ON Sundays my feet take ever the same way.First my temple service, and then five miles tramp over the tender, dewy fields, with their ineffable earthy smell, until I reach the little church at the foot of the grey-green down.Here, every Sunday, a young priest from a neighbouring village says Mass for the tiny hamlet, where all are very old or very young - for the heyday of life has no part under the long shadow of the hills, but is away at sea or in service.There is a beautiful seemliness in the extreme youth of the priest who serves these aged children of God.He bends to communicate them with the reverent tenderness of a son, and reads with the careful intonation of far-seeing love.To the old people he is the son of their old age, God-sent to guide their tottering footsteps along the highway of foolish wayfarers; and he, with his youth and strength, wishes no better task.Service ended, we greet each other friendly - for men should not be strange in the acre of God; and I pass through the little hamlet and out and up on the grey down beyond.Here, at the last gate, I pause for breakfast;and then up and on with quickening pulse, and evergreen memory of the weary war-worn Greeks who broke rank to greet the great blue Mother-way that led to home.I stand on the summit hatless, the wind in my hair, the smack of salt on my cheek, all round me rolling stretches of cloud-shadowed down, no sound but the shrill mourn of the peewit and the gathering of the sea.
The hours pass, the shadows lengthen, the sheep-bells clang; and Ilie in my niche under the stunted hawthorn watching the to and fro of the sea, and AEolus shepherding his white sheep across the blue.
I love the sea with its impenetrable fathoms, its wash and undertow, and rasp of shingle sucked anew.I love it for its secret dead in the Caverns of Peace, of which account must be given when the books are opened and earth and heaven have fled away.Yet in my love there is a paradox, for as I watch the restless, ineffective waves I think of the measureless, reflective depths of the still and silent Sea of Glass, of the dead, small and great, rich or poor, with the works which follow them, and of the Voice as the voice of many waters, when the multitude of one mind rends heaven with alleluia: and I lie so still that I almost feel the kiss of White Peace on my mouth.Later still, when the flare of the sinking sun has died away and the stars rise out of a veil of purple cloud, I take my way home, down the slopes, through the hamlet, and across miles of sleeping fields; over which night has thrown her shifting web of mist - home to the little attic, the deep, cool well, the kindly wrinkled face with its listening eyes -peace in my heart and thankfulness for the rhythm of the road.
Monday brings the joy of work, second only to the Sabbath of rest, and I settle to my heap by the white gate.Soon I hear the distant stamp of horsehoofs, heralding the grind and roll of the wheels which reaches me later - a heavy flour-waggon with a team of four great gentle horses, gay with brass trappings and scarlet ear-caps.
