I See It In A Different Light Now And Know
That You Were Right And We Were Wrong."
Towards evening I said good-bye to my kind friend and
entertainer and continued my rural ride.
From Coombe it is
five miles to Hurstbourne Tarrant, another charming "highland"
village, and the road, sloping down the entire distance,
struck me as one of the best to be on I had travelled in
Hampshire, running along a narrow green valley, with oak and
birch and bramble and thorn in their late autumn colours
growing on the slopes on either hand. Probably the beauty of
the scene, or the swift succession of beautiful scenes, with
the low sun flaming on the "coloured shades," served to keep
out of my mind something that should have been in it. At all
events, it was odd that I had more than once promised myself a
visit to the very village I was approaching solely because
William Cobbett had described and often stayed in it, and now
no thought of him and his ever-delightful Rural Rides was in
my mind.
Arrived at the village I went straight to the "George and
Dragon," where a friend had assured me I could always find
good accommodations. But he was wrong: there was no room for
me, I was told by a weird-looking, lean, white-haired old
woman with whity-blue unfriendly eyes. She appeared to resent
it that any one should ask for accommodation at such a time,
when the "shooting gents" from town required all the rooms
available.
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