The Salamanca Corpus: Yeoman Fleetwood (1900 ... - Gredos

The Salamanca Corpus: Yeoman Fleetwood (1900)
To these, whom death again did wed.
This grave's their second marriage-bed.
For though the hand of Fate could force
‘Twixt soul and body a divorce,
It could not sunder man and wife,
'Cause they both lived but one life. — Crashaw.
Though the anxiety of her husband and son did not decrease as time went by, there was
no material change in Mrs. Fleetwood's condition for more than three years; but when
Simon returned definitely to the Farm, after taking his degree, he was conscious that the
disease so long held in check had made subtle ravages. After the first glance at his
mother's face his eyes instinctively sought his father's, and he understood without need
of words that the time now remaining to her could not be long.
She herself, however, seemed to be in good spirits, and received Simon with real
affection and pleasure. He had brought her, as a present on this his homecoming, two
large china jars which he had picked up in a curiosity shop at Oxford, and the pattern of
which pretty nearly matched some china already in her possession. "They will just do
for pot-pourri," she cried. "I have not made any this year, and you know there is a
special receipt in my family. All our friends used to beg for it. I am impatient to begin
to make it while the roses last. Dear me, I want so many things for it —I must have
benzoin, storax, cassia-buds — and then
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cardamom and vanilla. You have some oil of jasmin and attar of roses, have you not,
Sister Belinda? I could begin to-morrow if I only had the spices."
"Do not let that trouble you, my love," cried her husband," for I have business in
Liverpool to-morrow, and will bring them back."
He was gone early on the following morning, which proved so bright and sunny that
Mrs. Fleetwood's satisfaction was complete.
"One could not have better weather for pot-pourri making," she exclaimed, almost with
the glee of a child. "You must know, Simon, that the roses should be gathered as dry as