Mushrooms on the Moor   By: Frank Boreham (1871-1959)

MUSHROOMS ON THE MOOR

by

F. W. BOREHAM

Author of 'Mountains in the Mist,' 'The Other Side of the Hill,' 'The Golden Milestone,' 'The Silver Shadow,' 'The Luggage of Life,' 'Faces in the Fire,' etc., etc.

The Abingdon Press New York Cincinnati

First American Edition Printed May, 1919 Reprinted August, 1919; May, 1920; July 1921

CONTENTS

PART I

CHAP.

I. A SLICE OF INFINITY II. READY MADE CLOTHES III. THE HIDDEN GOLD IV. 'SUCH A LOVELY BITE!' V. LANDLORD AND TENANT VI. THE CORNER CUPBOARD VII. WITH THE WOLVES IN THE WILD VIII. DICK SUNSHINE IX. FORTY! X. A WOMAN'S REASON

PART II

I. THE HANDICAP II. GOG AND MAGOG III. MY WARDROBE IV. 'PITY MY SIMPLICITY!' V. TUNING FROM THE BASS VI. A FRUITLESS DEPUTATION VII. TRAMP! TRAMP! TRAMP! VIII. THE FIRST MATE

PART III

CHAP.

I. WHEN THE COWS COME HOME II. MUSHROOMS ON THE MOOR III. ONIONS IV. ON GETTING OVER THINGS V. NAMING THE BABY VI. THE MISTRESS OF THE MARGIN VII. LILY

BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION

I have allowed the Mushrooms on the Moor to throw the glamour of their name over the entire volume because, in some respects, they are the most typical and representative things in it. They express so little but suggest so much! What fun we had, in the days of auld lang syne, when we scoured the dewy fields in search of them! And yet how small a proportion of our enjoyment the mushrooms themselves represented! Our flushed cheeks, our prodigious appetites, and our boisterous merriment told of gains immensely greater than any that our baskets could have held. What a contrast, for example, between mushrooms from the moor on the one hand and mushrooms from the market on the other! What memories of the soft summer mornings; the fresh and fragrant air; the diffused and misty sunshine; the sparkle of the dew on the tall wisps of speargrass; the beaded and shining cobwebs; the scamper, barefooted, across the glittering green! It was part of childhood's wild romance. And, in the sterner days that have followed those tremendous frolics, we have learned that life is full of just such suggestive things. As I glance back upon the years that lie behind me, I find that they have been almost equally divided between two hemispheres. But I have discovered that, under any stars,

There's part o' the sun in an apple; There's part o' the moon in a rose; There's part o' the flaming Pleiades In every leaf that grows.

And I shall reckon this book no failure if some of the ideas that I have tried to suggest are found to point at all steadily to that conclusion.

FRANK W. BOREHAM.

HOBART, TASMANIA, JUNE, 1915.

PART I

I

A SLICE OF INFINITY

I