Mysticism -- Fiction; Supernatural -- Fiction; Virginia -- Fiction
For a while they rode in silence. There was only the sound of their own
breathing and movement, and the very inner voice of the forest, low
speech of branches that brushed them, break of twigs, flutter of wings,
tap of woodpeckers, whisk of squirrel, and once, a little way off, the
heavy whir of a pheasant. At last Drew broke the silence. "My mother
died when I was fifteen years old, and my father when I was twenty. I
remember my mother's mother and my father's mother and father. I know a
good deal about their life after I was born and their life before I was
born. I have a fair notion of my grandparents' parents, and I know
something of the way of life of the generation behind that one. I have
been told and I have read. Of course there are presently ancestors of
whom I have been told nothing, and behind these countless others. Of
course I know that people often imaginatively share the experience of
parents and kindred. They say: 'It must have been so and so with my
mother and my father--or with my grandparents--or my ancestors
generally. They had these experiences and they must have felt and done
this way. It seems almost as if I were there!' I think when you say that
you are beginning. But it's grown to be more than that with me. After
all, what are you but your parents, your grandparents, your
great-grandparents, and so on? Your experience under your immediate name
and your experience under your old names--their names. And alike, what
are they but you? Share and share, comprehend and comprehend, include
and include! I tell you that I am aware of the pyramid behind this
cleaving point that is talking to you. I _remember_."
"Do you mean that you remember actually thinking, feeling, doing what
men say your ancestors did?"
"I don't get it clear. It's all wrought into some kind of unity. I don't
remember clearly sharp, isolated experiences--except that one time I
told you about, and that was clear and sharp repetition. But I remember,
all the same. I don't feel any wall between my father and myself,
between my mother and myself, my grandparents and myself. You don't know
how curiously I seem to share their life! Sometimes, lying still at
night, I simply, naturally, am Edward Drew as well as Philip Drew. I
look out of the Edward Drew window--or out of the Andrew or Robert or
Margaret or Janet window--and then I turn and look out of the Philip
Drew window. I had a great-grandfather who was a sailor. I can't tell
you what feel of the deck beneath my feet, what a sense of sea by day
and by night, I have at times!... But then, of course, in the far back I
must join many sailors.... I _am_ those folk. That's my own life they
led. I lead their life. Wherever they are, they lead mine!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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