It was very
still. The primroses and anemones had followed the hepaticas and
periwinkles. Patches of lily of the valley filled the air with
fragrance. Through openings of the trees he caught glimpses of the
lake, deep as the Italian blue of the sky above his head. White Alps
hung in the air beyond its farther shore line. Below him, already far
away, the village followed slowly, bringing its fields and vineyards
with it, until the tired old church called halt. And then it lay back,
nestling down to sleep, very small, very cosy, mere handful of brown
roofs among the orchards. Only the blue smoke of occasional peat fires
moved here and there, betraying human occupation.
The peace and beauty sank into his heart, as he wandered higher across
Mont Racine's velvet shoulder. And the contrast stirred memories of
his recent London life. He thought of the scurrying busy-bodies in the
'City,' and he thought of the Widow Jequier attacking life so
restlessly in her garden at that very minute. That other sentence of
the old Vicar floated though his mind: 'the grandeur of toil and the
insignificance of acquisition.'... Far overhead two giant buzzards
circled quietly, ceaselessly watching from the blue. A brimstone
butterfly danced in random flight before his face. Two cuckoos
answered one another in the denser forest somewhere above him.
Pages:
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272