Nor
Was It Of Much Avail To Sweep Them Away; They Were There Again To-Morrow,
And Until The Wind Changed.
The swallows were now very busy building;
there were not many houses for them, and therefore they flocked here.
Up
from over the meadows came the breeze, drawing into the hollow recesses
of the forest behind. It came over the grass and farther away over corn
just yellowing, the shadows of the clouds racing with it and instantly
lost in the trees. It drew through the pillars of the forest, and away to
the hills beyond.
The squire's ale was duly put for him, the particular gossip he liked was
ready for him; and having taken both, he looked at his old watch and went
on. His path now led for a while just inside the pale, which here divided
the forest from the meadows. In the olden time it would have been made of
oak, for they built all things then with an eye to endurance; but it was
now of fir, pitched, sawn from firs thrown in the copses. For the purpose
of keeping the deer in, it was as useful as the pale of oak. Oak is not
so plentiful nowadays. The high spars were the especial vaunting-places
of the little brown wrens which perched there and sang, in defiance of
all that the forest might hold. Rabbits crept under, but the hares waited
till evening and went round by the gates. Presently the path turned and
the squire passed a pond partly dried up, from the margin of which
several pigeons rose up, clattering their wings.
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