Under the Apple Boughs Quotes

“Sweetened by a tower of Norman stone, the bells of Lent, carrying on their ancient sides the names of saints and merchants, squires and parsons, rhymes and prayers, rang out over the village, their peal of eight tumbling in an avalanche of iron down and across the valley, the land from hillside to hillside drowned and ringing.”
― Peter Maughan, Under the Apple Boughs:

“A week before, snow had been forecast. Snow was gathering in the north and would, by the weekend, come down on the West County like a fist. Extra food and fuel were ordered, sheep herded lower down the valley, and the bird table in the postmistress's garden was made up like the spare room. But the threatened snow had not arrived. And that evening in the village pub, the Pike, the talk had scornfully left the present to dig up winters past, their iron ghosts clanking and blowing now around the small, log-warmed bar.”
― Peter Maughan, Under the Apple Boughs:

“And then, as if a challenge, said: ''When I were a lad, father and mother used to tell us that on Christmas Eve, at midnight, the cattle would kneel in their stalls.''
He aimed a sudden forefinger at me. ''Now that were old Christmas Eve, mind. January the fifth. And on Christmas Day, January the sixth, the white thorn, the Holy Thorn of Glastonbury, flowered. The thorn planted by the man who buried Christ. Joseph of Arimathea. Come here to bring the good news. Yes!”
― Peter Maughan, Under the Apple Boughs: