United States or Australia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
But though I proposed to take a bold course and make a short cut to the heart of this infernal mystery, I realised perfectly that if the cut actually led me there, it would prove an exceedingly dangerous by-way. It was such a gamble that I shrank from summoning my cousin until it had come off, but I wrote out the code telegram we had arranged and put it in my pocket ready for emergencies.
Her life, hidden away as she was in a by-way corner of a country town, and seeing no one all the week except her small band of pupils, gave her plenty of time for thought, and there was no young man in the village whose company she would tolerate if she could help it.
Now every incident had a particular bearing, every by-way branched off to Rome and that was Flora. When I had begun to speak I had kneeled upon the gravel withoutside the low window, rested my arms upon the sill, and lowered my voice to the most confidential whisper. Flora herself must kneel upon the other side, and this brought our heads upon a level with only the bars between us.
It requires no small effort of fancy, as we walk through some deserted by-way, wherein our footsteps echo audibly at noonday, to realize that this was the splendid arena where the House of Este so long held sway, limited in extent, but in its palmy days the centre of a brilliant court, a famous school of pictorial art, the seat of a university whose fame drew scholars from distant Britain, and whose ducal family gave birth to the Brunswick dynasty, whence descended the royalty of England.
Until I had killed or shook him off, I was quite divorced from my companions alone, in the midst of England, on a frosty by-way leading whither I knew not, with a sleuth-hound at my heels, and never a friend but the holly-stick! We came at the same time to a crossing of lanes. The branch to the left was overhung with trees, deeply sunken and dark.
"This hasn't been one of the stereotyped tours, it seems." "Oh, no! What's the use of doing Niagara or the White Mountains, or even New York and Philadelphia and Washington, on the map? I've been one of my little by-way trips, round among the villages; stopping wherever I found one cuddled in between a river and a hill, or in a little seashore nook.
He went away at the same quick pace; but the surface in that by-way was not as hard and ringing as that of the main road, and before long the sound of his steps died away into silence, and the hot, oppressive night became as still as ever.
Far up the rugged side of a mountain I perceived a rusty iron door, half overgrown with bushes and creeping plants, but with smoke issuing from its crevices. "Is that," inquired I, "the very door in the hill-side which the shepherds assured Christian was a by-way to hell?" "That was a joke on the part of the shepherds," said Mr. Smooth-itaway, with a smile.
Gaunt, low-spirited dogs prowled about in search of food, and always ran away at my approach. In one precipitous by-way, where the air was insupportably foul, I came upon an odd little scene: a pig and a cat, quite alone, were playing together, and enjoying themselves with remarkable spirit.
A moment's examination, and I saw that it was no modern by-way. The track was clean-cut in living rock, its smooth, hard surface lined with two parallel ruts nearly a foot deep; it extended for some twenty yards without a break, and further on I discovered less perfect bits. Here, manifestly, was the seaside approach to Tarentum, to Taras, perhaps to the Phoenician city which came before them.
Word Of The Day