PADDINGTON CANAL. “So far the life of men moving to and fro across the bridges was like the old life that I knew, though down below upon the sparkling waters many birds were alighting, or were already seated like wondrous blossoms upon the bulwarks of a barge painted in parrot colours red and green.” IN PURSUIT OF SPRING BY EDWARD THOMAS THOMAS NELSON AND SONS LONDON, EDINBURGH, DUBLIN AND NEW YORK. TO DOROTHY AND VIVIAN LOCKE ELLIS First Published April 1914...

This is the record of a journey from London to the Quantock Hills—to Nether Stowey, Kilve, Crowcombe, and West Bagborough, to the high point where the Taunton-Bridgwater road tops the hills and shows all Exmoor behind, all the Mendips before, and upon the left the sea, and Wales very far off. It was a journey on or with a bicycle. The season was Easter, a March Easter. “A North-Easter, probably?” No. Nor did much north-east go to the making of it. I will give its pedigree briefly, going back onl

I had planned to start on March 21, and rather late than early, to give the road time for drying. The light arrived bravely and innocently enough at sunrise; too bravely, for by eight o’clock it was already abashed by a shower. There could be no doubt that either I must wait for a better day, or at the next convenient fine interval I must pretend to be deceived and set out prepared for all things. So at ten I started, with maps and sufficient clothes to replace what my waterproof could not prote

Cocks crowing and wheels thundering on granite waked me at Guildford soon after six. I was out at seven, after paying 3s. 6d. for supper and bed: breakfast I was to have at Farnham. I have often fared as well as I did that night at a smaller cost, and worse at a larger. At Guildford itself, for example, I went recently into a place of no historic interest or natural beauty, and greenly consented to pay 3s. for a bed, although the woman, in answer to my question, said that the charge for supper a

Before the first brightening of the light on Sunday morning the rain ceased, and I returned to Dunbridge to pick up the road I had lost on Saturday evening. Above all, I wanted to ride along under Dean Hill, the level-ridged chalk hill dotted with yew that is seen running parallel to the railway a quarter of a mile on your left as you near Salisbury from Eastleigh. The sky was pale, scarcely more blue than the clouds with which it was here and there lightly whitewashed. For five miles I was ridi

Before I decided that sleep was better than any book, some bad poetry I was reading put me in mind of Stephen Duck. I had been thinking of him earlier in the day at Erlestoke, because it occurred to me that the sculpture was as inappropriate on the cottages there as were the frigid graces on the thresher’s mortal pages. This man, a labourer from Charlton, some way east of Erlestoke, was made a Yeoman of the Guard in 1733 for his services to literature, and rector of Byfleet in 1752. He drowned h

Once in the night I awoke and heard the weir again, but the first sound in the morning was a thrush singing in a lilac next my window. For the main chorus of dawn was over. It was a still morning under a sky that was one low arch of cloud, a little whiter in places, but all gray. Big drops glistened on the undersides of horizontal rails. There had been a white frost, and, as they said, we seldom have many white frosts before it rains again. But not until I went out could I tell that it was softl

I awoke to hear ducklings squeaking, and a starling in the pine tree imitating the curlew and the owl hunting. Then I heard another chiff-chaff. Everything more than a quarter of a mile away was hidden by the mist of a motionless white frost, but the blackbird disregarded it. At a quarter to eight he was singing perfectly in an oak at the cross roads. The sun had melted the frost wherever it was not protected by hedges or fallen trees. Soon a breeze broke up and scattered and destroyed the mist,

Day opened cold, dull, and windy in Shepton Mallet. After paying the usual bill of about four shillings for supper, bed, and breakfast, I tried to get into the churchyard again; but it was locked, and I set out for Wells. The road led me past the principal edifice in Shepton on the west side, as the prison is on the east—the Anglo-Bavarian Brewery, which is also the highest in position. It is a plain stone heap and a tubular chimney-stack of brick. A lover of size or of beer at any price might l

The night at Bridgwater was still. I heard little after ten except the clear deep bells of St. Mary’s telling the quarters. They woke me with the first light, and I was glad to be out of the hotel early because the three other guests (I think, commercial travellers) not only did not talk—which may have been a blessing—but took no notice of “Good evening” or “Good morning.” It was a clean, new, and unfriendly place, that caused a sensation as of having slept in linoleum. The charge for supper, be

When I awoke at six the light was good, but it was the light of rain. One thrush alone was singing, a few starlings whistled. And the rain lasted until half-past eight. Then the sunlight enshrined itself in the room, the red road glistened, a Lombardy poplar at Kilve Court waved against a white sky only a little blemished by gray, and I started again westward. The black stain of yesterday’s fire on the hill was very black, the new privet leaves very green, and the stitchwort very white in the ar