A kind of green gloom pervaded the watery
chasm, caused by the thick shade of trees overspreading from the
opposite bank. It was a spot that a painter might have chosen for "The
Kelpie's Home."
The cottage door was open; and I guessed by the silence inside that
old "Jone" had not reached home. His wife, Nanny, was a hale and
cheerful woman, with a fastidious love of cleanliness, and order, and
quietness, too, for she was more than seventy years of age. I found her
knitting, and slowly swaying her portly form to and fro in a shiny
old-fashioned chair, by the fireside. The carved oak clock-case in the
corner was as bright as a mirror; and the solemn, authoritative ticking
of the ancient time-marker was the loudest sound in the house. But the
softened roar of the stream outside filled all the place, steeping the
senses in a drowsy spell. At the end of a long table under the front
window, sat Nanny's granddaughter, a rosy, round-faced lass, about
twelve years old. She was turning over the pictures in a well-thumbed
copy of "Culpepper's Herbal." She smiled, and shut the book, but seemed
unable to speak; as if the poppied enchantment that wrapt the spot had
subdued her young spirit to a silence which she could not break.
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