"What I was going to observe, my dear Madam,"--here the resolute
Clump once more interposed with a bland air--"what I was going to observe when you gave utterance to sentiments which do you so much honour, was that I think you alarm yourself needlessly about our kind friend, and sacrifice your own health too prodigally in her favour."
As we approached the little
clump of verdure I saw the man come from his tent and with hand-shaded eyes peer intently at us.
"I found Numa crouching in that
clump of bushes where the tall grasses grow," and Akut pointed.
The
clump of laurel in which the criminal lay was in the angle of a road which, after, ascending, southward, a steep acclivity to that point, turned sharply to the west, running along the summit for perhaps one hundred yards.
It was while hiding in that
clump of trees that he saw Monsieur and Mademoiselle Stangerson, and then Daddy Jacques, leave the pavilion.
The pines, great and small, grew wide apart; and even between the
clumps of nutmeg and azalea, wide open spaces baked in the hot sunshine.
There were rosy bleeding-hearts and great splendid crimson peonies; white, fragrant narcissi and thorny, sweet Scotch roses; pink and blue and white columbines and lilac-tinted Bouncing Bets;
clumps of southernwood and ribbon grass and mint; purple Adam-and-Eve, daffodils, and masses of sweet clover white with its delicate, fragrant, feathery sprays; scarlet lightning that shot its fiery lances over prim white musk-flowers; a garden it was where sunshine lingered and bees hummed, and winds, beguiled into loitering, purred and rustled.
They had left their mules tethered some distance back, in a sheltering
clump of trees, and they hoped the animals would be safe.
In that singular light every little tree and shock of wheat, every sunflower stalk and
clump of snow-on-the-mountain, drew itself up high and pointed; the very clods and furrows in the fields seemed to stand up sharply.
If forced to fight in a salt-marsh, you should have water and grass near you, and get your back to a
clump of trees.
Low and heavy clouds betokened an approaching storm, and we hurried on to gain a covert in a
clump of thick bushes, which appeared to terminate the long ascent.
After some miles they came in view of the
clump of trees beyond which the village of Marlott stood.