period.

In the block that stood angle-wise to the rest, was the kitchen,
the door of which opened immediately on the court; and behind the
kitchen, in that part which had no windows to the valley, was the
milk-cellar, as they called the dairy, and places for household
storage. A rough causeway ran along the foot of the walls,
connecting the doors in the different blocks. Of these, the kitchen
door for the most part stood open: sometimes the snow would be
coming fast down the wide chimney, with little soft hisses in the
fire, and the business of the house going on without a thought of
closing it, though from it you could not have seen across the yard
for the falling flakes.

But when my story opens, the summer held the old house and the
older hills in its embrace. The sun was pouring torrents of light
and heat into the valley, and the slopes of it were covered with
green. The bees were about, contenting themselves with the flowers,
while the heather was getting ready its bloom for them, and a boy
of fourteen was sitting in a little garden that lay like a dropped
belt of beauty about the feet of the grim old walls. This was on
the other side--that to the south, parting the house from the slope
where the corn began--now with the ear half-formed. The boy sat on
a big stone, which once must have had some part in the house
itself, or its defences, but which he had never known except as a
seat for himself. His back leaned against the hoary wall, and he
was in truth meditating, although he did not look as if he were. He
was already more than an incipient philosopher, though he could not
yet have put into recognizable shape the thought that was now
passing through his mind. The bees were the primary but not the