dear secret greenness, nursed below
tempests and winds and winter nights!
vex not that but one sees thee grow;
that one made all these lesser lights.
henry vaughan.
it was, of course, quite by accident that sutherland had met margaret in the fir-wood. the wind had changed during the night, and swept all the clouds from the face of the sky; and when he looked out in the morning, he saw the fir-tops waving in the sunlight, and heard the sound of a south-west wind sweeping through them with the tune of running waters in its course. it is a well-practised ear that can tell whether the sound it hears be that of gently falling waters, or of wind flowing through the branches of firs. sutherland’s heart, reviving like a dormouse in its hole, began to be joyful at the sight of the genial motions of nature, telling of warmth and blessedness at hand. some goal of life, vague but sure, seemed to glimmer through the appearances around him, and to stimulate him to action. be dressed in haste, and went out to meet the spring. he wandered into the heart of the wood. the sunlight shone like a sunset upon the red trunks and boughs of the old fir-trees, but like the first sunrise of the world upon the new green fringes that edged the young shoots of the larches. high up, hung the memorials of past summers in the rich brown tassels of the clustering cones; while the ground under foot was dappled with sunshine on the fallen fir-needles, and the great fallen cones which had opened to scatter their autumnal seed, and now lay waiting for decay. overhead, the tops whence they had fallen, waved in the wind, as in welcome of the spring, with that peculiar swinging motion which made the poets of the sixteenth century call them “sailing pines.” the wind blew cool, but not cold; and was filled with a delicious odour from the earth, which sutherland took as a sign that she was coming alive at last. and the spring he went out to meet, met him. for, first, at the foot of a tree, he spied a tiny primrose, peeping out of its rough, careful leaves; and he wondered how, by any metamorphosis, such leaves could pass into such a flower. had he seen the mother of the next spring-messenger he was about to meet, the same thought would have returned in another form. for, next, as he passed on with the primrose in his hand, thinking it was almost cruel to pluck it, the spring met him, as if in her own shape, in the person of margaret, whom he spied a little way off, leaning against the stem of a scotch fir, and looking up to its top swaying overhead in the first billows of the outburst ocean of life. he went up to her with some shyness; for the presence of even a child-maiden was enough to make sutherland shy—partly from the fear of startling her shyness, as one feels when drawing near a couching fawn. but she, when she heard his footsteps, dropped her eyes slowly from the tree-top, and, as if she were in her own sanctuary, waited his approach. he said nothing at first, but offered her, instead of speech, the primrose he had just plucked, which she received with a smile of the eyes only, and the sweetest “thank you, sir,” he had ever heard. but while she held the primrose in her hand, her eyes wandered to the book which, according to his custom, sutherland had caught up as he left the house. it was the only well-bound book in his possession; and the eyes of margaret, not yet tutored by experience, naturally expected an entrancing page within such beautiful boards; for the gayest bindings she had seen, were those of a few old annuals up at the house—and were they not full of the most lovely tales and pictures? in this case, however, her expectation was not vain; for the volume was, as i have already disclosed, coleridge’s poems.
seeing her eyes fixed upon the book—“would you like to read it?” said he.
“if you please, sir,” answered margaret, her eyes brightening with the expectation of deliglit.
“are you fond of poetry?”
her face fell. the only poetry she knew was the scotch psalms and paraphrases, and such last-century verses as formed the chief part of the selections in her school-books; for this was a very retired parish, and the newer books had not yet reached its school. she had hoped chiefly for tales.
“i dinna ken much about poetry,” she answered, trying to speak english. “there’s an old book o’t on my father’s shelf; but the letters o’t are auld-fashioned, an’ i dinna care aboot it.”
“but this is quite easy to read, and very beautiful,” said hugh.
the girl’s eyes glistened for a moment, and this was all her reply.
“would you like to read it?” resumed hugh, seeing no further answer was on the road.
she held out her hand towards the volume. when he, in his turn, held the volume towards her hand, she almost snatched it from him, and ran towards the house, without a word of thanks or leave-taking—whether from eagerness, or doubt of the propriety of accepting the offer, hugh could not conjecture. he stood for some moments looking after her, and then retraced his steps towards the house.
it would have been something, in the monotony of one of the most trying of positions, to meet one who snatched at the offered means of spiritual growth, even if that disciple had not been a lovely girl, with the woman waking in her eyes. he commenced the duties of the day with considerably more of energy than he had yet brought to bear on his uninteresting pupils; and this energy did not flag before its effects upon the boys began to react in fresh impulse upon itself.
