Samuel Laing - "Report of the Railway Department of the Board of Trade on the"

Isabel Meredith - "A Girl Among the Anarchists"

James Jennings - "The Dialect of the West of England Particularly Somersetshire"

William Hayley - "Ballads"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

The Forest Lovers

M >> Maurice Hewlett >> The Forest Lovers




However, there was nobody to fight. North Morgraunt was pretty
constantly patrolled by the Countess's riders at this time. A few
grimy colliers; some chair-turners amid their huts and white chips on
the edge of a hidden hamlet; drovers with forest ponies going for
Waisford or Market Basing; the hospitality and interminable devotions
of a hermit by a mossy crucifix on Two Manors Waste; one night alone
in a ruined chapel on the top of a down:--of such were the encounters
and events of his journey. He was no Don Quixote to make desperadoes
or feats of endurance out of such gear; on the contrary, he
persistently enjoyed himself. Sour beer wetted his lips dry with
talking; leaves made a capital bed; the hermit, in the intervals of
his prayers, remembered his own fighting days in the Markstake, and
knew what was done to make Maximilian the Second safely king.
Everything was as it should be.

On the third day he fell in with a troop of horse, whose spears
carried the red saltire of the house of Forz on their banneroles.
Since they were bound as he was for the Castle, he rode in their
company, and in due course saw before him on a height among dark pines
the towers of High March, with the flag of the Lady Paramount afloat
on the breeze. It was on a dusty afternoon of October and in a whirl
of flying leaves, that he rode up to the great gate of the outer
bailey, and blew a blast on the horn which hung there, that they might
let down the bridge.

When the Countess Isabel heard who and of what condition her visitor
was she made him very welcome. The Forz and the Gais were of the same
country and of nearly the same degree in it. She had been a Forz
before she married, and she counted herself so still, for the earldom
of Hauterive was hers in her own right; and though she was Earl
Roger's widow (and thus a double Countess Dowager) she could not but
remember it. So she did Prosper every honour of hospitality: she sent
some of her ladies to disarm him and lead him to the bath; she sent
him soft clothing to do on when he was ready for it; in a word, put
him at his ease. When he came into the hall it was the same thing she
got up from her chair of estate and walked down to meet him, while all
the company made a lane for the pair of them. Prosper would have knelt
to kiss her hand had she let him, but instead she gave it frankly into
his own.

"You are the son of my father's friend, Sir Prosper," she said, "and
shall never kneel to me."

"My lady," said he, "I shall try to deserve your gracious welcome. My
father, rest his soul, is dead, as you may have heard."

"Alas, yes," the Countess replied, "I know it, and grieve for you and
your brothers. Of my Lord Malise I have also heard something."

"Nothing good, I'll swear," interjected Prosper to himself.

The Countess went on--

"Well, Sir Prosper, you stand as I stand, alone in the world. It would
seem we had need of each other."

Prosper bowed, feeling the need of nobody for his part. Remember he
was three-and-twenty to the Countess's thirty-five; and she ten years
a widow. She did not notice his silence, but went on, glowing with her
thoughts.

"We should be brother and sister for the sake of our two fathers," she
said with a gentle blush.

"I never felt to want a sister till now," cried Master Prosper, making
another bow. So it was understood between them that theirs was to be a
nearer relationship than host and guest.

The Countess Isabel--or to give her her due, Isabel, Countess of
Hauterive, Countess Dowager of March and Bellesme, Lady of Morgraunt--
was still a beautiful woman, tall, rather slim, pale, and of a
thoughtful cast of the face. She had a very noble forehead, level,
broad, and white; her eyes beneath arched brows were grey--cold grey,
not so full nor so dark as Isoult's, nor so blue in the whites, but
keener. They were apt to take a chill tinge when she was rather
Countess of Hauterive than that Isabel de Forz who had loved and lost
Fulk de Breaute. She never forgot him, and for his sake wore nothing
but silk of black and white; but she did not forget herself either;
within walls you never saw her without a thin gold circlet on her
head. Even at Mass she, would have no other covering. She said it was
enough for the Countess of Hauterive, whom Saint Paul probably had not
in his mind when he wrote his epistle. Her hair was a glory, shining
and very abundant, but brown not black. Isoult, you will perceive, was
a warmer, tenderer copy of her mother, owing something to Fulk.
Isoult, moreover, had not been born a countess. Both were
inaccessible, the daughter from the timidity of a wild thing, the
mother from the rarity of her air. Being what she was, twice a widow,
bereft of her only child, and burdened with cares which she was much
too proud to give over, she never had fair judgment she was considered
hard where she was merely lonely. Her greatness made her remote, and
her only comforter the worst in the world--herself. Her lips drooped a
little at the corners; this gave her a wistful look at times. At other
times she looked almost cruel, because of a trick she had of going
with them pressed together. As a matter of fact she was shy as well as
proud, and fed on her own sorrows from lack of the power to declare
them abroad. It was very seldom she took a liking for any stranger;
doubtful if Prosper's lineage had won her to open to him as she had
done. His face was more answerable; that blunt candour of his, the
inquiring blue eyes, the eager throw-back of the head as he walked,
above all the friendly smile he had for a world where everything and
everybody seemed new and delightful and specially designed for his
entertainment--this was what unlocked the Countess's darkened treasury
of thought.

Once loosed she never drew back. Brother and sister they were to be.
She made him hand her in to supper; he must sit at her right hand; her
own cup-bearer should fill his wine-cup, her own Sewer taste all his
meats. At the end of supper she sent for a great cup filled with wine;
it needed both her hands. She held it up before she drank to him,
saying, "Let there be love and amity between me and thee." The terms
of this aspiration astonished him; he accepted honours easily, for he
was used to observances at Starning; but to be thee'd and thou'd by
this lady! As he stood there laughing and blushing like a boy she made
him drink from the cup to the same wish and in the same terms. When
once your frozen soul opens to the thaw all the sluices are away,
truly. Prosper went to bed that night very well content with his
reception. He saw his schemes ripening fast on such a sunny wall as
this. His head was rather full, and of more than the fumes of wine;
consequently in saying his prayers he did not remember Isoult at all.
Yet hers had been sped out of Gracedieu Minster long before, and to
the same gods. Only she had had Saint Isidore in addition; and she had
had Prosper. Hers probably went nearer the mark. Until you have made a
beloved of your saint or a saint of your beloved--it matters not
greatly which--you will get little comfort out of your prayers.

It was, however, heedlessness rather than design which brought it
about, that as the days at High March succeeded each other Prosper did
not tell the Countess either of his adventure or of his summary method
of achieving it. Design was there: he did not see his way to involving
the Abbot, who was, he knew, a dependant of his hostess, and yet could
not begin the story elsewhere than at the beginning. Something, too,
kept the misfortunes of his wife from his tongue--an honourable
something, not his own pride of race. But he, in fact, forgot her. The
days were very pleasant. He hunted the hare, the deer, the wolf, the
bear. He hunted what he liked best of all to hunt, the man; and he got
the honour which only comes from successful hunting in that sort-the
devout admiration of those he led. So soon as it was found out where
his tastes and capacities lay he had as much of this work as he chose.
High March was on the northern borders of the Countess's country; not
far off was the Markstake, stormy, debatable land, plashy with blood.
There were raids, there were hornings and burnings, lifting of cattle
and ravishment of women, to be prevented or paid for. Prosper saw
service. The High March men had never had a leader quite like him-so
young, so light and fierce, so merry in fight. Isoult might eat her
heart out with love; Prosper had the love of his riders, for by this
they were his to a man.

There were other influences at work, more subtle and every bit as
rapacious. There were the long hours in the hall by the leaping light
of the fire and the torches, feasts to be eaten, songs to sing,
dances, revels, and such like. Prosper was a cheerful, very sociable
youth. He had the manners of his father and the light-hearted
impertinence of a hundred ancestors, all rulers of men and women. He
made love to no one, and laughed at what he got of it for nothing--
which was plenty. There were shaded hours in the Countess's chamber,
where the songs were softer and the pauses of the songs softer still;
morning hours in the grassy alleys between the yew hedges; hours in
the south walk in an air thick with the languors of warm earth and
garden flowers; intimate rides in the pine wood; the wild freedom of
hawking in the open downs; the grass paths; Yule; the music, the hopes
of youth, the sweet familiarity, the shared books, the timid
encroachments and gentle restraints, half-entreaties, half-denials:--
no young man can resist these things unless he thinks of them
suspectingly (as Prosper never did), and no woman wishes to resist
them. If Prosper found a sister, Isabel began to find more than a
brother. She grew younger as he grew older. They were more than likely
to meet half way.




CHAPTER XIV

A RECORDER


In these delicate times of crisis Isoult found an advocate, a
recorder, if you will be ruled by me. It was none too soon, for the
brother and sister of High March had reached that pretty stage of
intimacy when long silences are an embarrassment, and embarrassments
compact equally of pleasure and pain. As far as the lady was concerned
the pleasure predominated; the pain was reduced to sweet confusion,
the air made tremulous with promise. I do not say that for Prosper the
relationship did more than put him at his ease--but that is a good
deal. Say the Countess was a fire and High March an armchair. Prosper
had settled himself to stretch his legs and drowse. Poor Isoult was
the wailing wind in the chimney--a sound which could but add to his
comfortable well-being. It needs more than a whimper to tempt a man to
be cold in your company. The recorder was timely.

Prosper and his Countess were hawking in the fields beyond the forest,
and the sport had been bad. They had, in fact, their birds jessed and
hooded and were turning for home, when Prosper saw some fields away a
white bird--gull he thought--flying low. He sprang his tercel-gentle;
the same moment the Countess saw the quarry and flew hers. Both hawks
found at first cast; the white bird flew towards the falconers,
circling the field in which they stood, with its enemies glancing
about it. It gradually closed in, circling still round them and round,
till at last it was so near and so low as almost to be in reach of
Prosper's hand. He saw that it was not a gull, but a pigeon, and
started on a reminiscence. Just then one of the towering falcons
stooped and engaged. There was a wild scurry of wings; then the other
bird dropt. The Countess cheered the hawks: Prosper saw only the white
bird with a wound in her breast. Then as the quarry began to scream he
remembered everything, and to the dismay of the lady leapt off his
horse, ran to the struggling birds, and cuffed them off with all his
might. He succeeded. The wounded bird fluttered, half flying, half
hopping, across the grass, finally rose painfully into the air and
soared out of sight. Meantime Prosper, breathless and red in the face,
had hooded and bound the hawks. He brought hers back to the Countess
without a word.

"My dear Prosper," said she, "you will forgive me for asking if you
are mad?"

"I must seem so," he replied. "But I suppose every one has his tender
part which some shaft will reach. Mine is reached when two hawks wound
a white bird in the crop."

He spoke shortly, and still breathed faster than his wont. The
Countess was piqued.

"It seems to me, I confess, inconvenient in a falconer that he should
be nice as to the colour of his quarry. There must be some reason for
this. I will forgive you for making a bad day's sport worse if you
will tell me your story."

Prosper was troubled. He connected his story with Isoult, though he
could hardly say why. He had merely seen a white bird before his
marriage; yet without that sequel the story could have no point. He
did not wish to speak of his marriage, if for no other reason than
that it was much too late to speak of it. The other reasons remained
as valid as ever; but he was bound to confess the superior cogency of
this present one. Meanwhile the Countess clamoured.

"The story, Prosper, the story!" she cried. "I must and will have the
story. I am very sure it is romantic; you are growing red. Oh, it is
certainly romantic; I shall never rest without the story."

Prosper in desperation remembered a hawking mishap of his boyhood, and
clutched at it.

"This is my story," he said. "When I was a boy with my brothers our
father used to take us with him hawking on Marbery Down. There is a
famous heronry in the valley below it whence you may be sure of a
kill; but on the Down itself are great flocks of sheep tended by
shepherds who come from all parts of the country round about and lie
out by their fires. One day--just such a windy morning as this--my
father, my brother Osric, and I were out with our birds, and did
indifferently well, so far as I can remember. I had new falcon with
me--a haggard of the rock which I had mewed and manned myself. It was
the first time I had tried her on the Down, and she began by giving
trouble; then did better, but finally gave more trouble than at first,
as you shall hear. Towards noon I found myself separate from our
company on a great ridge of the Down where it slopes steeply to the
forest, as you know it does in one place. The flocks were out feeding
on the slopes below me, and their herds--three or four boys and girls
--were lying together by a patch of gorse, but one of them stood up
after a while and shaded her eyes to look over the forest. Then I saw
a lonely bird making way for the heronry. I remember it plainly; in
the sun it looked shining white. I flew my haggard out of the hood at
her, sure of a kill. She raked off at a great pace, as this one did
just now; but in mid air she checked suddenly, heeled over, beat up
against the wind, stooped and fell headlong at the shepherds. I could
not tell what had happened; it was as if the girl had been shot. But,
by the Saviour of mankind, this is the truth: I saw the girl who was
standing throw her arms up, I heard her scream; the others scattered.
Then I saw the battling sails of my falcon. She was on the girl. I
spurred my pony and went down the hill headlong to the music of the
girl's screaming. Never before or since have I seen a peregrine engage
at such a quarry as that. She had her with beak and claws below the
left pap. She had ripped up her clothes and drawn blood, sure enough.
The poor child, who looked very starved, was as white as death: I
cannot think she had any blood to spare. As for her screaming, I have
not forgotten it yet--in fact, the bird we struck to-day reminded me
of it and made me act as I did. To cut down my story, I pulled the
hawk off and strangled it, gave the girl what money I had, said what I
could to quiet her, and left her to be patched up by her friends. She
was more frightened than hurt, I fancy. As I told you, I was a boy at
the time; but these things stay by you. It is a fact at least that I
am queasy on the subject of white birds. Before I came to High March,
indeed it was almost my first day in Morgraunt, I saw and rescued a
white bird from two hen-harriers; and now I have been troubled by
another. I seem beset by white birds!"

"It is fortunate you have other hues to choose from," said the
Countess with a smile, "or otherwise you would be no falconer. But
your story is very strange. Have you ever consulted about it?"

"I have said very little about it," Prosper replied, remembering as he
spoke the forest Mass which he had heard, and that he had discoursed
upon this adventure with Alice of the Hermitage.

"The hawk pecked at the girl's heart," said the lady.

"It did not get so far as that, Countess."

"You speak prose, my friend."

"I am no troubadour, but speak what I know."

"The heart means nothing to you, Prosper!"

"The heart? Dear lady, I assure you the girl was not hurt. She is a
young woman by now, probably wife to a clown and mother of half-a-
dozen."

"Prosper, you disappoint me. Let us ride on. I am sick of these
shivering grey fields."

The Countess was vexed, for the life of him he could not tell why. He
made peace at last, but she would not tell him the cause of her
morning's irritation.

That was not the only reminder he had that day--in fact, it was but
the first. In the evening came another.

He was in the Countess's chamber after supper. She was embroidering a
banner, and he had been singing to her as she worked. After his music
the Countess took the lute from him, saying that she would sing. And
so she did, but in a voice so low and constrained that it seemed more
to comfort herself than any other.

Prosper sat by the table idly turning over a roll of blazonry--the
coats of all the knights and gentlemen who had ever been in the
service of High March. It was a roll carefully kept by the pursuivant,
very fine work. He saw that his own was already tricked in its place,
and recognized many more familiar faces. Suddenly he gave a start, and
sat up stiff as a bar. He looked no further, but at the end of the
Countess's song said abruptly--

"Tell me, Countess, whose are these arms?"

She looked at the coat--sable, three wicket-gates argent. "There is a
story about that," she said.

"I beg you to tell it to me," said Prosper; "story for story."

"That is only fair," she laughed, having quite recovered her easy
manner with him. "Come and sit by the fire, and you shall hear it. The
arms," she began, "are those which were assumed by a young knight
after a very bold exploit in my service. He came to me as Salomon de
Born, and I think he was but eighteen--a mere boy."

Prosper, from the heights of his three-and-twenty years, nodded
benignly.

"So much so," said the Countess, "that I fear I must have wounded his
vanity by laughing away what he asked of me. This was no less than to
lead a troop of my men against Renny of Coldscaur, an enemy and
slanderer of mine, but none the less as great a lord as he was rascal.
However, he begged so persistently that I gave in, finding other
things about him--a mystery of his birth and upbringing, a
steadfastness also and gravity far beyond his years--which drew me to
put him to the proof of what he dared. He went, therefore, with a
company of light horse, some fifty men. He was away eight weeks, and
then came back--with but six men, it is true; but youth is prodigal of
life, knowing so little of it."

"Life is given us to spend," quoth Prosper here.

"He came back with six men. But he brought the tongue of Blaise Renny
in a silver cup, and three wicket-gates, which took two men apiece to
carry."

"He had saved just enough men. That was wise of him, and like the king
his namesake," Prosper said, approving of Salomon.

"It was what he said himself", pursued the Countess, "that it was a
fortunate circumstance"

"And how did he win his adventure, and what had the wicket-gates to do
with the business?"

"You shall hear. It seems that Coldscaur, which is in North Marvilion
beyond the Middle Shires, stands on a fretted scarp. It is strongly
defended by art as well as nature, for there are three ravines about
it with a stepped path through each up to the Castle. These were
defended about midway of each by a wicket-gate and a couple of towers.
The gorges are so narrow that there is barely room for a man and horse
to get through; the gates of course correspond."

"Fine defences," said Prosper.

"Very. Well, Salomon de Born with my fifty men seized and occupied a
village at the foot of the scarp one night. In the morning there were
his defences thrown up man-high, and my standard on the church tower.
Renny was furious, and despatched a stronger force than he could
afford to re-take the village. Salomon, counting upon this, had left
two men in it to be killed; with the rest he scaled the scaur and
waited in hiding to see what force Renny took out. He knew to a nicety
the strength of the garrison, saw what there was to see, made his
calculations, and thought he would venture it. He got over the rock,
he and his men, by some means; came down the gorges from the top,
secured the defences, and posted a couple of men at each wicket. With
the rest he surprised the Castle. I believe, indeed, that all the men
in it were killed as well as most of mine. Yet for three or four hours
Coldscaur was in my hands."

"It should have been yours now," said Prosper, "with fifty of your men
once in it."

"My friend, I didn't need Coldscaur. I have castles enough. But it was
necessary to punish Renny."

"And that was done?"

"It was done. Salomon posted his men in the towers by the wicket-
gates, and waited for Renny to return from the village. Luckily for
him it grew dusk, but not dark, before he could be certain by which
gorge Renny himself was coming in. When he had made sure of this he
took all three wickets off their hinges, and sent six men to carry
them home to High March. With the rest he waited for Renny. Finally he
saw him riding up the stepped way, and, as his custom was, far ahead
of his troop. You must know that these people are besotted with pride;
the state they kept (and still keep, I suppose) was more than royal.
No one must ride, walk, or stand within a dozen yards of Renny of
Coldscaur. Salomon had calculated upon it. Well, it was dark before
Renny reached the wicket. Someone (Salomon, no doubt) called for the
word. Renny gave it; but it was his last. Salomon stabbed him at the
same instant and pulled him off his horse out of the way. He sent the
horse clattering up the hill. Renny's men followed it, nothing
doubting. I might have had the better part of my men but for the
subsequent foppery of the youth. He had Renny dead. He had Renny's
tongue. He must needs have a silver dish to put it in, so as to
present it honourably to me. He went to the Castle to get this. He got
it; but he was discovered and pursued, and only he escaped--he and the
six bearers of the wicket-gates. That is my story of the coat in
return for yours of the bird. The hero of it took the name of Salomon
de Montguichet after this performance, and my pursuivant devised him a
blazon, with the legend, _Entra per me_."

"He did very well," said Prosper, "though he should have fought with
Renny, and not stabbed him in the dark. But why did he bring the
wicket-gates?"

"He said that since they had for once been held by honest men, he
could not let them backslide. Moreover, they were in his way, and he
knew not what else to do with them."

"And why did he take the man's tongue?"

"He said that the head must stay tongueless at Coldscaur to warn all
traducers of me. True enough, the man has come to be remembered as
Blaise Sanslang."

"I should have done otherwise," said Prosper.

"What would you have made of it, Prosper?"

"I should have brought the man alive to your feet; I should have
advised you to give him a whipping and let him go."

"That would have been more merciless to Renny, my friend, than what
Salomon de Montguichet did. I have told you that they are the proudest
family in Christendom."

"I never thought of Renny," he answered; "I was thinking of myself in
Salomon's place."

"Montguichet thought of me, Prosper."

"I also was thinking of you, Countess."

Presently he grew keen on his own thoughts again and asked--

"What became of Salomon de Born?"

"I cannot tell you," she replied, "except this, that he took service
under the King of the Romans and went abroad. Of where he is now, or
how he fares, I know nothing."

"I think he is dead," said Prosper.

"What is your reason?"

"I have seen another carrying his arms."

"But it may have been the man himself. A thin man, hatchet-faced, with
hot, large eyes; a pale man, who looked not to have the sinew he
proved to have."

Prosper looked thoughtful, a little puzzled too. "The description is
familiar to me. I may have seen the man. But certainly it was not he
who carried the Montguichet shield."

Suddenly he sprang up with a shout. He stood holding the table, white
and shaky. The Countess ran to him and put her arm on his shoulder:
"Prosper, Prosper, you have frightened me! What is your thought? Are
you ill? I entreat you to tell me, Prosper."

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