"
"Oh," said Fanny, with a glance of defiance at Miss Gale, "if we are to
talk nothing but science, it _will_ be a weary world."
After the village there was a long, gradual ascent of about a mile, and
then they entered a new country. It was a series of woods and clearings,
some grass, some arable. Huge oaks, flung their arms over a road lined on
either side by short turf, close-cropped by the gypsies' cattle. Some
band or other of them was always encamped by the road-side, and never two
bands at once. And between these giant trees, not one of which was ever
felled, you saw here and there a glade, green as an emerald; or a yellow
stubble, glowing in the sun. After about a mile of this, still mounting,
but gradually, they emerged upon a spacious table-land--a long, broad,
open, grass plateau, studded with cottages. In this lake of grass Uxmoor
drew up at a word from Zoe, to show Miss Gale the scene. The cottages
were white as snow, and thatched as at Islip; but instead of
vegetable-gardens they all had orchards. The trees were apple and cherry:
of the latter not less than a thousand in that small hamlet. It was
literally a lawn, a quarter of a mile long and about two hundred yards
broad, bordered with white cottages and orchards.
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