A Story of Long Descent - Page 2

from his own people and
commanded it himself, fighting for his king and country both in and out
of England. He was, moreover, a friend of the king and his counsellor,
and universally esteemed for his virtues and valour; greatly loved by
all his people, especially by the poor and suffering, on account of his
generosity and kindness of heart.

A very glorious record, and by-and-by I believed every word of it.
For after reading the inscription I began to examine the effigy in
marble of the man himself which surmounted the tomb. He was lying
extended full length, six feet and five inches, his head on a low
pillow, his right hand grasping the handle of his drawn sword. The more
I looked at it, both during and after the service, the more convinced I
became that this was no mere conventional figure made by some lapidary
long after the subject's death, but was the work of an inspired artist,
an exact portrait of the man, even to his stature, and that he had
succeeded in giving to the countenance the very expression of the
living Sir Ranulph. And what it expressed was power and authority and,
with it, spirituality. A noble countenance with a fine forehead and
nose, the lower part of the face covered with the beard, and long hair
that fell to the shoulders.

It produced a feeling such as I have whenever I stand before a certain
sixteenth-century portrait in the National Gallery: a sense or an
illusion of being in the presence of a living person with whom I am
engaged in a wordless conversation, and who is revealing his inmost
soul to me. And it is only the work of a genius that can affect you in
that way.

Quitting the church I remembered with satisfaction that my hostess at
the quiet home-like family hotel where I had put up, was an educated
intelligent woman (good-looking, too), and that she would no doubt be
able to tell me something of the old history of the town and
particularly of Sir Ranulph. For this marble man, this knight of
ancient days, had taken possession of me and I could think of nothing
else.

At luncheon we met as in a private house at our table with our nice
hostess at the head, and beside her three or four guests staying in the
house; a few day visitors to the town came in and joined us. Next to me
I had a young New Zealand officer whose story I had heard with painful
interest the previous evening. Like so many of the New Zealanders I had
met before, he was a splendid young fellow; but he had been terribly
gassed at the front and had been told by the doctors that he would not
be fit to go back even if the war lasted another year, and we were then
well through the third. The way the poison in his lungs affected him
was curious. He had his bad periods when for a fortnight or