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Chapter II |
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NORTHIAM
In the story of " Gloriana," in " Rewards and Fairies," there is a strong Kipling personality present in every line. His aesthetic appreciation of what I call " sacramental " things—landscape and the fourth dimension of the English countryside which is charged with most ancient magic— is so subtly blended with his knowledge of English history that the picture he gives us of Queen Bess at a banquet beneath Brickwall Oak is quite remarkably vivid and concrete. He gives you not merely one aspect of Queen Elizabeth, but the impression her memory produces on his whole personality. Kipling makes Puck introduce Queen Bess to Dan and Una, and she tells with that terrible gift of familiarity, which enabled her to retain the immense hold she had on the affection of her subjects, how two young sprigs of the best blood of Sussex quarrelled over which of the two she had picked out for her special favour. In the end they go to " certain death by certain shame
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