Kenelm Chillingly — Volume 03Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron
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Kenelm Chillingly — Volume 03
Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron
English fiction -- 19th century
"I scarcely know what to say," answered Cecilia, musingly. "I can
remember no time in my childhood when I did not feel delight in that
which seemed to me beautiful in scenery, but I suspect that I vaguely
distinguished one kind of beauty from another. A common field with
daisies and buttercups was beautiful to me then, and I doubt if I saw
anything more beautiful in extensive landscapes."
"True," said Kenelm: "it is not in early childhood that we carry the
sight into distance: as is the mind so is the eye; in early childhood
the mind revels in the present, and the eye rejoices most in the
things nearest to it. I don't think in childhood that we--
"'Watched with wistful eyes the setting sun.'"
"Ah! what a world of thought in that word 'wistful'!" murmured
Cecilia, as her gaze riveted itself on the western heavens, towards
which Kenelm had pointed as he spoke, where the enlarging orb rested
half its disk on the rim of the horizon.
She had seated herself on a fragment of the ruin, backed by the
hollows of a broken arch. The last rays of the sun lingered on her
young face, and then lost themselves in the gloom of the arch behind.
There was a silence for some minutes, during which the sun had sunk.
Rosy clouds in thin flakes still floated, momently waning: and the
eve-star stole forth steadfast, bright, and lonely,--nay, lonely not
now; that sentinel has aroused a host.
Said a voice, "No sign of rain yet, Squire. What will become of the
turnips?"
"Real life again! Who can escape it?" muttered Kenelm, as his eye
rested on the burly figure of the Squire's bailiff.
"Ha! North," said Travers, "what brings you here? No bad news, I
hope?"
"Indeed, yes, Squire. The Durham bull--"
"The Durham bull! What of him? You frighten me."
"Taken bad. Colic."
"Excuse me, Chillingly," cried Travers; "I must be off. A most
valuable animal, and no one I can trust to doctor him but myself."
"That's true enough," said the bailiff, admiringly. "There's not a
veterinary in the county like the Squire."
Travers was already gone, and the panting bailiff had hard work to
catch him up.
Kenelm seated himself beside Cecilia on the ruined fragment.
"How I envy your father!" said he.
"Why just at this moment,--because he knows how to doctor the bull?"
said Cecilia, with a sweet low laugh.
"Well, that is something to envy. It is a pleasure to relieve from
pain any of God's creatures,--even a Durham bull."
"Indeed, yes. I am justly rebuked."
"On the contrary you are to be justly praised. Your question
suggested to me an amiable sentiment in place of the selfish one which
was uppermost in my thoughts. I envied your father because he creates
for himself so many objects of interest; because while he can
appreciate the mere sensuous enjoyment of a landscape and a sunset, he
can find mental excitement in turnip crops and bulls. Happy, Miss
Travers, is the Practical Man."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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