Whats Mines Mine | Page 7

shoulder of a hill,
here and there planted with firs. Of the hardy trees there was a thicket
at the back of the house, while toward the south, less hardy ones grew
in the shrubbery, though they would never, because of the sea-breezes,
come to any height. The carriage-drive to the house joined two not very
distant points on the same road, and there was no lodge at either gate. It
was a rough, country road, a good deal rutted, and seldom repaired.
Opposite the gates rose the steep slope of a heathery hill, along the
flank of which the girls were now walking. On their right lay a piece of
rough moorland, covered with heather, patches of bracken, and coarse
grass. A few yards to the right, it sank in a steep descent. Such was the
disposition of the ground for some distance along the road--on one side
the hill, on the other a narrow level, and abrupt descent.
As they advanced they caught sight of a ruin rising above the brow of
the descent: the two younger darted across the heather toward it; the
two elder continued their walk along the road, gradually descending
towards a valley.
"I wonder what we shall see round the corner there!" said Mercy, the
younger of the two.
"The same over again, I suppose!" answered Christina. "What a rough
road it is! I've twice nearly sprained my ankle!"

"I was thinking of what I saw the other day in somebody's
travels--about his interest in every turn of the road, always looking for
what was to come next."
"Time enough when it comes, in my opinion!" rejoined Christina.
For she was like any other mirror--quite ready to receive what was
thrown upon her, but incapable of originating anything, almost
incapable of using anything.
As they descended, and the hill-side, here covered with bracken and
boulders, grew higher and higher above them, the valley, in front and
on the right, gradually opened, here and there showing a glimpse of a
small stream that cantered steadily toward the sea, now tumbling over a
rock, now sullen in a brown pool. Arriving at length at a shoulder of the
hill round which the road turned, a whole mile of the brook lay before
them. It came down a narrow valley, with scraps of meadow in the
bottom; but immediately below them the valley was of some width, and
was good land from side to side, where green oats waved their feathery
grace, and the yellow barley was nearly ready for the sickle. No more
than the barren hill, however, had the fertile valley anything for them.
Their talk was of the last ball they were at.
The sisters were about as good friends as such negative creatures could
be; and they would be such friends all their lives, if on the one hand
neither of them grew to anything better, and on the other no jealousy,
or marked difference of social position through marriage, intervened.
They loved each other, if not tenderly, yet with the genuineness of
healthy family-habit--a thing not to be despised, for it keeps the door
open for something better. In itself it is not at all to be reckoned upon,
for habit is but the merest shadow of reality. Still it is not a small thing,
as families go, if sisters and brothers do not dislike each other.
They were criticizing certain of the young men they had met at the said
ball. Being, in their development, if not in their nature, commonplace,
what should they talk about but clothes or young men? And why,
although an excellent type of its kind, should I take the trouble to
record their conversation? To read, it might have amused me--or even

interested, as may a carrot painted by a Dutchman; but were I a painter,
I should be sorry to paint carrots, and the girls' talk is not for my pen.
At the same time I confess myself incapable of doing it justice. When
one is annoyed at the sight of things meant to be and not beautiful,
there is danger of not giving them even the poor fair-play they stand in
so much the more need of that it can do so little for them.
But now they changed the subject of their talk. They had come to a
point of the road not far from the ruin to which the children had run
across the heather.
"Look, Chrissy! It IS an old castle!" said Mercy. "I wonder whether it
is on our land!"
"Not much to be proud of!" replied the other. "It is nothing but the
walls of a square house!"
"Not just a common square house! Look at that pepper-pot on one of
the corners!--I wonder how it is all the old