Set in Silver
wanted to go in and ask if they show the room Lord Nelson used; but we
had too many things to see.
Of course, I am always wishing for you, but I began to wish the hardest
just as we came into this green, brackeny, fairyland of Surrey. It's the
kind of country you love best; although I must say it was never planned
for motors. Winding through those green tunnels which are the Surrey
lanes, I felt as if, in some quaint dream, I were motoring on a
tight-rope, expecting another car to want to pass me on the same
rope--which naturally it couldn't!
It would have been much worse, though, if Young Nick had been driving.
That little, smooth brown face of his looks as if its idol-simper hid no
human emotions, and I believe if people and animals were perfectly flat,
like paper dolls, so that they would do no harm to his car, he wouldn't
mind how many he drove over. Luckily, however, they _aren't_ flat, and
the only thing earthly he adores, after his master, is his motor; so he
is nice and cautious for its sake. But the Dragon thinks of everyone,
and says there's no pleasure for him in motoring if he leaves a trail of
distress or even annoyance along the road as he passes. He slows down at
corners; he goes carefully round them; he almost walks Apollo in places
where creatures of any kind may start out unexpectedly; and he blows our
pleasant musical horn as if by instinct, never forgetting, as I'm sure I
should do.
As we twisted and turned through the Surrey lanes, between Dorking and
Shere, little children in red cloaks and tams appeared from behind
hedges, looking like blowing poppies as they ran. And blue-eyed,
gold-brown haired girls in cottage doorways, under hanging bowers of
roses, were as decorative as Old Chelsea china girls. The red tiles of
their roofs, as I turned back for one more glimpse, would already be
half hidden in waves of green, but would just show up like beds of
scarlet geraniums buried in leaves.
Shere was almost too beautiful to be real, with its rows of Elizabethan
cottages whose windows twinkled at us with their diamond-shaped,
diamond-bright panes, sparkling under their low, thatch-eyebrows, from
between black oak beams. The Tudor chimneys were as graceful as the
smoke wreaths that lazily spiraled above them, and the whole effect
was--was--well, inexpressibly Birket Foster. I used to think he
idealized; but then, I'd never seen anything of England but London, and
didn't know how all English trees, cottages, and even clouds, are
trained to group themselves to suit artists of different schools.
I kept wishing that you'd made me study architecture and botany, instead
of languages and music. In justice to oneself, one ought, when
travelling in England, to have at least a bowing acquaintance with every
sort of architecture, and all families of flowers, to say nothing of
trees, so that one might exclaim, as snobs do of royalties and
celebrities: "Oh, _she_ was the great granddaughter of So-and-So." "He
married Lady This-and-That." Also, I find I need much more knowledge of
literature than I have. This country is divided off into a kind of
glorious chessboard, each square being sacred to some immortal author,
playwright, or poet. The artists press them close, without overcrowding;
and history lies underneath--history for every square inch.
"Twelve coffin deep," I quoted Kipling to myself, as my mind panted
along Roman roads, and the Pilgrim's Way.
"Why, was there a cemetery there?" asked Mrs. Norton, looking mildly
interested.
She, by the way, doesn't much care for ruins. She says they're so
untidy.
You and I travelled till our money threatened to give out in the noble
cause of sight-seeing, but I never realized history quite so potently
even in Italy as I do in England. Yet that's not strange, when you think
how tiny England is, compared with other countries, and how things have
gone on happening there every minute since the Phoenicians found it a
snug little island. Its chapters of history have to be packed like
sardines, beginning down, down, far deeper than Kipling's "twelve
coffins."
One Surrey village telleth another, just to slip through in a motor-car,
though none could ever be tiresome in the telling; but if one stopped to
hear the real story of each one, how different they would all be! There
would be grand chapters of fighting, and mysterious chapters of
smuggling--oh, but long ones about smuggling, since most of the manors
and half the old cottages have "smugglers' rooms," where the lace and
spirits used to be hidden, in their secret journey from Portsmouth to
London. It's difficult to believe in these thrilling chapters now, in
the rich, placid county, where the only mystery floats in the veil of
blue mist that twists like a gauze scarf around the tree trunks in the
woods, and the only black spots are the dark downs in the distance, with
the sky pale gold behind them.
You would love motoring, not only for what you do see, but for what you
nearly see, and long to see, but can't--just as Dad used to say "Thank
God for all the blessings I've never had!" Why, every road you don't go
down looks fantastically alluring, just twice as alluring as the one you
are in. You grudge missing anything, and fear, greedily, that there may
be better villages with more history beyond the line of your route. It's
no consolation when Mrs. Norton says, "Well, you can't see everything!"
You _want_ to see everything. And you wish you had eyes all the way
round your head. It would be inconvenient for hair and hats, but you
could manage somehow.
We had to go through Petworth, a most feudal-looking old place, reeking
of history since the Confessor, and mentioned in the Domesday Book (I do
so respect towns or houses mentioned in the Domesday Book!), and if it
had been the right day we could have seen Lord Leconsfield's collection
of pictures, some of the best in England; but it was the wrong day, so
we sailed on out of Surrey into Sussex, and arrived at Bignor.
All I knew about Bignor was that I must expect something amazing there.
Sir Lionel asked me not to read about it in the books of which we have a
travelling library in the car--one at least for each county we shall
visit. He said he "wanted Bignor to be a surprise" for me; and it is odd
the way one finds oneself obeying that man! Not that one's afraid of
him, but--well, I don't know why exactly, but one just does it. We
didn't stop in the village, though there was the quaintest grocery shop
there you can imagine, perfectly mediaeval; and in the churchyard yew
trees grand enough to make bows for half the archers of England--if
there were any in these days. We went on to quite a modern-looking
farmhouse, and Sir Lionel said, "I am going to ask Mrs. Tupper if she
will give us a little lunch. If she says 'yes,' it's sure to be good."
"I don't know any Tuppers, Lionel," objected Mrs. Norton. "Who are
they?"
"Relatives of Martin Tupper, if that name recalls anything to your
mind," said he.
Mrs. Norton had a vague idea that she had been more or less brought up
on extracts from Martin Tupper, and seemed to associate him with
Sundays, when, as a child, she hadn't been allowed to play. But that
didn't explain how Lionel happened to know connections of his in a
Sussex farmhouse. Besides, he couldn't possibly have seen them for more
than fifteen years.
"That is true, and I only saw them once, even then," he admitted. "But
Mrs. Tupper had been here for a good many years, engaged in the most
delightful work, which you will hear about by and by; and I'm sure she
is here still, and will be for many more years to come, because I don't
want to imagine the place without her."
Mrs. Norton said no more, and her brother knocked on the door of the
farmhouse, which stood hospitably open. In a minute, a dear old
white-haired lady appeared, and instantly her face lighted up.
"Why, if it isn't Mr. Pendragon--I mean Sir Lionel--come back to see us
again!" said she.
Sir Lionel grew red with pleasure, at being remembered by her, for
apparently he hadn't at all expected it. He seems to forget that he is a
celebrity, and generally doesn't like being reminded of the fact, but he
was pleased that Mrs. Tupper had read about him in the papers from time
to time, and had never forgotten his face.
She said she would be delighted to provide us with lunch, if we didn't
mind a simple one; and then she would have gone on to say something
which would have given the "surprise" away, if Sir Lionel hadn't stopped
her.
We had delicious country things to eat, with real Surrey cream and apple
dumplings. They did taste good after the elaborate French cooking in
London, by way of contrast! Then, when we had finished, Sir Lionel said,
"Now, Mrs. Tupper, can you take us for a stroll round the farm?"
That didn't sound exciting, did it? We walked out, and it seemed a very
nice farm, but nothing remarkable. As we wandered toward some sheds, in
a field of mangolds, Sir Lionel made us look up at a big hill, and said,
"There was a Roman camp there. If you'd stood where you stand now, on a
quiet night in those times, you could have heard the clanking of armour
or the soldiers quarrelling over their dice. Here Roman Stane Street
ran, and chariots used to stop to bring the latest news from Rome to the
owner of the villa."
"Was there a villa?" asked Mrs. Norton, who thinks it polite to ask her
brother questions, whether she is interested or not.
"Let's take a look into this shed," said he, by way of answer. And,
there, protected by that rough roof, was a great stretch of splendid
mosaic pavement. It was done in circular compartments of ornamentation,
and in one was a beautiful head of Ganymede--in another, Winter. Alas, I
shouldn't have known what they were if I hadn't been told, but I would
have known that they were rare and wonderful.
This was the "surprise." This was the secret of Bignor; but it wasn't
nearly all. There were lovely broken pillars, and lots more pavements,
acres of mosaic, it seemed; for the villa had been large and important,
and must have been built by a rich man with cultivated taste. He knew
how to make exile endurable, did that Roman gentleman! Standing in his
dining-hall, I could imagine him and his fair lady-wife sitting at
breakfast, looking out from between white, glittering pillars at the
Sussex downs, grander than those of Surrey, reminding me of great, brave
shoulders raised to protect England. Now we knew what Mrs. Tupper's
"delightful work" was! For forty-nine years she has cleaned the mosaic
pavement of the vanished Roman villa, all of which were discovered by
the grandfather of the present owner of the farm. Never once has she
tired of looking at the mosaics, because, as she explained to us, "one
doesn't tire of what is beautiful." There speaks true appreciation,
doesn't it? Only a born lover of the beautiful could have said that so
simply.
There was an Italian, a man from Venice, repairing the mosaic. He could
hardly speak a word of English, and beamed with a sudden smile when I
asked him some question in his native tongue. We talked awhile, and I
translated several things he said to Sir Lionel and his sister. I'm
ashamed to confess, dear, that I was pleased to show off my poor little
accomplishment, and proud because I knew one thing which our famous man
didn't. Wasn't that low of me?
"Well, you weren't disappointed in my surprise, I think?" said Sir
Lionel, when we were starting away at last.
I just gave him one look. It really wasn't necessary to answer.
As we flashed on, through country always exquisite, and over perfect
roads, I could think of nothing but Bignor, until suddenly, after
passing through a long aisle of great beeches, like an avenue in a