太子爷小说网 > 英语电子书 > under the greenwood tree >

第1节

under the greenwood tree-第1节

小说: under the greenwood tree 字数: 每页4000字

按键盘上方向键 ← 或 → 可快速上下翻页,按键盘上的 Enter 键可回到本书目录页,按键盘上方向键 ↑ 可回到本页顶部!
————未阅读完?加入书签已便下次继续阅读!







Under the Greenwood Tree

or

The Mellstock Quire

A Rural Painting of the Dutch School




by Thomas Hardy













PREFACE







This story of the Mellstock Quire and its old established west…

gallery musicians; with some supplementary descriptions of similar

officials in Two on a Tower; A Few Crusted Characters; and other

places; is intended to be a fairly true picture; at first hand; of

the personages; ways; and customs which were common among such

orchestral bodies in the villages of fifty or sixty years ago。



One is inclined to regret the displacement of these ecclesiastical

bandsmen by an isolated organist (often at first a barrel…organist)

or harmonium player; and despite certain advantages in point of

control and accomplishment which were; no doubt; secured by

installing the single artist; the change has tended to stultify the

professed aims of the clergy; its direct result being to curtail and

extinguish the interest of parishioners in church doings。  Under the

old plan; from half a dozen to ten full…grown players; in addition

to the numerous more or less grown…up singers; were officially

occupied with the Sunday routine; and concerned in trying their best

to make it an artistic outcome of the combined musical taste of the

congregation。  With a musical executive limited; as it mostly is

limited now; to the parson's wife or daughter and the school…

children; or to the school…teacher and the children; an important

union of interests has disappeared。



The zest of these bygone instrumentalists must have been keen and

staying to take them; as it did; on foot every Sunday after a

toilsome week; through all weathers; to the church; which often lay

at a distance from their homes。  They usually received so little in

payment for their performances that their efforts were really a

labour of love。  In the parish I had in my mind when writing the

present tale; the gratuities received yearly by the musicians at

Christmas were somewhat as follows:  From the manor…house ten

shillings and a supper; from the vicar ten shillings; from the

farmers five shillings each; from each cottage…household one

shilling; amounting altogether to not more than ten shillings a head

annuallyjust enough; as an old executant told me; to pay for their

fiddle…strings; repairs; rosin; and music…paper (which they mostly

ruled themselves)。  Their music in those days was all in their own

manuscript; copied in the evenings after work; and their music…books

were home…bound。



It was customary to inscribe a few jigs; reels; horn…pipes; and

ballads in the same book; by beginning it at the other end; the

insertions being continued from front and back till sacred and

secular met together in the middle; often with bizarre effect; the

words of some of the songs exhibiting that ancient and broad humour

which our grandfathers; and possibly grandmothers; took delight in;

and is in these days unquotable。



The aforesaid fiddle…strings; rosin; and music…paper were supplied

by a pedlar; who travelled exclusively in such wares from parish to

parish; coming to each village about every six months。  Tales are

told of the consternation once caused among the church fiddlers

when; on the occasion of their producing a new Christmas anthem; he

did not come to time; owing to being snowed up on the downs; and the

straits they were in through having to make shift with whipcord and

twine for strings。  He was generally a musician himself; and

sometimes a composer in a small way; bringing his own new tunes; and

tempting each choir to adopt them for a consideration。  Some of

these compositions which now lie before me; with their repetitions

of lines; half…lines; and half…words; their fugues and their

intermediate symphonies; are good singing still; though they would

hardly be admitted into such hymn…books as are popular in the

churches of fashionable society at the present time。



August 1896。



Under the Greenwood Tree was first brought out in the summer of 1872

in two volumes。  The name of the story was originally intended to

be; more appropriately; The Mellstock Quire; and this has been

appended as a sub…title since the early editions; it having been

thought unadvisable to displace for it the title by which the book

first became known。



In rereading the narrative after a long interval there occurs the

inevitable reflection that the realities out of which it was spun

were material for another kind of study of this little group of

church musicians than is found in the chapters here penned so

lightly; even so farcically and flippantly at times。  But

circumstances would have rendered any aim at a deeper; more

essential; more transcendent handling unadvisable at the date of

writing; and the exhibition of the Mellstock Quire in the following

pages must remain the only extant one; except for the few glimpses

of that perished band which I have given in verse elsewhere。



T。 H。



April 1912。









PART THE FIRSTWINTER









CHAPTER I:  MELLSTOCK…LANE







To dwellers in a wood almost every species of tree has its voice as

well as its feature。  At the passing of the breeze the fir…trees sob

and moan no less distinctly than they rock; the holly whistles as it

battles with itself; the ash hisses amid its quiverings; the beech

rustles while its flat boughs rise and fall。  And winter; which

modifies the note of such trees as shed their leaves; does not

destroy its individuality。



On a cold and starry Christmas…eve within living memory a man was

passing up a lane towards Mellstock Cross in the darkness of a

plantation that whispered thus distinctively to his intelligence。

All the evidences of his nature were those afforded by the spirit of

his footsteps; which succeeded each other lightly and quickly; and

by the liveliness of his voice as he sang in a rural cadence:





〃With the rose and the lily

And the daffodowndilly;

The lads and the lasses a…sheep…shearing go。〃





The lonely lane he was following connected one of the hamlets of

Mellstock parish with Upper Mellstock and Lewgate; and to his eyes;

casually glancing upward; the silver and black…stemmed birches with

their characteristic tufts; the pale grey boughs of beech; the dark…

creviced elm; all appeared now as black and flat outlines upon the

sky; wherein the white stars twinkled so vehemently that their

flickering seemed like the flapping of wings。  Within the woody

pass; at a level anything lower than the horizon; all was dark as

the grave。  The copse…wood forming the sides of the bower interlaced

its branches so densely; even at this season of the year; that the

draught from the north…east flew along the channel with scarcely an

interruption from lateral breezes。



After passing the plantation and reaching Mellstock Cross the white

surface of the lane revealed itself between the dark hedgerows like

a ribbon jagged at the edges; the irregularity being caused by

temporary accumulations of leaves extending from the ditch on either

side。



The song (many times interrupted by flitting thoughts which took the

place of several bars; and resumed at a point it would have reached

had its continuity been unbroken) now received a more palpable

check; in the shape of 〃Ho…i…i…i…i…i!〃 from the crossing lane to

Lower Mellstock; on the right of the singer who had just emerged

from the trees。



〃Ho…i…i…i…i…i!〃 he answered; stopping and looking round; though with

no idea of seeing anything more than imagination pictured。



〃Is that thee; young Dick Dewy?〃 came from the darkness。



〃Ay; sure; Michael Mail。〃



〃Then why not stop for fellow…cratersgoing to thy own father's

house too; as we be; and knowen us so well?〃



Dick Dewy faced about and continued his tune in an under…whistle;

implying that the business of his mouth could not be checked at a

moment's notice by the placid emotion of friendship。



Having come more into the open he could now be seen rising against

the sky; his profile appearing on the light background like the

portrait of a gentleman in black cardboard。  It assumed the form of

a low…crowned hat; an ordinary…shaped nose; an ordinary chin; an

ordinary neck; and ordinary shoulders。  What he consisted of further

down was invisible from lack of sky low enough to picture him on。



Shuffling; halting; irregular footsteps of various kinds were now

heard coming up the hill; and presently there emerged from the shade

severally five men of different ages and gaits; all of them working

villagers of the parish of Mellstock。  They; too; had lost their

rotundity with the daylight; and advanced against the sky in flat

outlines; which suggested some processional design on Greek or

Etruscan pottery。  They represented the chief portion of Mellstock

parish choir。



The first was a bowed and bent man; who carried a fiddle under his

返回目录 下一页 回到顶部 0 0

你可能喜欢的