"Richard Jefferies - After London" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jefferies Richard)

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After London
Richard Jefferies Part I. The Relapse into Barbarism Chapter I. The Great Forest Chapter
II. Wild Animals Chapter III. Men of the Woods Chapter IV. The Invaders Chapter V. The Lake Part
II. Wild England Chapter I. Sir Felix Chapter II. The House of Aquila Chapter III. The Stockade
Chapter IV. The Canoe Chapter V. Baron Aquila Chapter VI. The Forest Track Chapter VII. The
Forest Track Continued Chapter VIII. Thyma Castle Chapter IX. Superstitions Chapter X. The Feast
Chapter XI. Aurora Chapter XII. Night in the Forest Chapter XIII. Sailing Away Chapter XIV. The
Straits Chapter XV. Sailing Onwards Chapter XVI. The City Chapter XVII. The Camp Chapter XVIII.
The King's Levy Chapter XIX. Fighting Chapter XX. In Danger Chapter XXI. A Voyage Chapter
XXII. Discoveries Chapter XXIII. Strange Things Chapter XXIV. Fiery Vapours Chapter XXV. The
Shepherds Chapter XXVI. Bow and Arrow Chapter XXVII. Surprised Chapter XXVIII. For Aurora

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Part I. The Relapse into Barbarism


CHAPTER I. The Great Forest

The old men say their fathers told them that soon after the fields were left to themselves a change began
to be visible. It became green everywhere in the first spring, after London ended, so that all the country
looked alike.

The meadows were green, and so was the rising wheat which had been sown, but which neither had nor
would receive any further care. Such arable fields as had not been sown, but where the last stubble had
been ploughed up, were overrun with couch-grass, and where the short stubble had not bee ploughed,
the weeds hid it. So that there was no place which was not more or less green; the footpaths were the
greenest of all, for such is the nature of grass where it has once been trodden on, and by-and-by, as the
summer came on, the former roads were thinly covered with the grass that had spread out from the
margin.

In the autumn, as the meadows were not mown, the grass withered as it stood, falling this way and that,
as the wind had blown it; the seeds dropped, and the bennets became a greyish-white, or, where the
docks and sorrel were thick, a brownish-red. The wheat, after it had ripened, there being no one to reap
it, also remained standing, and was eaten by clouds of sparrows, rooks, and pigeons, which flocked to it
and were undisturbed, feasting at their pleasure. As the winter came on, the crops were beaten down by
the storms, soaked with rain, and trodden upon by herds of animals.

Next summer the prostrate straw of the preceding year was concealed by the young green wheat and
barley that sprang up from the grain sown by dropping from the ears, and by quantities of docks, thistles,
oxeye daisies, and similar plants. This matted mass grew up through the bleached straw. Charlock, too,
hid the rotting roots in the fields under a blaze of yellow flower. The young spring meadow-grass could
scarcely push its way up through the long dead grass and bennets of the year previous, but docks and
thistles, sorrel, wild carrots, and nettles, found no such difficulty.