew up the ladder after him. ”

“ Honour was dangerously ill.
In the dusk of evening, when the house was quiet, and Mrs. Darling sat by the bedside, her brain almost as busy as the one she was there to guard, the thought arose to her that she would put at rest (as far as it could be put to rest) a question that troubled her. In closing the nursery-door quietly--as it had been represented the unfortunate child did close it--would the bolt slip into its groove? Was it possible that it could do so? Mrs. Darling had pondered the doubt that day more than she would have cared to tell. ”

“ When they came up the ladder, the breathing was audible to all; and one of the gentlemen, whom I now perceived to be the stranger, who was with us in my master's cellar, when I was bled, slid down into the dark and narrow passage, without uttering a word. I confess that some feelings of trepidation passed through my nerves when I stood alone; but now that a leader had preceded me, I followed, and glided through the smooth and elastic cypress tops, to the bottom of this vast labyrinth of green boughs. ”

“ The fair creatures have, in many a dream, for many a long night, been cradled by his side, in beauty and love. Their voices have whispered to him, their faces have smiled upon him, in the mysteries of sleep. And yet he must now awake them to feel the breath of unearthly enmity and power, withering their souls, while serpents are even twined around their shroud! ”

“ But I am nature’s child, and when this short life is ended, these eyes will be opened, and nature, my mother, shall be seen by me. These sightless orbs! Oh! I know not what it is to see, even in dreams. Dreams only hush me with sound, fragrance, and touch of love, in a dark cradle, but never remove the covering, that I might gaze upon the universe around. My little brother, far away in other lands, was my inseparable companion, until he went to the tomb. ”

“ A wild-looking woman, whom even in his agitation, Mr. Lorry observed to be all of a red colour, and to have red hair, and to be dressed in some extraordinary tight-fitting fashion, and to have on her head a most wonderful bonnet like a Grenadier wooden measure, and good measure too, or a great Stilton cheese, came running into the room in advance of the inn servants, and soon settled the question of his detachment from the poor young lady, by laying a brawny hand upon his chest, and sending him flying back against the nearest wall. ”

“ I well remember when a boy you could not go out, particularly up the vale of Lustleigh, but you heard them all crowing in all directions, each on his own dung-hill, challenging each other, and their shrill clarion-like sound echoed through the valley.... The sort they have now are so hoarse and dull in their crowing that there is nothing to attract attention, nothing agreeable in their sound, and not loud enough to be heard by one another, so there is no answering each other. ”

“ He felt a sudden contempt for Larrie and an overwhelming sorrow for himself; what a very sweet little child she was with those soft flushed cheeks and wide darkening eyes! And to think there was a lifetime of hunger for one man because he could never touch one of those soft, boyish curls, and the other who had all of her, held her so lightly. ”

“ And, indeed, the Laird did stare considerably when he saw—elbowing his way through the crowd and making for us with a laugh of welcome on the fresh-coloured face—a stout-set, muscular, blue-eyed, sandy-haired, good-humoured-looking, youngish man; who, instead of having anything Celtic about his appearance, might have been taken for the son of a south-country farmer. Our young Doctor was carrying his own portmanteau, and sturdily shoving his way through the porters who would fain have seized it. ”

“ Is not ambition but an endless ladder by which no height is ever climbed till the last unreachable rung is mounted? For height leads on to height, and there is no resting-place upon them, and rung doth grow upon rung, and there is no limit to the number. ”

“ Consciousness at last came, and I perceived that we were driving up a thickly planted avenue. Why, confound it, they can't have mistaken it, thought I, or are we really going up to the house, instead of waiting at the lodge? I at once lowered the sash, and stretching out my head, cried out, "Do you know what ye are about, lads; is this all right?" ”

“ Darrell looked up. "They come to be fed," said he, "smooth emblems of the great social union. Affection is the offspring of utility. I am useful to them: they love me." He rose, uncovered, and bowed to the birds in mock courtesy: "Friends, I have no bread to give you."
LIONEL.—"Let me run in for some. I would be useful too."
MR. DARRELL.—"Rival!—useful to my swans?"
LIONEL (tenderly) .—"Or to you, sir." ”

“ MRS. DARLING (scoring) . I did. I rolled it up, George; and here it is.
(She produces it from a drawer. They unroll and examine the flimsy thing, which is not more material than a puff of smoke, and if let go would probably float into the ceiling without discolouring it. Yet it has human shape. As they nod their heads over it they present the most satisfying picture on earth, two happy parents conspiring cosily by the fire for the good of their children.)
MR. DARLING. It is nobody I know, but he does look ascoundrel.
MRS. DARLING. I think he comes back to get his shadow,George. ”

“ I do much rejoice that thou hast the glorious desire of reaping laurels so strong within thee. Trust me, I shall be no hindrance in thy way to fame, but rather I shall hold fast the ladder, and aid thee to climb and reach it. Thy time shall be thine own, and thou shalt be at full liberty to use thy discretion. ”

“ Ewes. Many of us may have seen such another—a tall, lithe figure, rather bent, and very white-headed for his age, with a wistful eye; but otherwise a most composed, intelligent, courteous gentleman of a laird's degree. Take any old friend aside, and he will tell, with respectful sympathy, that the quiet, sensible, well-bred Laird, has suffered agonies in the course of his life, though too wise and modest a man to hold up his heart for daws to peck at, and you will believe him. ”

“ Out of my slumber I woke in affright;
Why does the lark sing so deep in the night?
The day is gone, the morning is far,
Down on my pillow shines many a star;
And ever the song of the lark I hear ”

“ The ladder was over-short, and it required an effort to heave oneself from it through the casement on to the leads. I am stout, and not so nimble as I was when younger. After one or two efforts, and after presenting from below an appearance that would have provoked laughter at any other time, I succeeded in getting through and upon the leads. ”

“ Here are two or three specimens of the riddles of the old bards, and in riddle and saga we get most vivid pictures of the life and thoughts, the ways and words of the forefathers whom we are too ready to think of as ‘rude,’ but who are here portrayed to us as gentle, mild, and large of soul; men and women whom we, their posterity, may well delight to honour. ”

“ Dear Abbé, porphyry is heavy, gold is heavier; Ossa and Olympus are rough and unequal; the steppes of Tartary, though high, are of uniform elevation: there is not a rock, nor a birch, nor a cytisus, nor an arbutus upon them great enough to shelter a new-dropped lamb. Level the Alps one with another, and where is their sublimity? Raise up the vale of Tempe to the downs above, and where are those sylvan creeks and harbours in which the imagination watches while the soul reposes; those recesses in which the gods partook the weaknesses of mortals, and mortals the enjoyments of the gods? ”

“ The men look like pigmies, and one cannot follow their movements until the eye has accustomed itself to the depth and to the darkness prevailing below. But the darkness is not very dense; I could distinguish most of the ladders, which seemed to me like children’s toys. ”

“ Of a truth I pass entirely over the Middle Ages,
joining my life to the most ancient dwellers of the plains, and
becoming a simple father of flocks and herds. When they have been duly
stabled according to their kinds, I climb to the crib in the barn and
create a great landslide of the fat ears that is like laughter ”

“ "I should like to ask you:—Does your childhood seem far off? Do the days when you sat at your mother's knee, seem days of very long ago?"
Responding to his softened manner, Mr. Lorry answered:
"Twenty years back, yes; at this time of my life, no. For, as I draw closer and closer to the end, I travel in the circle, nearer and nearer to the beginning. It seems to be one of the kind smoothings and preparings of the way. My heart is touched now, by many remembrances that had long fallen asleep, of my pretty young mother (and I so old!) ”

“ I replied, “that, with every year added to your life, you may, if you will, grow wiser and stronger. You stand, as all young minds, at the bottom of a ladder. The height to which you climb will depend upon your strength and endurance.” ”

“ DARRELL.—“A philosophy that preceded, and will outlive, all other schools. It is twin-born with the world itself. Go on; though the theme be inexhaustible, its interest never flags.”
GEORGE MORLEY.—“Has it struck you, Mr. Darrell, that few lives have ever passed under your survey; in which the inexpressible tenderness of the Omniscient has been more visibly clear than in that of your guest, William Losely?” ”

“ Moreover, the ladder of life reaches from the pit to the stars, so that they who climb up or climb down, as it were, may see a firmament at either end: the good, their lights and joys; the evil, their chimeras and fire of darkness. ”

“ Lorry quietly chafed the hands that held his arm. "There, there, there! See now, see now! The best and the worst are known to you, now. You are well on your way to the poor wronged gentleman, and, with a fair sea voyage, and a fair land journey, you will be soon at his dear side." ”

“ Now shines the nymph to human eye revealed,
And leads her Tamar timorous o’er the waves.
Immortals crowding round congratulate
The shepherd; he shrinks back, of breath bereft:
His vesture clinging closely round his limbs
Unfelt, while they the whole fair form admire,
He fears that he has lost it, then he fears
The wave has moved it, most to look he fears. ”

“ If a fakir can bring a dog down from a clear sky out of nothingness, or can climb a ladder held upright beneath the vault of heaven, and pulling it up after him, vanish ladder and all, why that which I claim for my man is but baby play. ”

“ The man with the lantern, if there was a man and a lantern, seemed to be moving with the wind. Then, again, he seemed to divide himself, as the lower orders of life at the bottom 55 of the seas divide themselves, appearing on both sides of a dark space at the same moment. ”

“ As Lorraine had so clearly seen, the spur of ambition, and a resolute determination to succeed in other walks than that of the casual, charming, petted favourite of fortune, were indispensable to bring his traits into a harmony with each other that would achieve. ”

“ It is so tall that, though it kneels down to take us up, we have, at the peril of our lives, to mount a ladder of eight steps to get on its back; and when it gets up, first on its fore feet, we are tilted back in an alarming manner. ”

“ Darling, who never for one moment forgot the little empty beds and the silence and cheerlessness of the nursery. Then he left her, and sitting down by the fire, Mrs. Darling was alone with her sad thoughts. ”

“ The sort of thing is not always very amusing, I admit, but you must look upon it as the ladder by which you will be enabled to rise from the degradation of a parasitical life. If you were in a well, and some one were to let down a real ladder for you to get up by, I do not think you would complain of the difficulty of using it. ”

“ Larks, as soon as they have found a grain and eaten it, are borne by a direct flight aloft towards heaven, that they may shun the eyes of beholders, singing as they fly, and returning thanks to God, the Parent and Nourisher of all creatures. ”

“ Careless of how the other might be observing him, Lander, with a few quick touches of the tall gentleman’s own knife, released the girl who had already, in very truth, tasted of the bitterness of death. ”

“ Oppressed by the sight of so much wretchedness, I turned from its contemplation, and called aloud to the gentlemen without (who had all this time been waiting to hear from us) to come up the ladder to the top of the pile of boughs. The overseer was quickly at the top of the opening, by which I had descended; and I now informed him that we had found the lady. ”

“ A woman more experienced, more quick in a perception of surface indications, might have guessed a weightier matter than the young man's words implied. Lorry took them as they were, feeling only the heart behind them. ”

“ Would any man in his senses go down into the cellar, and seize first an amphora from the right, and then an amphora from the left, for the pleasure of breaking them in pieces, and of letting out the wine he had taken the trouble to put in? We are not contented with attributing to the gods our own infirmities ”