Whats Mines Mine | Page 8

castles get deserted!"
"Because they are old. It's well to desert them before they tumble
down."
"But they wouldn't tumble down if they weren't neglected. Think of
Warwick castle! Stone doesn't rot like wood! Just see the thickness of
those walls!"
"Yes, they are thick! But stone too has its way of rotting. Westminster
palace is wearing through, flake by flake. The weather will be at the
lords before long."
"That's what Valentine would call a sign of the times. I say, what a
radical he is, Chrissy!--Look! the old place is just like an empty
egg-shell! I know, if it had been mine, I wouldn't have let it come to
that!"
"You say so because it never was yours: if it had been, you would
know how uncomfortable it was!"

"I should like to know," said Mercy, after a little pause, during which
they stood looking at the ruin, "whether the owners leave such places
because they get fastidious and want better, or because they are too
poor to keep them up! At all events a man must be poor to SELL the
house that belonged to his ancestors!--It must be miserable to grow
poor after being used to plenty!--I wonder whose is the old place!"
"Oh, the governor's, I suppose! He has all hereabout for miles."
"I hope it is ours! I SHOULD like to build it up again! I would live in it
myself!"
"I'm afraid the governor won't advance your share for that purpose!"
"I love old things!" said Mercy.
"I believe you take your old doll to bed with you yet!" rejoined
Christina. "I am different to you!" she continued, with Frenchified
grammar; "I like things as new as ever I can have them!"
"I like new things well enough, Chrissy--you know I do! It is natural.
The earth herself has new clothes once a year. It is but once a year, I
grant!"
"Often enough for an old granny like her!"
"Look what a pretty cottage!--down there, half-way to the burn! It's like
an English cottage! Those we saw as we came along were either like a
piece of the earth, or so white as to look ghastly! This one looks neat
and comfortable, and has trees about it!"
The ruin, once a fortified house and called a castle, stood on a sloping
root or spur that ran from the hill down to the bank of the stream, where
it stopped abruptly with a steep scaur, at whose foot lay a dark pool. On
the same spur, half-way to the burn, stood a low, stone-built, thatched
cottage, with a little grove about it, mostly of the hardy, contented,
musical fir--a tree that would seem to have less regard to earthly
prosperity than most, and looks like a pilgrim and a stranger: not caring

much, it thrives where other trees cannot. There might have been a
hundred of them, mingled, in strangest contrast, with a few delicate
silver birches, about the cottage. It stood toward the east side of the
sinking ridge, which had a steep descent, both east and west, to the
fields below. The slopes were green with sweet grass, and apparently
smooth as a lawn. Not far from where the cottage seemed to rest rather
than rise or stand, the burn rushed right against the side of the spur, as
if to go straight through it, but turned abruptly, and flowed along the
side to the end of it, where its way to the sea was open. On the point of
the ridge were a few more firs: except these, those about the cottage,
the mole on the hill-cheek, and the plantation about the New House, up
or down was not a tree to be seen. The girls stood for a moment
looking.
"It's really quite pretty!" said Christina with condescension. "It has
actually something of what one misses here so much--a certain cosy
look! Tidy it is too! As you say, Mercy, it might be in England --only
for the poverty of its trees.--And oh those wretched bare hills!" she
added, as she turned away and moved on.
"Wait till the heather is quite out: then you will have colour to make up
for the bareness."
"Tell true now, Mercy: that you are Scotch need not keep you from
speaking the truth:--don't you think heather just--well--just a leetle
magentaish?--not a colour to be altogether admired?--just a little vulgar,
don't you know? The fashion has changed so much within the last few
years!"
"No, I don't think so; and if I did I should be ashamed of it. I suppose
poor old mother Earth ought to go to the pre-Raphaelites to be taught
how to dress herself!"
Mercy spoke with some warmth, but Christina was not sufficiently
interested to be cross. She made no