He said that the ways of the villagers were not the
ways of his people.
He and all his house cherished only kind
feelings towards their neighbours; whether those feelings were
returned or not, it was not for him to say. And there was
something else. A small appointment which would keep a man
from want for the term of his natural life, without absorbing
all his time, had become vacant in the village. Several of
the young men in the place were anxious to have it; then he,
too, came forward as a candidate, and all the others jeered at
him and tried to laugh him out of it. He cared nothing for
that, and when the examination came off he proved the best man
and got the place. He had fought his fight and had overcome
all his enemies; if they did not like him any the better for
his victory, and did and said little things to injure him, he
did not mind much, he could afford to forgive them.
Having finished his story, he said good-bye, and went his way,
blown, as it were, along the road by the wind.
We were now very curious to see the other members of his
family; they would, we imagined, prove amusing, if nothing
better. They proved a good deal better. The house we sought,
for a house it was, stood a little way back from the street
in a large garden. It had in former times been an inn, or
farm-house, possibly a manor-house, and was large, with
many small rooms, and short, narrow, crooked staircases,
half-landings and narrow passages, and a few large rooms,
their low ceilings resting on old oak beams, black as ebony.
Outside, it was the most picturesque and doubtless the oldest
house in the village; many-gabled, with very tall ancient
chimneys, the roofs of red tiles mottled grey and yellow with
age and lichen. It was a surprise to find a woodman - for that
was what the man was - living in such a big place. The woodman
himself, his appearance and character, gave us a second and
greater surprise. He was a well-shaped man of medium height;
although past middle life he looked young, and had no white
thread in his raven-black hair and beard. His teeth were
white and even, and his features as perfect as I have seen in
any man. His eyes were pure dark blue, contrasting rather
strangely with his pale olive skin and intense black hair.
Only a woodman, but he might have come of one of the oldest
and best families in the country, if there is any connection
between good blood and fine features and a noble expression.
Oddly enough, his surname was an uncommon and aristocratic
one. His wife, on the other hand, although a very good woman
as we found, had a distinctly plebeian countenance. One day
she informed us that she came of a different and better class
than her husband's. She was the daughter of a small
tradesman, and had begun life as a lady's-maid:
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