The sunlight blazed down upon the earth, there was a vividness of flamy
vegetation, of fierce seclusion amid the savage peace of the commons.
Strange how the savage England lingers in patches: as here, amid these
shaggy gorse commons, and marshy, snake infested places near the foot of
the south downs. The spirit of place lingering on primeval, as when the
Saxons came, so long ago.

Ah, how he had loved it! The green garden path, the tufts of flowers,
purple and white columbines, and great oriental red poppies with their
black chaps and mulleins tall and yellow, this flamy garden which had
been a garden for a thousand years, scooped out in the little hollow
among the snake-infested commons. He had made it flame with flowers, in a
sun cup under its hedges and trees. So old, so old a place! And yet he
had re-created it.

The timbered cottage with its sloping, cloak-like roof was old and
forgotten. It belonged to the old England of hamlets and yeomen. Lost
all alone on the edge of the common, at the end of a wide, grassy,
briar-entangled lane shaded with oak, it had never known the world of
today. Not till Egbert came with his bride. And he had come to fill it
with flowers.

The house was ancient and very uncomfortable. But he did not want to
alter it. Ah, marvellous to sit there in the wide, black, time-old
chimney, at night when the wind roared overhead, and the wood which he
had chopped himself sputtered on the hearth! Himself on one side the
angle, and Winifred on the other.

Ah, how he had wanted her: Winifred! She was young and beautiful and
strong with life, like a flame in sunshine. She moved with a slow grace