United States or Romania ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Once on a time there was a man so mean and cross that he never thought his wife did anything right in the house. So one evening in hay-making time he came home scolding and tearing, and showing his teeth and making a fuss. "Dear love, don't be so angry; there's a good man," said his goody; "to-morrow let's change our work. I'll go out with the mowers and mow, and you shall mind the house at home."
So the child-squire romped on equal terms with the little rustics of Nohant, sharing their village sports and the occupations of the seasons as they came round: hay-making and gleaning in summer; in winter weaving bird-nets to spread in the snowy fields for the wholesale capture of larks; anon listening with mixed terror and delight to the picturesque legends told by the hemp-beaters, as they sat at their work out of doors on September moonlight evenings to all the traditional ghost-stories of the "Black Valley," as she fancifully christened the country round about.
He did not say any more, but turned back into the field, and took up his hay-making again. Sylvia stood quite still, thinking, and wistfully longing for some kind of certainty. Kester came up to her.
Somewhat disconcerted, he suddenly changed the conversation, and, like many another distressed creature, took to the water, saying briskly, "By-the-by, Miss Wilder, as I've engaged to do the honors, shall I have the pleasure of bathing with you when the fun begins? As you are fond of hay-making, I suppose you intend to pay your respects to the old gentleman with the three-pronged pitchfork?"
He had seen the hay-making at Saint Cloud, last summer: and now he must have been pleased at the thought of the sweet fields and gardens of the country, and the woods just bursting into leaf. There were many woods about Saint Cloud. He knew nothing of armed nobles lurking there to save him and his family.
And in the summer before the hay-making, and then again before the harvest, will be the best chance for building a nice tight warm little house, all of tamarack. I have the wood ready, cut and piled behind my barn; my brother will help me, perhaps Esdras and Da'Be as well, when they get home.
I remember, too, when some elderly women, with a younger one, were hay-making, one of the old ladies, dragging the big "heel-rake" behind the waggon in course of loading always rather a tough job tried to induce the younger woman to take her place with, "Here, Sally, thee take a turn at it; thee be a better 'ooman nor I be."
He remembered the lusty, jovial country folk, the songs and dances at hay-making, the fragrance of the land, the sluggish rivers rolling their brown mud about the plains, the mild long-drawn evenings. He felt again that all-pervading charm of sadness, of tender yearning, that hangs in the pale Russian sky and penetrates to the very soul of the endless country.
"Wilt thou into the wildwood?" said she. "Nay, mother," he said, "I will but walk about the meadow and look on the hay-making folk." "For that," said the carline, "thou needest neither sword nor helm. Ralph started as she said the word, but held his peace awhile. Then he said: "And who is lord of this fair land?" "There is no lord, but a lady," said the carline. "How hight she?" said Ralph.
Selina was the most popular, being liable to shrieks of laughter at the smallest witticisms, and always ready for that species of amusement termed "bally-ragging" or "hay-making." But Ada was the most admired. She belonged to that type which in hotel society and country towns is always termed "queenly." She "kept the men at a distance." She "never allowed them to take liberties," etc., etc.
Word Of The Day