The Woodlanders

The next morning Grace was at the window early. She felt determined to

see him somehow that day, and prepared his breakfast eagerly. Eight

o'clock struck, and she had remembered that he had not come to arouse

her by a knocking, as usual, her own anxiety having caused her to stir.

The breakfast was set in its place without. But he did not arrive to

take it; and she waited on. Nine o'clock arrived, and the breakfast

was cold; and still there was no Giles. A thrush, that had been

repeating itself a good deal on an opposite bush for some time, came

and took a morsel from the plate and bolted it, waited, looked around,

and took another. At ten o'clock she drew in the tray, and sat down to

her own solitary meal. He must have been called away on business

early, the rain having cleared off.

Yet she would have liked to assure herself, by thoroughly exploring the

precincts of the hut, that he was nowhere in its vicinity; but as the

day was comparatively fine, the dread lest some stray passenger or

woodman should encounter her in such a reconnoitre paralyzed her wish.

The solitude was further accentuated to-day by the stopping of the

clock for want of winding, and the fall into the chimney-corner of

flakes of soot loosened by the rains. At noon she heard a slight

rustling outside the window, and found that it was caused by an eft

which had crept out of the leaves to bask in the last sun-rays that

would be worth having till the following May.

She continually peeped out through the lattice, but could see little.

In front lay the brown leaves of last year, and upon them some

yellowish-green ones of this season that had been prematurely blown

down by the gale. Above stretched an old beech, with vast armpits, and

great pocket-holes in its sides where branches had been amputated in

past times; a black slug was trying to climb it. Dead boughs were

scattered about like ichthyosauri in a museum, and beyond them were

perishing woodbine stems resembling old ropes.

From the other window all she could see were more trees, jacketed with

lichen and stockinged with moss. At their roots were stemless yellow

fungi like lemons and apricots, and tall fungi with more stem than

stool. Next were more trees close together, wrestling for existence,

their branches disfigured with wounds resulting from their mutual

rubbings and blows. It was the struggle between these neighbors that

she had heard in the night. Beneath them were the rotting stumps of

those of the group that had been vanquished long ago, rising from their

mossy setting like decayed teeth from green gums. Farther on were

other tufts of moss in islands divided by the shed leaves--variety upon

variety, dark green and pale green; moss-like little fir-trees, like

plush, like malachite stars, like nothing on earth except moss.