Beyond this, the hills and the
heavens once more. And there is Dimchurch!
As for the inhabitants--what am I to say? I suppose I must tell the
truth.
I remarked one born gentleman among the inhabitants, and he was a
sheep-dog. He alone did the honors of the place. He had a stump of a
tail, which he wagged at me with extreme difficulty, and a good honest
white and black face which he poked companionably into my hand. "Welcome,
Madame Pratolungo, to Dimchurch; and excuse these male and female
laborers who stand and stare at you. The good God who makes us all has
made them too, but has not succeeded so well as with you and me." I
happen to be one of the few people who can read dogs' language as written
in dogs' faces. I correctly report the language of the gentleman
sheep-dog on this occasion.
We opened the gate of the rectory, and passed in. So my Land-Voyage over
the South Down Hills came prosperously to its end.
CHAPTER THE THIRD
Poor Miss Finch
THE rectory resembled, in one respect, this narrative that I am now
writing. It was in Two Parts. Part the First, in front, composed of the
everlasting flint and mortar of the neighborhood, failed to interest me.
Part the Second, running back at a right angle, asserted itself as
ancient. It had been, in its time, as I afterwards heard, a convent of
nuns. Here were snug little Gothic windows, and dark ivy-covered walls of
venerable stone: repaired in places, at some past period, with quaint red
bricks.
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