It Was The Same Everywhere In The District, She Said, Except
In That Village Which Had No Public-House.
Not only were they
better off, and independent of blanket societies and charity
in all forms, but they were infinitely happier.
And after the
day's work the men came home to spend the evening with their
wives and children.
At this stage I was surprised by a sudden burst of passion on
her part. She stood up, her face flushing red, and solemnly
declared that if ever a public-house was opened in that
village, and if the men took to spending their evenings in it,
her husband with them, she would not endure such a condition
of things - she wondered that so many women endured it - but
would take her little ones and go away to earn her own living
under some other roof!
Chapter Five: Wind, Wave, and Spirit
The rambles I have described were mostly inland: when by
chance they took us down to the sea our impressions and
adventures appeared less interesting. Looking back on the
holiday, it would seem to us a somewhat vacant time compared
to one spent in wandering from village to village. I mean if
we do not take into account that first impression which the
sea invariably makes on us on returning to it after a long
absence - the shock of recognition and wonder and joy as if we
had been suffering from loss of memory and it had now suddenly
come back to us. That brief moving experience over, there is
little the sea can give us to compare with the land. How
could it be otherwise in our case, seeing that we were by it
in a crowd, our movements and way of life regulated for us in
places which appear like overgrown and ill-organized
convalescent homes? There was always a secret intense dislike
of all parasitic and holiday places, an uncomfortable feeling
which made the pleasure seem poor and the remembrance of days
so spent hardly worth dwelling on. And as we are able to keep
in or throw out of our minds whatever we please, being
autocrats in our own little kingdom, I elected to cast away
most of the memories of these comparatively insipid holidays.
But not all, and of those I retain I will describe at least
two, one in the present chapter on the East Anglian coast, the
other later on.
It was cold, though the month was August; it blew and the sky
was grey and rain beginning to fall when we came down about
noon to a small town on the Norfolk coast, where we hoped to
find lodging and such comforts as could be purchased out of a
slender purse. It was a small modern pleasure town of an
almost startling appearance owing to the material used in
building its straight rows of cottages and its ugly square
houses and villas. This was an orange-brown stone found in
the neighbourhood, the roofs being all of hard, black slate.
I had never seen houses of such a colour, it was stronger,
more glaring and aggressive than the reddest brick, and there
was not a green thing to partially screen or soften it, nor
did the darkness of the wet weather have any mitigating effect
on it.
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