The Yellow Admiral by Patrick O’Brian Read Free Book Online Page B

races. In good years we field an eleven that can beat teams of fifteen and even seventeen from most of the nearby villages. Down there, a little south of east, do you see - no, to the left - there is the lane the fair people come up on the days before Old Lammas. It will take us a little out of our way, but I should like to take you down and across; there is something in the south pasture that may please you; and'- looking at his watch - 'we have plenty of time before Welland comes to see me.'
    As they dropped, Bess started a hare that ran straight from them, going awkwardly down the slope with the dog so close that neither man chose to fire. Ten yards almost touching and then the hare, now out of range, jigged to the right, changed to her natural uphill pace and fairly raced away, a pleasure to behold, Jack hailooing after her, echoed by the shrill voice of the goose-girl, and Bess bounding like a cricket-ball, but with no effect, hopelessly outrun. The hare vanished over the high bank. Bess returned, gasping, and soon after they reached the lane.
    'You can still see the mark of their carts, in spite of the rain,' observed Jack. 'And before the last heavy fall you could just make out the print of a camel, a camel, a camel with two bunches that carried the tent belonging to one of the bearded ladies, a present from the Arabian queen, she said.'
    'There is something magic about a fair,' said Stephen. 'The smell of trampled grass, the flaring lights... you still have wheatears, I see.'
    'Yes, but they will soon be gone, and we with them.' A wood-pigeon, flying straight and high, crossed over. 'Your bird,' said Jack.
    'Not at all,' said Stephen.
    Jack fired. The bird came down in a long swift glide, its wings still spread. 'I am glad to have hit something, however,' he said. 'That is one of the droits de seigneur, you know. In theory only the lord of the manor can shoot, though he can always give his friends a deputation.'
    They talked about preserving game, poaching, keepers, and deer for half a mile, and then, when another lane branched off, winding through deep furze on either side, they followed it and so reached a white line of post and rail. Jack said, 'This is the limit of the common. Beyond the fence our south pasture begins, demesne land. You have only seen a small corner of Simmon's Lea - another day I hope to show you the mere and beyond - but it gives you an idea...'
    'A wonderfully pleasant idea, a delightful landscape indeed; and in the autumn, the late autumn, you will have all the northern duck down here, to say nothing of waders, and with any luck some geese.'
    'Certainly, and perhaps some whooper swans. But I really meant an idea of what these unhappy commoners are signing away. You may say they do not value the beauty...'
    'I say nothing of the kind: would scorn it.'
    'But they do value the grazing, the fuel, the litter for their beasts, the thatch and the hundred little things the common can provide: to say nothing of the fish, particularly eels, the rabbits, the odd hare and a few of Griffiths' pheasants. Harding does not see them, so long as it is villagers, and on a decent scale.'
    For some time they had been hearing an odd continuous sound that Stephen could not identify until they came to the gate itself; while Jack was opening it Stephen looked back along a straight piece of the lane, and there he saw a woman leading an ass harnessed to a sledge piled high with furze; she was wearing a man's old, very old coat and gloves and it was evident that she had cut it herself. Jack held the gate for her, calling out, 'Mrs Harris, how do you do?'
    'And yourself, Captain Jack?' she replied in an equally powerful voice, though hoarser. 'And your good lady? I will not stop, sir - I fairly dreaded that old gate - for the ass is so eternal sullen I should never get him to move again, if I let up to open it.' Indeed the ass's momentum slackened in the gateway; but with a singularly vile oath she urged him on and