Up and down these lanes
they walk, Durdles discoursing of the 'old uns' he yet counts on
disinterring, and slapping a wall, in which he considers 'a whole
family on 'em' to be stoned and earthed up, just as if he were a
familiar friend of the family. The taciturnity of Durdles is for
the time overcome by Mr. Jasper's wicker bottle, which circulates
freely;--in the sense, that is to say, that its contents enter
freely into Mr. Durdles's circulation, while Mr. Jasper only rinses
his mouth once, and casts forth the rinsing.
They are to ascend the great Tower. On the steps by which they
rise to the Cathedral, Durdles pauses for new store of breath. The
steps are very dark, but out of the darkness they can see the lanes
of light they have traversed. Durdles seats himself upon a step.
Mr. Jasper seats himself upon another. The odour from the wicker
bottle (which has somehow passed into Durdles's keeping) soon
intimates that the cork has been taken out; but this is not
ascertainable through the sense of sight, since neither can descry
the other. And yet, in talking, they turn to one another, as
though their faces could commune together.
'This is good stuff, Mister Jarsper!'
'It is very good stuff, I hope.--I bought it on purpose.'
'They don't show, you see, the old uns don't, Mister Jarsper!'
'It would be a more confused world than it is, if they could.'
'Well, it WOULD lead towards a mixing of things,' Durdles
acquiesces: pausing on the remark, as if the idea of ghosts had
not previously presented itself to him in a merely inconvenient
light, domestically or chronologically.
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