cottages

And there were cottages which had come out into the festive air and danced together, then paused for breath and had stood still in amazement ever since; or so it seemed.
The sweet perfume of may and maybe jasmine wafted all about and the fragrant wood-smoke from many chimneys mingled there, the trees their nodding tops bowed, and curtsied in endless courtesy and there became almost a fairy glade.
The stranger stood entranced, the soft still silent scented scene played before his gaze; and far, far beyond, the whistle of a shepherd to his dog was all the sound there was, except
perhaps the whisper of the river of the breeze in the topmost topmast-tall green leaves.
He carefully walked forth into the midst of all where morning mist had kissed the dewy ground but had made no longer stay.
A small child in a doorway appeared, stared at him for a long moment then ran inside, a moment later a woman's face came to a window, she looked and smiled, or so it seemed, and
waved to him in greeting.
In an upstairs window a sad and ancient face he saw, which looked then turned away,
turned and looked away.
To his right from a small chimney a sudden dragon's-breath of smoke and sooty flame burst forth from where a blacksmith's day was now begun; to his left an old cobbler in his porch and
shaded from the sun tapped and stitched his heap of dusty tasks away.
And to crown it all, from nowhere came a fat fair maid with a basket heaped high with damp and dazzling wash, she hanged and pegged her way along a line that drooped the more
she worked; yet in a final glorious moment with her long forked prop she flung the mass aloft into the singing air where shirt and smock danced with gaiety and pride alongside petticoat
and sheet so that the sun sure gleamed all the more-
or so it seemed.