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expand2006 (1)
1Author:  Herbert Henry William 1807-1858Requires cookie*
 Title:  The village inn, or, The adventure of Bellechassaigne  
 Published:  2006 
 Subjects:  University of Virginia Library, Modern English collection | UVA-LIB-Text 
 Description: On the western outskirts of a little hamlet, situated on the verge of a great forest, not many miles from Vitry, on the high-road leading from Bar le Due to Paris, there stood in the summer of 1653, a large old-fashioned inn, which has long since yielded, like all things earthly, to the consuming hand of time, but which in its day possessed no limited or narrow reputation. So excellent indeed was its accommodations, so celebrated its cuisine, and so remarkable the courtesy of the aubergist, that the cerf blanc of Lagny la Forêt, was known so well to all who journeyed in that district, that travellers would often turn aside from the direct line of their route in order to enjoy its far-famed hospitality. It was a solitary building of considerable size, situated in a spot of singular and romantic loveliness at the foot of three soft green hills, which sloped down easily on every side except the south, with two small glens between them, each watered by a bright and sparkling rivulet, which meeting at their base, swept off in easy curves through a rich level meadow, and joined a more considerable stream at the distance of a quarter of a mile, or perhaps less, to the southward. The summits of two of these green knolls, for they were indeed little more—those to the north and west, were crowned by the tall trees of the neighboring forest which covered the whole face of the country for miles in that direction, and many scattered oaks and ashes grew straggling down their sides, the outposts as it were and sentinels of the vast verdant host. The third or eastern hill, unlike its neighbors, was cleared almost entirely of wood and very richly cultivated in meadow-land and pastures, divided from each other by lines of thriving fruit-trees, among which wound a narrow sandy road toward the village, lying just out of sight beyond the summit—its tall and lance-like spire standing out clear and sharp against the sky, above the rounded brow. Just in the hollow where the streams blended their bright waters, stood the old inn, a large irregular rambling edifice, with steep projecting gables and latticed windows, no two of them alike; of every shape and size that can be fancied, and a huge oaken porch all overrun with jessamine and woodbine, facing the yellow road. Four or five weeping-willows of vast size grew on the margin of the stream, quite overarching the stone bridge, which spanned it close to the western gable, and bathed the old moss-grown roof with cool and grateful umhrage; while a small strip of garden on either side the door, fenced by a rustic paling and thickly set with sweet-briars and many-colored rose-bushes, completed the attractions of the spot. The stables and out-buildings were all behind the house, concealed from view by the nature of the ground, nor were there any indications that the house itself was one for public entertainment, unless it were an antiquated sign representing the White, Stag whence the inn's name, which swung from a cross-piece morticed into the trunk of one of the great willows, and a long horse-trough supplied with living water by a little aqueduct from a spring in the hill-side, with a stone horseblock by its end.
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