NOTE


On the occasion of an obscure dramatic presentation, an early and
rudimentary draft of Book I. was published in 1910. It has since
been entirely re-written. Book II., written 1919-22, has not been
printed hitherto. Though the work was not conceived with a view to
stage-production, the author reserves the acting rights.

It may be added that, while “Krindlesyke” is not in dialect, it has been
flavoured with a sprinkling of local words; but as these are, for the
most part, words expressive of emotion, rather than words conveying
information, the sense of them should be easily gathered even by the
south-country reader.

W. G.




PRELUDE


Four bleak stone walls, an eaveless, bleak stone roof,
Like a squared block of native crag, it stands,
Hunched, on skirlnaked, windy fells, aloof:
Yet, was it built by patient human hands: