Page:Once a Week Dec 1860 to June 61.pdf/186

 . 9, 1861.] comes up again to your mind, you’ll just give Laura a kiss for her brother-in-law, and say that he upheld her in the hour when her good-for-nought husband permitted the devil, which is Satan, to get the upper hand of him. But you’ll drive away the devil’s thoughts now, Arthur, I’ve your promise for that?"

“You have.”

“Your hand on it. And I’ll see you to the train, my man. We’ll have no discontented bodies like you upon this free and happy soil of France.”

household and I have no wish to be perverse; but we cannot join in the common abuse of the month of February. It is not surprising that the people of London and other large towns should dislike the most sloppy of the months, precluded as they are from witnessing the awakening of the year as we see it in the country; but I rather wonder that rural residents should join in the fault-finding. No month has a more distinctive character; and no characteristic can be more interesting than that of an awakening from the season of sleep, and a visible preparation for the noble shows of the coming year. The days are lengthening; the sunshine in our south rooms is warmer; and we trace with pleasure the change in its course. The sun is no longer so low as to light up the bookcases on the opposite wall, or touch the pictures on one side; the carpet only is now shone upon; and the space will shorten till, at Midsummer, the glare will not pass the threshold of the glass door. There is a portrait in a room of ours which has a western aspect; and for a few days, twice a year, the sunlight touches the eyes of this portrait, immediately before sunset, giving an extraordinary and unearthly expression to a familiar face, which it is scarcely possible to look at steadily. A thoughtless stranger might easily make a ghost story out of it. For that purpose, he must come towards the end of February, or in the middle of October, and take his chance for some one of the three days at each period which will serve.

Better even than the lengthening of the days, is the rising of the sap. Candlemas (2nd of February) is conspicuously observed in our part of the country; and one preparation for it is, finishing off all planting of trees of every kind. Our woodmen and nurserymen say they will warrant the growth of nearly every tree they plant between Martinmas and Christmas, but not one after Candlemas. So we now see no more of the winter wains with their picturesque loads of living trees,—now a noble tree, anchored upright, with cables and chains; and now, a little grove of young hollies or oaks, each with its ball of earth about its roots, going to the square hole already dug for it, where buckets of water stand ready to make a puddle when it is in, that the soil may settle down well upon the roots. We shall see no more such processions till the leaves which are now in the bud have all fallen,—late next autumn. Talking of leaves in the bud,—some have already come out. Besides the honeysuckle, we have now some sprouts just visible on the rose-bushes outside the porch. A few bright days further on in the month change the hue of the hedges, and of the woods, far and near, casting a tint of purplish red over them, which tells of swelling buds, and of life within the bare and rigid branches. By that time the leaves of daffodils and narcissus are showing themselves, all along the verge of the woods. As early as Candlemas we have the snowdrop,—the white lady of February, as it used to be called in days when that feast filled everybody’s thoughts with the Virgin and her Purification. The religious association was hardly so strong as in the case of the passion-flower; but the snowdrop was the Virgin’s flower, or her picture.

On the 2nd of February, in those days, the candles were blessed by the Church for the whole year. It is regarded for other reasons now. There are several records, and two or three proverbs, which show that sunshine on Candlemas day has always been considered a misfortune. It portends a protraction of the winter, in its severity; whereas a grey, lowering day promises a seasonable transition into spring. I do not know that my neighbours have their hearts in these portents, so much as their forefathers had. They are more occupied with getting their bills paid. Candlemas is the grand season for settling accounts with us, as Christmas is in the towns. Some of us think this the worst custom we have. Long credits are apt to be the rule in woodland districts, from the practice of distant payments for timber. The timber sellers having to wait for their money, make the tradesmen wait, and then the tradesmen make the artisans wait; and the artisans make their labourers wait; and so the evil practice goes the round. At great mansions, where there are a score of servants on the premises, the baker’s bill for the year will be paid to-day,—a great trial to the honesty of more than one party concerned. From his single room the labourer goes forth, to claim the balance due to him for the year. He has been paid in part on account; but he has more to receive. The question is whether the balance will clear off what he owes for bread, bacon, potatoes, clothing, and at the publichouse. His wife looks after him from the door, wishing she might go with him, or in his stead; for he will be offered a little glass of spirits at every place of business; and it is nearly certain that a good deal of the balance will be left at the publichouse before the next morning. Our wives and daughters get home early, or keep at home on Candlemas day, because almost every man they meet is more or less overcome by drink,—even men who are sober every other day of the year. They are unaware of the effect of sips of whisky, repeated from house to house; and when they find it out next morning, they will discover that they have somehow or other made away with a great deal of their money. It seldom happens that two or three households, which ought to have been doing well, are not “sold up,” within a few weeks of Candlemas. I consider the gentry answerable for most of this mischief. When the squire’s beef and mutton are paid for