I Have Kept A Great Many Of My Joyful Sentiments To Myself, Because
Jone Is Too Well Contented As It Is, And There Is A Great Deal Yet To
Be Seen In England.
Sometimes we hire a dogcart and a black horse named
Punch, from the inn in the village, and we take long drives over roads
that are almost as smooth as bowling alleys.
The country is very hilly,
and every time we get to the top of a hill we can see, spread about us
for miles and miles, the beautiful hills and vales, and lordly
residences and cottages, and steeple tops, looking as though they had
been stuck down here and there, to show where villages had been
planted.
Letter Number Five
CHEDCOMBE
This morning, when Jone was out taking a walk and I was talking to Miss
Pondar, and getting her to teach me how to make Devonshire clotted
cream, which we have for every meal, putting it on everything it will
go on, into everything it will go into, and eating it by itself when
there is nothing it will go on or into; and trying to find out why it
is that whitings are always brought on the table with their tails stuck
through their throats, as if they had committed suicide by cutting
their jugular veins in this fashion, I saw, coming along the road to
our cottage, a pretty little dogcart with two ladies in it. The horse
they drove was a pony, and the prettiest creature I ever saw, being
formed like a full-sized horse, only very small, and with as much fire
and spirit and gracefulness as could be got into an animal sixteen
hands high. I heard afterward that he came from Exmoor, which is about
twelve miles from here, and produces ponies and deers of similar size
and swiftness. They stopped at the door, and one of them got out and
came in. Miss Pondar told me she wished to see me, and that she was
Mrs. Locky, of the "Bordley Arms" in the village.
"The innkeeper's wife?" said I; to which Miss Pondar said it was, and I
went into the parlor. Mrs. Locky was a handsome-looking lady, and
wearing as stylish clothes as if she was a duchess, and extremely
polite and respectful.
She said she would have asked Mrs. Shutterfield to come with her and
introduce her, but that lady was away from home, and so she had come by
herself to ask me a very great favor.
When I begged her to sit down and name it she went on to say there had
come that morning to the inn a very large party in a coach-and-four,
that was making a trip through the country, and as they didn't travel
on Sunday they wanted to stay at the "Bordley Arms" until Monday
morning.
"Now," said she, "that puts me to a dreadful lot of trouble, because I
haven't room to accommodate them all, and even if I could get rooms for
them somewhere else they don't want to be separated.
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