[Gutenberg 26241] • Antony Gray,—Gardener

Excerpt from Antony Gray, Gardener

March had come in like a lion, raging, turbulent. Throughout the day the wind had tom spitefully at the yet bare branches of the great elms in the park; it had rushed in insensate fury round the walls of the big grey house; it had driven the rain lashing against the windows. It had sent the few remaining leaves of the old year scudding up the drive; it had littered the lawns with fragments of broken twigs; it had beaten yellow and purple crocuses prostrate to the brown earth.

Against the distant rocky coast the sea had boomed like the muffled thunder of guns; it had flung itself upon the beach, dragging the stones back with it in each receding wave, their grinding adding to the crash of the waters. Nature had been in her wildest mood, a thing of mad fury.

With sundown a calm had fallen. The wind, tired of its onslaught, had sunk suddenly to rest.