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diff --git a/20528-8.txt b/20528-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1053ea6 --- /dev/null +++ b/20528-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3819 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Round About a Great Estate, by Richard Jefferies + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Round About a Great Estate + +Author: Richard Jefferies + +Release Date: February 6, 2007 [EBook #20528] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROUND ABOUT A GREAT ESTATE *** + + + + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +ROUND ABOUT A GREAT ESTATE + + + +BY + +RICHARD JEFFERIES + + +AUTHOR OF + +'THE GAMEKEEPER AT HOME' +'WILD LIFE IN A SOUTHERN COUNTY' +'THE AMATEUR POACHER' +'GREEN FERNE FARM' +'HODGE AND HIS MASTERS' + + + +LONDON +SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE +1880 + +[_All rights reserved_] + + + + +PREFACE. + + +There is an old story which in respect of a modern application may +bear re-telling. Once upon a time in a lonely 'coombe-bottom' of the +Downs, where there was neither church, chapel, nor public building of +any kind, there lived a cottage-girl who had never seen anything of +civilisation. A friend, however, having gone out to service in a +market-town some few miles distant, she one day walked in to see her, +and was shown the wonders of the place, the railway, the post-office, +the hotels, and so forth. In the evening the friend accompanied her a +short way on the return journey, and as they went out of the town, +they passed the church. Looking suddenly up at the tower, the visitor +exclaimed, 'Lard-a-mussy! you've got another moon here. Yourn have got +figures all round un!' In her excitement, and prepared to see marvels, +she had mistaken the large dial of the church clock for a moon of a +different kind to the one which shone upon her native home. This old +tale, familiar to country folk as an illustration of simplicity, has +to-day a wider meaning. Until recent years the population dwelling in +villages and hamlets, and even in little rural towns, saw indeed the +sun by day and the moon by night, and learned the traditions and +customs of their forefathers, such as had been handed down for +generations. But now a new illumination has fallen upon these far-away +places. The cottager is no longer ignorant, and his child is well +grounded in rudimentary education, reads and writes with facility, and +is not without knowledge of the higher sort. Thus there is now another +moon with the figures of education all round it. In this book some +notes have been made of the former state of things before it passes +away entirely. But I would not have it therefore thought that I wish +it to continue or return. My sympathies and hopes are with the light +of the future, only I should like it to come from nature. The clock +should be read by the sunshine, not the sun timed by the clock. The +latter is indeed impossible, for though all the clocks in the world +should declare the hour of dawn to be midnight, the sun will presently +rise just the same. + +RICHARD JEFFERIES. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I. OKEBOURNE CHACE. FELLING TREES. 1 + + II. CICELY. THE BROOK. 20 + + III. A PACK OF STOATS. BIRDS. 42 + + IV. HAMLET FOLK. 61 + + V. WIND-ANEMONES. THE FISHPOND. 82 + + VI. A FARMER OF THE OLDEN TIMES. 103 + + VII. THE CUCKOO-FIELDS. 125 + +VIII. CICELY'S DAIRY. HILARY'S TALK. 144 + + IX. THE WATER-MILL. FIELD NAMES. 163 + + X. THE COOMBE-BOTTOM. CONCLUSION. 183 + + + + +ROUND ABOUT A GREAT ESTATE. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +OKEBOURNE CHACE. FELLING TREES. + + +The great house at Okebourne Chace stands in the midst of the park, +and from the southern windows no dwellings are visible. Near at hand +the trees appear isolated, but further away insensibly gather +together, and above them rises the distant Down crowned with four +tumuli. Among several private paths which traverse the park there is +one that, passing through a belt of ash wood, enters the meadows. +Sometimes following the hedges and sometimes crossing the angles, this +path finally ends, after about a mile, in the garden surrounding a +large thatched farmhouse. In the maps of the parish it has probably +another name, but from being so long inhabited by the Lucketts it is +always spoken of as Lucketts' Place. + +The house itself and ninety acres of grass land have been their +freehold for many generations; in fact, although there is no actual +deed of entail, the property is as strictly preserved in the family +and descends from heir to heir as regularly as the great estate and +mansion adjacent. Old Hilary Luckett--though familiarly called 'old,' +he is physically in the prime of life--is probably about the most +independent man in the county. Yet he is on terms of more than +goodwill with the great house, and rents one of the largest farms on +the estate, somewhere between six and seven hundred acres. He has the +right of shooting, and in the course of years privilege after +privilege has been granted, till Hilary is now as free of the warren +as the owner of the charter himself. If you should be visiting +Okebourne Chace, and any question should arise whether of horses, dog, +or gun, you are sure to be referred to Hilary. Hilary knows all about +it: he is the authority thereabout on all matters concerning game. Is +it proposed to plant fresh covers? Hilary's opinion is asked. Is it +proposed to thin out some of the older trees; what does Hilary say? + +It is a fact that people really believe no part of a partridge is ever +taken away after being set before him. Neither bones nor sinews +remain: so fond is he of the brown bird. Having eaten the breast, and +the juicy leg and the delicate wing, he next proceeds to suck the +bones; for game to be thoroughly enjoyed should be eaten like a +mince-pie, in the fingers. There is always one bone with a sweeter +flavour than the rest, just at the joint or fracture: it varies in +every bird according to the chance of the cooking, but, having +discovered it, put it aside for further and more strict attention. +Presently he begins to grind up the bones in his strong teeth, +commencing with the smallest. His teeth are not now so powerful as +when in younger days he used to lift a sack of wheat with them, or the +full milking-bucket up to the level of the copper in the dairy. Still +they gradually reduce the slender skeleton. The feat is not so +difficult if the bird has been well hung. + +He has the right to shoot, and need take no precautions. But, in fact, +a farmer, whether he has liberty or not, can usually amuse himself +occasionally in that way. If his labourer sees him quietly slipping up +beside the hedge with his double-barrel towards the copse in the +corner where a pheasant has been heard several times lately, the +labourer watches him with delight, and says nothing. Should anyone in +authority ask where that gun went off, the labourer 'thenks it wur th' +birdkippur up in th' Dree Vurlong, you.' Presently the pheasant hangs +in the farmer's cellar, his long tail sweeping the top of the XXX +cask; and the 'servant-wench,' who is in and out all day, also says +nothing. Nor can anything exceed the care with which she disposes of +the feathers when she picks the bird. There is a thorough sympathy +between master and man so far. Hilary himself, with all that great +estate to sport over, cannot at times refrain from stepping across the +boundary. His landlord once, it is whispered, was out with Hilary +shooting, and they became so absent-minded while discussing some +interesting subject as to wander several fields beyond the property +before they discovered their mistake. + +At Lucketts' Place the favourite partridge always comes up for supper: +a pleasant meal that nowadays can rarely be had out of a farmhouse. +Then the bright light from the burning log outshines the lamp, and +glances rosy on the silver tankard standing under a glass shade on a +bracket against the wall. Hilary's father won it near half a century +since in some heats that were run on the Downs on the old racecourse, +before it was ploughed up. For the wicked turnip is responsible for +the destruction of old England; far more so than the steam-engine. + +Waste lands all glorious with golden blossoming furze, with purple +foxglove, or curious orchis hiding in stray corners; wild moor-like +lands, beautiful with heaths and honey-bottle; grand stretches of +sloping downs where the hares hid in the grass, and where all the +horses in the kingdom might gallop at their will; these have been +overthrown with the plough because of the turnip. As the root crops +came in, the rage began for thinning the hedges and grubbing the +double mounds and killing the young timber, besides putting in the +drains and driving away the wild-ducks. The wicked turnip put diamonds +on the fingers of the farmer's wife, and presently raised his rent. +But now some of the land is getting 'turnip-sick,' the roots come +stringy and small and useless, so that many let it 'vall down.' + +After the last crop it is left alone, the couch grows, the docks +spread out from the hedges, every species of weed starts up, till +by-and-by the ploughed land becomes green and is called pasture. This +is a process going on at the present moment, and to which owners of +land should see without delay. Hilary has been looked on somewhat +coldly by other tenants for openly calling the lord of the manor's +attention to it. He sturdily maintains that arable land if laid down +for pasture should be laid down properly--a thing that requires labour +and expenditure just the same as other farming operations. So the +silver tankard, won when 'cups' were not so common as now, is a +memorial of the old times before the plough turned up the sweet turf +of the racecourse. + +Hilary does not bet beyond the modest 'fiver' which a man would be +thought unsociable if he did not risk on the horse that carries the +country's colours. But he is very 'thick' with the racing-people on +the Downs, and supplies the stable with oats, which is, I believe, not +an unprofitable commission. The historical anecdote of the Roman +emperor who fed his horse on gilded oats reads a little strange when +we first come across it in youth. But many a race-horse owner has +found reason since to doubt if it be so wonderful, as his own stud--to +judge by the cost--must live on golden fodder. Now, before I found +this out about the stable, it happened one spring day that I met +Hilary in the fields, and listened to a long tirade which he delivered +against 'wuts.' + +The wheat was then showing a beautiful flag, the despised oats were +coming out in jag, and the black knots on the delicate barley straw +were beginning to be topped with the hail. The flag is the long narrow +green leaf of the wheat; in jag means the spray-like drooping awn of +the oat; and the hail is the beard of the barley, which when it is +white and brittle in harvest-time gets down the back of the neck, +irritating the skin of those who work among it. According to Hilary, +oats do not flourish on rich land; and when he was young (and +everything was then done right) a farmer who grew oats was looked upon +with contempt, as they were thought only fit for the poorest soil, and +a crop that therefore denoted poverty. But nowadays, thundered Hilary +in scorn, all farmers grow oats, and, indeed, anything in preference +to wheat. + +Afterwards, at the Derby that year, methought I saw Hilary as I passed +the sign of the 'Carrion Crow:' the dead bird dangles from the top of +a tall pole stuck in the sward beside a booth. I lost him in the crowd +then. But later on in autumn, while rambling round the Chace, there +came on a 'skit' of rain, and I made for one of his barns for shelter. +There was Hilary in the barn with his men, as busy as they could well +be, winnowing oats. It seemed to me that especial care was being +taken, and on asking questions, to which the men silently replied with +a grin, Hilary presently blurted out that the dust had to be carefully +removed, because the grain was for the racing-stable. The dainty +creatures up there must have food free from dust, which makes them too +thirsty. The hay supplied, for the same reason, had to be shaken +before being used. No oats would do under 40 lb. the bushel, and the +heavier the better. + +Luckett was a man whom every one knew to be 'square;' but, if the talk +of the country-side is to be believed, the farmers who have much to do +with the stables do not always come off successful. They sometimes +become too sharp, and fancy themselves cleverer than a class of men +who, if their stature be not great, are probably the keenest of wit. +The farmer who obliges them is invariably repaid with lucrative +'tips;' but if he betrays those 'tips' may possibly find his +information in turn untrustworthy, and have to sell by auction, and +depart to Texas. Luckett avoids such pitfalls by the simple policy of +'squareness,' which is, perhaps, the wisest of all. When the 'skit' +blew past he took his gun from the corner and stepped over the hatch, +and came down the path with me, grumbling that all the grain, even +where the crop looked well, had threshed out so light. + +Farming had gone utterly to the dogs of late seasons; he thought he +should give up the land he rented, and live on the ninety acres +freehold. In short, to hear him talk, you would think that he was +conferring a very great favour upon his landlord in consenting to hold +that six or seven hundred acres at a rent which has not been altered +these fifty years at least. But the owner was a very good fellow, and +as Hilary said, 'There it is, you see.' My private opinion is that, +despite the late bad seasons, Hilary has long been doing remarkably +well; and as for his landlord, that he would stand by him shoulder to +shoulder if defence were needed. + +Much as I admired the timber about the Chace, I could not help +sometimes wishing to have a chop at it. The pleasure of felling trees +is never lost. In youth, in manhood--so long as the arm can wield the +axe--the enjoyment is equally keen. As the heavy tool passes over the +shoulder the impetus of the swinging motion lightens the weight, and +something like a thrill passes through the sinews. Why is it so +pleasant to strike? What secret instinct is it that makes the delivery +of a blow with axe or hammer so exhilarating? The wilder frenzy of the +sword--the fury of striking with the keen blade, which overtakes men +even now when they come hand to hand, and which was once the life of +battle--seems to arise from the same feeling. Then, as the sharp edge +of the axe cuts deep through the bark into the wood, there is a second +moment of gratification. The next blow sends a chip spinning aside; +and by-the-bye never stand at the side of a woodman, for a chip may +score your cheek like a slash with a knife. But the shortness of man's +days will not allow him to cut down many trees. In imagination I +sometimes seem to hear the sounds of the axes that have been ringing +in the forests of America for a hundred years, and envy the joy of the +lumbermen as the tall pines toppled to the fall. Of our English trees +there is none so pleasant to chop as the lime; the steel enters into +it so easily. + +In the enclosed portion of the park at Okebourne the boughs of the +trees descended and swept the sward. Nothing but sheep being permitted +to graze there, the trees grew in their natural form, the lower limbs +drooping downwards to the ground. Hedgerow timber is usually +'stripped' up at intervals, and the bushes, too, interfere with the +expansion of the branches; while the boughs of trees standing in the +open fields are nibbled off by cattle. But in that part of the park no +cattle had fed in the memory of man; so that the lower limbs, drooping +by their own weight, came arching to the turf. Each tree thus made a +perfect bower. + +The old woodmen who worked in the Chace told me it used to be said +that elm ought only to be thrown on two days of the year--_i.e._ the +31st of December and the 1st of January. The meaning was that it +should be cut in the very 'dead of the year,' when the sap had +retired, so that the timber might last longer. The old folk took the +greatest trouble to get their timber well seasoned, which is the +reason why the woodwork in old houses has endured so well. Passing +under some elms one June evening, I heard a humming overhead, and +found it was caused by a number of bees and humble-bees busy in the +upper branches at a great height from the ground. They were probably +after the honey-dew. Buttercups do not flourish under trees; in early +summer, where elms or oaks stand in the mowing-grass, there is often a +circle around almost bare of them and merely green, while the rest of +the meadow glistens with the burnished gold of that beautiful flower. + +The oak is properly regarded as a slow-growing tree, but under certain +circumstances a sapling will shoot up quickly to a wonderful height. +When the woodmen cut down a fir plantation in the Chace there was a +young oak among it that overtopped the firs, and yet its diameter was +so small that it looked no larger than a pole; and the supporting +boughs of the firs being now removed it could not uphold itself, but +bent so much from the perpendicular as to appear incapable of +withstanding a gale. The bark of the oak, when stripped and stacked, +requires fine weather to dry it, much the same as hay, so that a wet +season like 1879 is very unfavourable. + +In the open glades of the Chace there were noble clumps of beeches, +and if you walked quietly under them in the still October days you +might hear a slight but clear and distinct sound above you. This was +caused by the teeth of a squirrel nibbling the beech-nuts, and every +now and then down came pieces of husk rustling through the coloured +leaves. Sometimes a nut would fall which he had dropped; and yet, with +the nibbling sound to guide the eye, it was not always easy to +distinguish the little creature. But his tail presently betrayed him +among the foliage, far out on a bough where the nuts grew. The husks, +if undisturbed, remain on all the winter and till the tree is in full +green leaf again; the young nuts are formed about midsummer. + +The black poplars are so much like the aspen as to be easily mistaken, +especially as their leaves rustle in the same way. But the true aspen +has a smooth bark, while that of the black poplar is scored or rough. +Woodmen always call the aspen the 'asp,' dropping the termination. In +the spring the young foliage of the black poplar has a yellow tint. +When they cut down the alder poles by the water and peeled them, the +sap under the bark as it dried turned as red as if stained. The paths +in spring were strewn with the sheaths of the young leaves and buds +pushing forth; showers of such brown sheaths came off the hawthorn +with every breeze. These, with the catkins, form the first fall from +tree and bush. The second is the flower, as the May, and the +horse-chestnut bloom, whose petals cover the ground. The third fall is +that of the leaf, and the fourth the fruit. + +On the Scotch fir the young green cones are formed about the beginning +of June, and then the catkin adjacent to the cone is completely +covered with quantities of pale yellow farina. If handled, it covers +the fingers as though they had been dipped in sulphur-flour; shake the +branch and it flies off, a little cloud of powdery particles. The +scaly bark takes a ruddy tinge, when the sunshine falls upon it, and +would then, I think, be worthy the attention of an artist as much as +the birch bark, whose peculiar mingling of silvery white, orange, and +brown, painters so often endeavour to represent on canvas. There is +something in the Scotch fir, crowned at the top like a palm with its +dark foliage, which, in a way I cannot express or indeed analyse, +suggests to my mind the far-away old world of the geologists. + +In the boughs of the birch a mass of twigs sometimes grows so close +and entangled together as to appear like a large nest from a distance +when the leaves are off. Even as early as December the tomtits attack +the buds, then in their sheaths, of the birch, clinging to the very +extremities of the slender boughs. I once found a young birch growing +on the ledge of a brick bridge, outside the parapet, and some forty or +fifty feet from the ground. It was about four feet high, quite a +sapling, and apparently flourishing, though where the roots could find +soil it was difficult to discover. + +The ash tree is slowly disappearing from many places, and owners of +hedgerow and copse would do well to plant ash, which affords a most +useful wood. Ash poles are plentiful, but ash timber gets scarcer year +by year; for as the present trees are felled there are no young ones +rising up to take their place. Consequently ash is becoming dearer, as +the fishermen find; for many of the pleasure yachts which they let out +in summer are planked with ash, which answers well for boats which are +often high and dry on the beach, though it would not do if always in +the water. These beach-boats have an oak frame, oak stem and +stern-post, beech keel, and are planked with ash. When they require +repairing, the owners find ash planking scarce and dear. + +Trees may be said to change their garments thrice in the season. In +the spring the woods at Okebourne were of the tenderest green, which, +as the summer drew on, lost its delicacy of hue. Then came the second +or 'midsummer shoot,' brightening them with fresh leaves and fresh +green. The second shoot of the oak is reddish: there was one oak in +the Chace which after midsummer thus became ruddy from the highest to +the lowest branch; others did not show the change nearly so much. +Lastly came the brown and yellow autumn tints. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +CICELY. THE BROOK. + + +In the kitchen at Lucketts' Place there was a stool made by sawing off +about six inches of the butt of a small ash tree. The bark remained +on, and it was not smoothed or trimmed in any way. This mere log was +Cicely Luckett's favourite seat as a girl; she was Hilary's only +daughter. The kitchen had perhaps originally been the house, the rest +having been added to it in the course of years as the mode of life +changed and increasing civilisation demanded more convenience and +comfort. The walls were quite four feet thick, and the one small +lattice-window in its deep recess scarcely let in sufficient light, +even on a summer's day, to dispel the gloom, except at one particular +time. + +The little panes, yellow and green, were but just above the ground, +looking out upon the road into the rickyard, so that the birds which +came searching along among the grasses and pieces of wood thrown +carelessly aside against the wall could see into the room. Robins, of +course, came every morning, perching on the sill and peering in with +the head held on one side. Blackbird and thrush came, but always +passed the window itself quickly, though they stayed without fear +within a few inches of it on either hand. + +There was an old oak table in the centre of the room--a table so solid +that young Aaron, the strong labourer, could only move it with +difficulty. There was no ceiling properly speaking, the boards of the +floor above and a thick beam which upheld it being only whitewashed; +and much of that had scaled off. An oaken door led down a few steps +into the cellar, and over both cellar and kitchen there sloped a long +roof, thatched, whose eaves were but just above the ground. + +Now, when there was no one in the kitchen, as in the afternoon, when +even the indoor servants had gone out to help in the hayfield, little +Cicely used to come in here and sit dreaming on the ash log by the +hearth. The rude stool was always placed inside the fireplace, which +was very broad for burning wood, faggots and split pieces of timber. +Bending over the grey ashes, she could see right up the great broad +tunnel of the chimney to the blue sky above, which seemed the more +deeply azure, as it does from the bottom of a well. In the evenings +when she looked up she sometimes saw a star shining above. In the +early mornings of the spring, as she came rushing down to breakfast, +the tiny yellow panes of the window which faced the east were all lit +up and rosy with the rays of the rising sun. + +The beautiful light came through the elms of the rickyard, away from +the ridge of the distant Down, and then for the first hour of the day +the room was aglow. For quite two hundred years every visible sunrise +had shone in at that window more or less, as the season changed and +the sun rose to the north of east. Perhaps it was that sense of +ancient homeliness that caused Cicely, without knowing why, to steal +in there alone to dream, for nowhere else indoors could she have been +so far away from the world of to-day. + +Left much to herself, she roamed along the hedgerow as now and then a +mild day came, soon after the birds had paired, and saw the +arrow-shaped, pointed leaves with black spots rising and unrolling at +the sides of the ditches. Many of these seemed to die away presently +without producing anything, but from some there pushed up a sharply +conical sheath, from which emerged the spadix of the arum with its +frill. Thrusting a stick into the loose earth of the bank, she found +the root, covered with a thick wrinkled skin which peeled easily and +left a white substance like a small potato. Some of the old women who +came into the kitchen used to talk about 'yarbs,' and she was told +that this was poisonous and ought not to be touched--the very reason +why she slipped into the dry ditch and dug it up. But she started with +a sense of guilt as she heard the slow rustle of a snake gliding along +the mound over the dead, dry leaves of last year. + +In August, when the reapers began to call and ask for work, she found +the arum stalks, left alone without leaves, surrounded with berries, +some green, some ripening red. As the berries ripen, the stalk grows +weak and frequently falls prone of its own weight among the grasses. +This noisome fruit of clustering berries, like an ear of maize stained +red, they told her was 'snake's victuals,' and to be avoided; for, +bright as was its colour, it was only fit for a reptile's food. + +She knew, too, where to find the first 'crazy Betties,' whose large +yellow flowers do not wait for the sun, but shine when the March wind +scatters king's ransoms over the fields. These are the marsh +marigolds: there were two places where she gathered them, one beside +the streamlet flowing through the 'Mash,' a meadow which was almost a +water-meadow; and the other inside a withy-bed. She pulled the +'cat's-tails,' as she learned to call the horse-tails, to see the stem +part at the joints; and when the mowing-grass began to grow long, +picked the cuckoo-flowers and nibbled the stalk and leaflets to essay +the cress-like taste. In the garden, which was full of old-fashioned +shrubs and herbs, she watched the bees busy at the sweet-scented +'honey-plant,' and sometimes peered under the sage-bush to look at the +'effets' that hid there. + +By the footpath through the meadows there were now small places where +the mowers had tried their new scythes as they came home, a little +warm with ale perhaps, from the market town. They cut a yard or two of +grass as they went through the fields, just to get the swing of the +scythe and as a hint to the farmer that it was time to begin. With the +first June rose in the hedge the haymaking commenced--the two usually +coincide--and then Cicely fluctuated between the haymakers and the +mowers, now watching one and now the other. One of the haymaking girls +was very proud because she had not lost a single wooden tooth out of +her rake, for it is easy to break or pull them out. In the next field +the mowers, one behind the other in echelon, left each his swathe as +he went. The tall bennets with their purplish anthers, the sorrel, and +the great white 'moon-daisies' fell before them. Cicely would watch +till perhaps the sharp scythe cut a frog, and the poor creature +squealed with the pain. + +Then away along the hedge to the pond in the corner, all green with +'creed,' or duckweed, when one of the boys about the place would come +timidly up to offer a nest of eggs just taken, and if she would speak +to him would tell her about his exploits 'a-nisting,' about the +bombarrel tit--a corruption apparently of nonpareil--and how he had +put the yellow juice of the celandine on his 'wurrut' to cure it. Then +they pulled the plantain leaves, those that grew by the path, to see +which could draw out the longest 'cat-gut;' the sinews, as it were, of +the plant stretching out like the strings of a fiddle. + +In the next meadow the cows had just been turned into fresh grass, and +were lazily rioting in it. They fed in the sunshine with the golden +buttercups up above their knees, literally wading in gold, their horns +as they held their heads low just visible among the flowers. Some that +were standing in the furrows were hidden up to their middles by the +buttercups. Their sleek roan and white hides contrasted with the green +grass and the sheen of the flowers: one stood still, chewing the cud, +her square face expressive of intense content, her beautiful +eye--there is no animal with a more beautiful eye than the +cow--following Cicely's motions. At this time of the year, as they +grazed far from the pens, the herd were milked in the corner of the +field, instead of driving them to the yard. + +One afternoon Cicely came quietly through a gap in the hedge by this +particular corner, thinking to laugh at Aaron's voice, for he milked +there and sang to the cows, when she saw him sitting on the +three-legged milking-stool, stooping in the attitude of milking, with +the bucket between his knees, but firm asleep, and quite alone in his +glory. He had had too much ale, and dropped asleep while milking the +last cow, and the herd had left him and marched away in stately single +file down to the pond, as they always drink after the milking. Cicely +stole away and said nothing; but presently Aaron was missed and a +search made, and he was discovered by the other men still sleeping. +Poor 'young Aaron' got into nearly as much disgrace through the brown +jug as a poaching uncle of his through his ferrets and wires. + +When the moon rose full and lit up the Overboro'-road as bright as +day, and the children came out from the cottages to their play, +Cicely, though she did not join, used to watch their romping dances +and picked up the old rhymes they chanted. When the full moon shone in +at her bedroom window, Cicely was very careful to turn away or cover +her face; for she had heard one of the mowers declare that after +sleeping on the hay in the moonlight one night he woke up in the +morning almost blind. Besides the meadows around Lucketts' Place, she +sometimes wandered further to the edge of Hilary's great open arable +fields, where the green corn, before it came out in ear, seemed to +flutter, flutter like innumerable tiny flags, as the wind rushed over +it. + +She learned to rub the ripe ears in her hands to work the grain out of +the husk, and then to winnow away the chaff by letting the corn slowly +drop in a stream from one palm to the other, blowing gently with her +mouth the while. The grain remained on account of its weight, the +chaff floating away, and the wheat, still soft though fully formed, +could thus be pleasantly tasted. The plaintive notes of the +yellowhammer fell from the scanty trees of the wheat-field hedge, +and the ploughboy who was put there to frighten away the rooks told +her the bird said, repeating the song over and over again, 'A little +bit of bread and _no_ cheese.' And indeed these syllables, with a +lengthening emphasis on the 'no,' come ludicrously near to represent +the notes. The ploughboy understood them very well, for to have only a +hunch of bread and little or no cheese was often his own case. + +Two meadows distant from the lower woods of the Chace there is what +seems from afar a remarkably wide hedge irregularly bordered with +furze. But on entering a gateway in it you find a bridge over a brook, +which for some distance flows with a hedge on either side. The low +parapet of the bridge affords a seat--one of Cicely's favourite +haunts--whence in spring it is pleasant to look up the brook; for the +banks sloping down from the bushes to the water are yellow with +primroses, and hung over with willow boughs. As the brook is straight, +the eye can see under these a long way up; and presently a kingfisher, +bright with azure and ruddy hues, comes down the brook, flying but +just above the surface on which his reflection travels too. He perches +for a moment on a branch close to the bridge, but the next sees that +he is not alone, and instantly retreats with a shrill cry. + +A moorhen ventures forth from under the arches, her favourite +hiding-place, and feeds among the weeds by the shore, but at the least +movement rushes back to shelter. A wood-pigeon comes over, flying +slowly; he was going to alight on the ash tree yonder, but suddenly +espying some one under the cover of the boughs increases his pace and +rises higher. Two bright bold bullfinches pass; they have a nest +somewhere in the thick hawthorn. A jay, crossing from the fir +plantations, stays awhile in the hedge, and utters his loud harsh +scream like the tearing of linen. For a few hours the winds are still +and the sunshine broods warm over the mead. It is a delicious snatch +of spring. + +Every now and then a rabbit emerges from the burrows which are +scattered thickly along the banks, and, passing among the primroses, +goes through the hedge into the border of furze, and thence into the +meadow-grass. Some way down the brook they are so numerous as to have +destroyed the vegetation on the banks, excepting a few ferns, by their +constant movements and scratching of the sand; so that there is a +small warren on either side of the water. It is said that they +occasionally swim across the broad brook, which is much too wide to +jump; but I have never seen such a thing but once. A rabbit already +stung with shot and with a spaniel at his heels did once leap at the +brook here, and, falling short, swam the remainder without apparent +trouble, and escaped into a hole on the opposite shore with his wet +fur laid close to the body. But they usually cross at the bridge, +where the ground bears the marks of their incessant nightly travels to +and fro. + +Passing now in the other direction, up the stream from the bridge, the +hedges after a while cease, and the brook winds through the open +fields. Here there is a pond, to which at night the heron resorts; for +he does not care to trust himself between the high hedgerows. In the +still shallow, but beyond reach, there floats on the surface a small +patch of green vegetation formed of the treble leaves of the water +crow-foot. Towards June it will be a brilliant white spot. The slender +stems uphold the cup-like flowers two or three inches above the +surface, the petals of the purest white with a golden centre. They are +the silver buttercups of the brook. Where the current flows slowly the +long and somewhat spear-shaped leaves of the water-plantain stand up, +and in the summer will be surmounted by a tall stalk with three small +pale pink petals on its branches. The leaf can be written on with a +pencil, the point tracing letters by removing the green colouring +where it passes. + +Far larger are the leaves of the water-docks; they sometimes attain to +immense size. By the bank the 'wild willow,' or water-betony, with its +woody stem, willow-shaped leaves, and pale red flowers, grows thickly. +Across where there is a mud-bank the stout stems of the willow herb +are already tall. They quite cover the shoal, and line the brook like +shrubs. They are the strongest and the most prominent of all the brook +plants. At the end of March or beginning of April the stalks appear a +few inches high, and they gradually increase in size, until in July +they reach above the waist, and form a thicket by the shore. Not till +July does the flower open, so that, though they make so much show of +foliage, it is months before any colour brightens it. The red flower +comes at the end of a pod, and has a tiny white cross within it; it is +welcome, because by August so many of the earlier flowers are fading. +The country folk call it the sod-apple, and say the leaves crushed in +the fingers have something of the scent of apple-pie. + +Farther up the stream, where a hawthorn bush shelters it, stands a +knotted fig-wort with a square stem and many branches, each with small +velvety flowers. If handled, the leaves emit a strong odour, like the +leaves of the elder-bush; it is a coarse-growing plant, and +occasionally reaches to a height of between four and five feet, with a +stem more than half an inch square. Some ditches are full of it. By +the rushes the long purple spike of the loose-strife rises, and on the +mud-banks among the willows there grows a tall plant with bunches of +flower, the petals a bright yellow: this is the yellow loose-strife. +Near it is a herb with a much-divided leaf, and curious flowers like +small yellow buttons. Rub one of these gently, and it will give forth +a most peculiar perfume--aromatic, and not to be compared with +anything else; the tansy once scented will always be recognised. + +The large rough leaves of the wild comfrey grow in bunches here and +there; the leaves are attached to the stem for part of their length, +and the stem is curiously flanged. The bells are often greenish, +sometimes white, occasionally faintly lilac; they are partly hidden +under the dark-green leaves. Where undisturbed the comfrey grows to a +great size, the stems becoming very thick. Green flags hide and almost +choke the shallow mouth of a streamlet that joins the brook coming +from the woods. Though green above, the flag where it enters its +sheath is white. + +Tracing it upwards, the brook becomes narrower and the stream less, +though running more swiftly; and here there is a marshy spot with +willows, and between them some bulrushes and great bunches of +bullpolls. This coarse grass forms tufts or cushions, on which snakes +often coil in the sunshine. Yet though so rough, in June the bullpoll +sends up tall slender stalks with graceful feathery heads, reed-like, +surrounded with long ribbons of grass. In the ditches hereabout, and +beside the brook itself, the meadow-sweet scents the air; the +country-folk call it 'meadow-soot.' And in those ditches are numerous +coarse stems and leaves which, if crushed in the fingers, yield a +strong parsnip-like smell. The water-parsnip, which is poisonous, is +said to be sometimes gathered for watercress; but the palate must be +dull, one would think, to eat it, and the smell is a sure test. The +blue flower of the brooklime is not seen here; you must look for it +where the springs break forth, where its foliage sometimes quite +conceals the tiny rill. + +These flowers do not, of course, all appear together; but they may be +all found in the summer season along the brook, and you should begin +to look for them when the brown scum, that sign of coming warmth, +rises from the bottom of the waters. Returning to the pond, it may be +noticed that the cart-horses when they walk in of a summer's day paw +the stream, as if they enjoyed the cool sound of the splash; but the +cows stand quite still with the water up to their knees. + +There is a spot by a yet more quiet bridge, where the little +water-shrews play to and fro where the bank overhangs. As they dive +and move under water the reddish-brown back looks of a lighter colour; +when they touch the ground they thrust their tiny nostrils up just +above the surface. There are many holes of water-rats, but no one +would imagine how numerous these latter creatures are. One of Hilary's +sons, Hugh, kept some ferrets, and in the summer was put to it to find +them enough food. The bird-keepers brought in a bird occasionally, and +there were cruel rumours of a cat having disappeared. Still there was +not sufficient till he hit on the idea of trapping the water-rats; and +this is how he did it. + +He took three small twigs and ran them into the bank of the brook at +the mouth of the water-rat's hole and just beneath the surface of the +stream. These made a platform upon which the gin was placed--the pan, +and indeed all the trap, just under the water, which prevented any +scent. Whether the rat came out of his hole and plunged to dive or +started to swim, or whether he came swimming noiselessly round the +bend and was about to enter the burrow, it made no difference; he was +certain to pass over and throw the gin. The instant the teeth struck +him he gave a jump which lifted the trap off the twig platform, and it +immediately sank in the deep water and soon drowned him; for the +water-rat, though continually diving, can only stay a short time under +water. It proved a fatal contrivance, chiefly, as was supposed, +because the gin, being just under the water, could not be smelt. No +fewer than eleven rats were thus captured in succession at the mouth +of one hole. Altogether 150 were taken in the course of that summer. + +Hugh kept a record of them by drawing a stroke with chalk for every +rat on the red brick wall of the stable, near his ferret-hutch. He +only used a few traps--one was set not at a hole, but at a sharp curve +of the brook--and the whole of these rats were taken in a part of the +brook about 250 or 300 yards in length, just where it ran through a +single field. The great majority were water-rats, but there were +fifteen or twenty house-rats among them: these were very thin though +large, and seemed to be caught as they were migrating; for sometimes +several were trapped the same day, and then none (of this kind) for a +week or more. Three moorhens were also caught; a fourth was only held +by its claw in the gin; this one, not being in the least injured, he +let go again. + +It had been observed previously that the water-rats, either in making +their burrows or for food, gnawed off the young withy-stoles +underneath the ground in the withy-beds, and thus killed a +considerable amount of withy; but after all this slaughter the +withy-beds recovered and bore the finest crop they ever grew. But who +could have imagined in walking by the brook that only in its course +through a single meadow it harboured 150 rats? Probably, though, some +of them came up or down the stream. The ferrets fared sumptuously all +the summer. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +A PACK OF STOATS. BIRDS. + + +The sweet scent from a beanfield beside the road caused me to linger +one summer morning in a gateway under the elms. A gentle south wind +came over the beans, bearing with it the odour of their black-and-white +bloom. The Overboro' road ran through part of the Okebourne property +(which was far too extensive to be enclosed in a ring fence), and the +timber had therefore been allowed to grow so that there was an +irregular avenue of trees for some distance. I faced the beanfield, +which was on the opposite side, leaning back against the gate which +led into some of Hilary's wheat. The silence of the highway, the soft +wind, the alternate sunshine and shade as the light clouds passed +over, induced a dreamy feeling; and I cannot say how long I had been +there when something seemed as it were to cross the corners of my +half-closed eyes. + +Looking up I saw three stoats gallop across the road, not more than +ten yards away. They issued from under the footpath, which was raised +and had a drain through it to relieve the road of flood-water in +storm. The drain was faced with a flat stone, with a small round hole +cut in it. Coming from the wheat at my back, the stoats went down into +the ditch; thence entered the short tunnel under the footpath, and out +at its stone portal, over the road to the broad sward on the opposite +side; then along a furrow in the turf to the other hedge, and so into +the beanfield. They galloped like racehorses straining for the +victory; the first leading, the second but a neck behind, and the +third not half a length. The smooth road rising slightly in the centre +showed them well; and thus, with the neck stretched out in front and +the tail extended in the rear, the stoat appears much longer than on a +mound or in the grass. + +A second or so afterwards two more started from the same spot; but I +was perhaps in the act to move, for before they had gone three yards +they saw me and rushed back to the drain. After a few minutes the +larger of these two, probably the male, ventured forth again and +reached the middle of the road, when he discovered that his more +timorous companion had not followed but was only just peeping out. He +stopped and elevated his neck some five or six inches, planting the +fore-feet so as to lift him up high to see round, while his +hindquarters were flush with the road, quite flat in the dust in which +his tail was trailing. His reddish body and white neck, the clear-cut +head, the sharp ears, and dark eye were perfectly displayed in that +erect attitude. As his companion still hesitated he cried twice, as if +impatiently, 'check, check'--a sound like placing the tongue against +the teeth and drawing it away. But she feared to follow, and he +returned to her. Thinking they would attempt to cross again presently, +I waited quietly. + +A lark came over from the wheat, and, alighting, dusted herself in the +road, hardly five yards from the mouth of the drain, and was there +some minutes. A robin went still closer--almost opposite the hole; +both birds apparently quite unconscious of the bloodthirsty creatures +concealed within it. Some time passed, but the two stoats did not come +out, and I saw no more of them: they probably retreated to the wheat +as I left the gateway, and would remain there till the noise and jar +of my footsteps had ceased in the distance. Examining the road, there +was a trail where the first three had crossed in quick succession. In +the thick white dust their swift feet had left a line drawn roughly +yet lightly, the paws leaving not an exact but an elongated, +ill-defined impression. But where the fourth stopped, elevated his +neck, and cried to his mate, there was a perfect print of the +fore-feet side by side. So slight a track would be obliterated by the +first cart that came by. + +Till that day I had never seen so many as five stoats together hunting +in a pack. It would seem as if stoats and weasels had regular routes; +for I now recollected that in the previous winter, when the snow was +on the ground, I surprised two weasels almost exactly in the same +spot. At other times, too, I have seen solitary stoats and weasels +(which may have had companions in the hedge) hunting along that mound, +both before and since. I was at first going to tell Hilary about the +pack, but afterwards refrained, as he would at once proceed to set up +gins in the run, while I thought I should like to see the animals +again. But I got him to talk about stoats and weasels, and found that +he had not himself seen so many together. There was, however, a man +about the place who told a tale of some weasels he had seen. It was +'that rascal old Aaron;' but he could not listen to such a fellow. +Hilary would tell me nothing further, having evidently a strong +dislike to the man. + +It seems there were two Aarons--uncle and nephew: old Aaron was the +arch-poacher of the parish, young Aaron worked regularly at Lucketts' +Place. This young labourer (the man who fell asleep on the +milking-stool) was one of the best of his class--a great, powerful +fellow, but good-natured, willing, and pleasant to speak to. He was a +favourite with many, and with reason, for he had a gentleness of +manner beyond his station; and, till you knew his weakness, you could +not but take an interest in him. His vice was drink. He was always +down at Lucketts' Place; and through him I made acquaintance with his +disreputable uncle, who was at first rather shy of me, for he had seen +me about with Hilary, and between the two there was a mortal feud. Old +Aaron could not keep out of Okebourne Chace, and Hilary was 'down' +upon him. Hilary was, indeed, keener than the keepers. + +The old poacher saw the weasels in the 'Pitching.' This was a private +lane, which ran through the recesses of the Chace where the wood was +thickest and most secluded. It had been made for the convenience of +communication between the upper and lower farms, and for hauling +timber; the gates at each end being kept locked. In one place the lane +descended the steepest part of the wooded hill, and in frosty weather +it was not easy even to walk down it there. Sarsen stones, gathered +out of the way of the plough in the arable fields, had been thrown +down in it at various times with the object of making a firm bottom. +Rounded and smooth and very hard, these stones, irregularly placed, +with gaps and intervals, when slippery with hoar frost were most +difficult to walk on. Once or twice men out hunting had been known to +gallop down this hill: the extreme of headlong bravado; for if there +was any frost it was sure to linger in that shady lane, and a slip of +the iron-shod hoof could scarcely fail to result in a broken neck. It +was like riding down a long steep flight of steps. + +Aaron one day was engaged with his ferret and nets in the Pitching, +just at the bottom of the hill, where there grew a quantity of +brake-fern as tall as the shoulder. It was shrivelled and yellow, but +thick enough to give him very good cover. Every now and then he looked +out into the lane to see if any one was about, and on one of these +occasions saw what he imagined at first to be a colony of rats +migrating; but when they came near, racing down the lane, he found +they were weasels. He counted fourteen, and thought there were one or +two more. + +Aaron also told me a curious incident that happened to him very early +one morning towards the beginning of spring. The snow was on the +ground and the moon was shining brightly as he got on the railway (a +few miles from Okebourne) and walked some distance up it: he did not +say what for, but probably as the nearest way to a cover. As he +entered a deep cutting where the line came round a sharp curve he +noticed strange spots upon the snow, and upon examination found it was +blood. For the moment he thought there had been an accident; but +shortly afterwards he picked up a hare's pad severed from the leg, and +next a hare's head, and presently came on a quantity of similar +fragments, all fresh. He collected them, and found they had belonged +to six hares which had been cut to pieces by a passing train. The +animals were so mutilated as not to be of the least use. + +When I told Hilary of this, he at once pronounced it impossible, and +nothing but one of Aaron's lies. On reflection, however, I am not so +sure that it is impossible, nor can I see any reason why the old +poacher should invent a falsehood of the kind. It was just a time of +the year when hares are beginning to go 'mad,' and, as they were not +feeding but playing together, they might have strayed up the line just +as they do along roads. Most persons must have observed how quietly a +train sometimes steals up--so quietly as to be inaudible: a fact that +has undoubtedly been the death of many unfortunates. Now, just at this +spot there was a sharp curve, and if the driver shut off steam as he +ran round it the train very likely came up without a sound. The sides +of the cutting being very steep, the hares, when at last they +perceived their danger, would naturally rush straight away along the +metals. Coming at great speed, the engine would overtake and destroy +them: a miserable end for the poor creatures in the midst of their +moonlight frolic. But what Aaron laid stress on was the fact that he +could not even sell the skins, they were so cut to pieces. + +The rooks' nests in the Chace were very numerous, and were chiefly +built in elm trees, but some in tall spruce firs. It was easy to know +when the birds had paired, as a couple of rooks could then be often +seen perched gravely side by side upon an old nest in the midst of +leafless boughs, deliberating about its repair. There were some +poplars near a part of the rookery, and when the nests were fully +occupied with young the old birds frequently alighted on the very top +of an adjacent poplar. The slender brush-like tip of the tree bent +with their weight, curving over like a whip, to spring up when they +left. + +The rooks were fond of maize, boldly descending among the poultry kept +in a rickyard within a short distance of their trees. If any one has a +clump of trees in which rooks seem inclined to build and it is desired +to encourage them, it would appear a good plan to establish a +poultry-yard in the same field. They are certain to visit the spot. + +One day I watched a rook pursuing a swift and making every effort to +overtake and strike it. The rook displayed great power of wing, +twisting and turning, now descending or turning on one side to glide +more rapidly, and uttering short 'caws' of eagerness or anger; but, +just eluding the heavy rush of its pursuer, the swift doubled and +darted away before it, as if tempting the enemy to charge, and then +enjoying his disappointment. Several other swifts wheeled above at a +distance, apparently watching. These evolutions lasted some minutes, +rook and swift rising higher and higher into the air until, tired of +being chased, the swift went straight away at full speed, easily +outstripping the rook, which soon desisted from the attempt to follow. + +When birds are thus combating, the chief aim of each is to get above +the other, as any elevation gives an advantage. This may be +continually noticed in spring, when fighting is always going on, and +is as characteristic of the small birds as the larger. At first I +thought it was a crow after the swift, but came to the conclusion that +it must be a rook because the battle began over the rookery and +afterwards the aggressor sailed away to where some rooks were feeding. +Nor would a crow have exhibited such agility of wing. Swallows often +buffet a crow; but this was a clear case of a rook attacking. + +In the country rooks never perch on houses, and but seldom on sheds, +unless fresh thatched, when they come to examine the straw, as also on +the ricks. But in Brighton, which is a treeless locality, a rook may +sometimes be seen on a chimney-pot in the midst of the town, and the +pinnacles of the Pavilion are a favourite resort; a whole flock of +rooks and jackdaws often wheel about the domes of that building. At +the Chace a rook occasionally mounted on a molehill recently thrown up +and scattered the earth right and left with his bill--striking now to +one side and now to the other. Hilary admitted that rooks destroyed +vast quantities of grubs and creeping things, but was equally positive +that they feasted on grain; and indeed it could not be denied that a +crop of wheat almost ripe is a very favourite resort of a flock. He +had seen rooks carry away ears of wheat detached from the stalk to an +open spot for better convenience. They would follow the dibbling +machine, taking each grain of seed-wheat in succession, guided to the +exact spot by the slight depression made by the dibble. + +Every evening all the rooks of the neighbourhood gathered into vast +flocks and returned to roost in the woods of the Chace. But one winter +afternoon there came on the most dense fog that had been known for a +length of time, and a flock of rooks on their way as usual to the +Chace stopped all night in a clump of trees on the farm a mile from +the roosting-place. This the oldest labourer had never known them do +before. In the winter just past (1879-80) there were several very +thick fogs during sharp frost. One afternoon I noticed a small flock +of starlings which seemed unable to find their way home to the copse +where I knew vast numbers of them roosted. This flock as it grew dusk +settled in an elm by the roadside, then removed to another, shaking +down the rime from the branches, and a third time wheeled round and +perched in an oak. At that hour on ordinary days the starlings would +all have been flying fast in a straight line for the copse, but these +were evidently in doubt and did not know which direction to take. + +Hilary disliked to see the wood-pigeons in his wheat-fields: the +wood-pigeon beats the grains out of a wheat-ear with the bill, +striking it while on the ground. The sparrows, again, clear the +standing wheat-ears, which at a little distance look thin and +disarranged, and when handled are empty. + +There were many missel-thrushes about the Chace; they are fond of a +wooded district. They pack together in summer and part in winter--just +opposite in that respect to so many other birds, which separate in +warm weather and congregate as it grows cold, so that the lower the +temperature the larger the flock. In winter and spring the +missel-thrushes fly alone or not more than two together. After their +young have left the nest they go in small packs. I saw ten or twelve +rise from an arable field on the 18th of June last year; there do not +often seem to be more than a dozen together. I have counted ten in a +pack on the 16th of September, and seven together as late as the 2nd +of October. Soon after that they appear to separate and act on their +individual wishes. Starlings in like manner pack after their young can +fly, but then they do not separate in autumn. + +It may be remarked that by autumn the young missel-thrushes would not +only fly well, but would have been educated by the old birds, and +would have come to maturity. Their natural independence might then +come into play. But these are effects rather than causes, besides +which I think birds and animals often act from custom rather than for +advantage. Among men customs survive for centuries after the original +meaning has been lost. I had always been told by country people that +the missel-thrush was a solitary bird, and when I first observed a +pack and mentioned it some incredulity was expressed. Very naturally +in summer people do not see much but hay and wheat. It was noticed on +the farms about the Chace in the springs of 1878 and 1879 that the +corncrakes, which had formerly been so numerous and proclaimed their +presence so loudly, were scarcely heard at all. + +It is a little outside my subject, since it did not occur in the +Chace, but the other day a friend was telling me how he had been +hunted by bucks while riding a bicycle. He was passing through a +forest in the summer, when he suddenly became aware of six or seven +bucks coming down a glade after him. The track being rough he could +not ride at full speed--probably they would have outstripped him even +if he had been able to do so--and they were overtaking him rapidly. As +they came up he saw that they meant mischief, and fearing a bad fall +he alighted by a tree, behind which he thought to dodge them. But no +sooner did he touch the ground than the bucks so furiously rushing +after him stopped dead in their career; he stepped towards them, and +directly they saw him walking they retreated hastily to a distance. + +The first berries to go as the autumn approaches are those of the +mountain-ash. Both blackbirds and thrushes began to devour the +pale-red bunches hanging on the mountain-ashes as early as the 4th of +September last year. Starlings are fond of elder-berries: a flock +alighting on a bush black with ripe berries will clear the bunches in +a very short time. Haws, or peggles, which often quite cover the +hawthorn bushes, are not so general a food as the fruit of the briar. +Hips are preferred; at least, the fruit of the briar is the first of +the two to disappear. The hip is pecked open (by thrushes, redwings, +and blackbirds) at the tip, the seeds extracted, and the part where it +is attached to the stalk left, just as if the contents had been sucked +out. Greenfinches, too, will eat hips. + +Haws are often left even after severe frosts; sometimes they seem to +shrivel or blacken, and may not perhaps be palatable then. +Missel-thrushes and wood-pigeons eat them. Last winter in the stress +of the sharp and continued frosts the greenfinches were driven in +December to swallow the shrivelled blackberries still on the brambles. +The fruity part of the berries was of course gone, and nothing +remained but the seeds or pips, dry and hard as wood; they were +reduced to feeding on this wretched food. Perhaps the last of the +seeds available are those of the docks. + +This is well known to bird-fowlers, and on a dry day in January they +take two large bunches of docks--'red docks' they call them--tied +round the centre like faggots and well smeared at the top with +birdlime. These are placed on the ground, by a hedge, and near them a +decoy goldfinch in a cage. Goldfinches eat dock-seed, and if any +approach the decoy-bird calls. The wild bird descends from the hedge +to feed on the dock-seed and is caught. Goldfinches go in pairs all +the winter and work along the hedges together. In spring the young +green buds upon the hawthorn are called 'cuckoo's bread and cheese' by +the ploughboys. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +HAMLET FOLK. + + +It happened one Sunday morning in June that a swarm of bees issued +from a hive in a cottage garden near Okebourne church. The queen at +first took up her position in an elm tree just outside the churchyard, +where a large cluster of bees quickly depended from a bough. Being at +a great height the cottager could not take them, and, anxious not to +lose the swarm, he resorted to the ancient expedient of rattling +fire-tongs and shovel together in order to attract them by the +clatter. The discordant banging of the fire-irons resounded in the +church, the doors being open to admit the summer air; and the noise +became so uproarious that the clerk presently, at a sign from the +rector, went out to stop it, for the congregation were in a grin. He +did stop it, the cottager desisting with much reluctance; but, as if +to revenge the bee-master's wrongs, in the course of the day the +swarm, quitting the elm, entered the church and occupied a post in the +roof. + +After a while it was found that the swarm had finally settled there, +and were proceeding to build combs and lay in a store of honey. The +bees, indeed, became such a terror to nervous people, buzzing without +ceremony over their heads as they stood up to sing, and caused such a +commotion and buffeting with Prayer-books and fans and handkerchiefs, +that ultimately the congregation were compelled to abandon their pews. +All efforts to dislodge the bees proving for the time ineffectual, the +rector had a temporary reading-desk erected in the porch, and there +held the service, the congregation sitting on chairs and forms in the +yard, and some on the stone tombs, and even on the sward under the +shade of the yew tree. + +In the warm dry hay-making weather this open-air worship was very +pleasant, the flowers in the grass and the roses in the little plots +about the tombs giving colour and sweet odours, while the swallows +glided gracefully overhead and sometimes a blackbird whistled. The +bees, moreover, interfered with the baptisms, and even caused several +marriages to be postponed. Inside the porch was a recess where the +women left their pattens in winter, instead of clattering iron-shod +down the aisle. + +Okebourne village was built in an irregular way on both sides of a +steep coombe, just at the verge of the hills, and about a mile from +the Chace; indeed, the outlying cottages bordered the park wall. The +most melancholy object in the place was the ruins of a windmill; the +sails and arms had long disappeared, but the wooden walls, black and +rotting, remained. The windmill had its genius, its human +representative--a mere wreck, like itself, of olden times. There never +was a face so battered by wind and weather as that of old Peter, the +owner of the ruin. His eyes were so light a grey as to appear all but +colourless. He wore a smock-frock the hue of dirt itself, and his +hands were ever in his pockets as he walked through rain and snow +beside his cart, hauling flints from the pits upon the Downs. + +If the history of the cottage-folk is inquired into it will often be +found that they have descended from well-to-do positions in life--not +from extravagance or crime, or any remarkable piece of folly, but +simply from a long-continued process of muddling away money. When the +windmill was new, Peter's forefathers had been, for village people +well off. The family had never done anything to bring themselves into +disgrace; they had never speculated; but their money had been +gradually muddled away, leaving the last little better than a +labourer. To see him crawling along the road by his load of flints, +stooping forward, hands in pocket, and then to glance at the distant +windmill, likewise broken down, the roof open, and the rain and winds +rushing through it, was a pitiful spectacle. For that old building +represented the loss of hope and contentment in life as much as any +once lordly castle whose battlements are now visited only by the +jackdaw. The family had, as it were, foundered and gone down. + +How they got the stray cattle into the pound it is difficult to +imagine; for the gate was very narrow, and neither bullocks nor horses +like being driven into a box. The copings of the wall on one side had +been pushed over, and lay in a thick growth of nettles: this, almost +the last of old village institutions, was, too, going by degrees to +destruction. + +Every hamlet used to have its representative fighting-man--often more +than one--who visited the neighbouring villages on the feast days, +when there was a good deal of liquor flowing, to vaunt of their +prowess before the local champions. These quickly gathered, and after +due interchange of speeches not unlike the heroes of Homer, who +harangue each other ere they hurl the spear, engaged in conflict dire. +There was a regular feud for many years between the Okebourne men and +the Clipstone 'chaps;' and never did the stalwart labourers of those +two villages meet without falling to fisticuffs with right goodwill. +Nor did they like each other at all the worse, and after the battle +drank deeply from the same quart cups. Had these encounters found an +historian to put them upon record, they would have read something like +the wars (without the bloodshed) between the little Greek cities, +whose population scarcely exceeded that of a village, and between +which and our old villages there exists a certain similarity. A +simplicity of sentiment, an unconsciousness as it were of themselves, +strong local attachments and hatreds, these they had in common, and +the Okebourne and Clipstone men thwacked and banged each other's broad +chests in true antique style. + +Hilary said that when he was a boy almost all the cottages in the +place had a man or woman living in them who had attained to extreme +old age. He reckoned up cottage after cottage to me in which he had +known old folk up to and over eighty years of age. Of late the old +people seemed to have somehow died out: there were not nearly so many +now. + +Okebourne Wick, a little hamlet of fifteen or twenty scattered houses, +was not more than half a mile from Lucketts' Place; on the Overboro' +road, which passed it, was a pleasant roadside inn, where, under the +sign of The Sun, very good ale was sold. Most of the farmers dropped +in there now and then, not so much for a glass as a gossip, and no one +from the neighbouring villages or from Overboro' town ever drove past +without stopping. In the 'tap' of an evening you might see the +labourers playing at 'chuck-board,' which consists in casting a small +square piece of lead on to certain marked divisions of a shallow +tray-like box placed on the trestle-table. The lead, being heavy, +would stay where it fell; the rules I do not know, but the scene +reminded me of the tric-trac contests depicted by the old Dutch +painters. + +Young Aaron was very clever at it. He pottered round the inn of an +evening and Saturday afternoons, doing odd jobs in the cellar with the +barrels; for your true toping spirit loves to knock the hoops and to +work about the cask, and carry the jugs in answer to the cry for some +more 'tangle-legs'--for thus they called the strong beer. Sometimes a +labourer would toast his cheese on a fork in the flame of the candle. +In the old days, before folk got so choice of food and delicate of +palate, there really seemed no limit to the strange things they ate. +Before the railways were made, herds of cattle had of course to travel +the roads, and often came great distances. The drovers were at the +same time the hardiest and the roughest of men in that rough and hardy +time. As night came on, after seeing their herd safe in a field, they +naturally ate their supper at the adjacent inn. Then sometimes, as a +dainty treat with which to finish his meal, a drover would call for a +biscuit, large and hard, as broad as his hand, and, taking the tallow +candle, proceed to drip the grease on it till it was well larded and +soaked with the melted fat. + +At that date, before the Government stamp had been removed from +newspapers, the roadside inn was the centre and focus of all +intelligence. When the first railway was constructed up in the North +the Okebourne folk, like the rest of the world, were with good reason +extremely curious about this wonderful invention, and questioned every +passer-by eagerly for information. But no one could describe it, till +at last a man, born in the village, but who had been away for some +years soldiering, returned to his native place. He had been serving in +Canada and came through Liverpool, and thus saw the marvel of the age. +At the Sun the folk in the evening crowded round him, and insisted +upon knowing what a steam-engine was like. He did his best to describe +it, but in vain; they wanted a familiar illustration, and could not be +satisfied till the soldier, by a happy inspiration, said the only +thing to which he could compare a locomotive was a great cannon on a +timber-carriage. To us who are so accustomed to railways it seems a +singular idea; but, upon reflection, it was not so inapt, considering +that the audience had seen or heard something of cannons, and were +well acquainted with timber-carriages. The soldier wished to convey +the notion of a barrel or boiler mounted on wheels. + +They kept up the institution of the parish constable, as separate and +distinct from the policeman, till very recently at Okebourne, though +it seems to have lapsed long since in many country places. One year +Hilary, with much shrugging of shoulders, was forced into the office; +and during his term there was a terrible set-to between two tribes of +gipsies in the Overboro' road. They fought like tigers, making the +lovely summer day hideous with their cries and shrieks--the women, the +fiercer by far, tearing each other's hair. One fiendish creature drew +her scissors, and, using them like a stiletto, drove the sharp point +into a sister 'gip's' head. + +'Where's the constable?' was the cry. Messengers rushed to Lucketts' +Place; the barn, the sheds, the hayfield, all were searched in +vain--Hilary had quite disappeared. At the very first sound he had +slipped away to look at some cattle in Chequer's Piece, the very last +and outlying field of the farms, full a mile away, and when the +messengers got to Chequer's Piece of course he was up on the Down. So +much for the parish constable's office--an office the farmers shirked +whenever they could, and would not put in force when compelled to +accept it. + +How could a resident willingly go into a neighbour's cottage and +arrest him without malice and scandal being engendered? If he did his +duty he was abused; if he did not do it, it was hinted that he +favoured the offender. As for the 'gip' who was stabbed, nothing more +was heard of it; she 'traipsed' off with the rest. + +Sometimes when the 'tangle-legs' got up into their heads the labourers +felt an inclination to resume the ancient practices of their +fore-fathers. Then you might see a couple facing each other in the +doorway, each with his mug in one hand, and the other clenched, +flourishing their knuckles. 'Thee hit I.' 'Thee come out in th' road +and I'll let thee knaw.' The one knew very well that the other dared +not strike him in the house, and the other felt certain that, however +entreated, nothing would induce his opponent to accept the invitation +and 'come out into th' road.' + +The shadows of the elm have so far to fall that they become enlarged +and lose the edge upon reaching the ground. I noticed this one +moonlight night in early June while sitting on a stile where the +footpath opened on the Overboro' road. Presently I heard voices, and +immediately afterwards a group came round the curve of the highway. +There were three cottage women, each with a basket and several +packages; having doubtless been into Overboro' town shopping, for it +was Saturday. They walked together in a row; and in front of them, +about five yards ahead, came a burly labourer of the same party, +carrying in his arms a large clock. + +He had taken too much ale, and staggered as he walked, two steps aside +to one forward, and indeed could hardly keep upright. His efforts to +save himself and the clock from destruction led to some singular +flexures of the body, and his feet traced a maze as he advanced, +hugging the clock to his chest. The task was too much for his +over-taxed patience: just opposite the stile he stood still, held his +load high over his head, and shouting, 'Dang th' clock!' hurled it +with all his force thirty feet against the mound, at the same time +dropping a-sprawl. The women, without the least excitement or +surprise, quietly endeavoured to assist him up; and, as he resisted, +one of them remarked in the driest matter-of-fact tone, 'Ourn be just +like un--as contrary as the wind.' She alluded to her own husband. + +When I mentioned this incident afterwards to Mrs. Luckett, she said +the troubles the cottage women underwent on account of the 'beer' were +past belief. One woman who did some work at the farmhouse kept her +cottage entirely by her own exertions; her husband doing nothing but +drink. He took her money from her by force, nor could she hide it +anywhere but what he would hunt it out. At last in despair she dropped +the silver in the jug on the wash-hand basin, and had the satisfaction +of seeing him turn everything topsy-turvy in a vain attempt to find +it. As he never washed, it never occurred to him to look in the +water-jug. + +The cottage women when they went into Overboro' shopping, she said, +were the despair of the drapers. A woman, with two or three more to +chorus her sentiments, would go into a shop and examine half-a-dozen +dress fabrics, rubbing each between her work-hardened fingers and +thumb till the shopkeeper winced, expecting to see it torn. After +trying several and getting the counter covered she would push them +aside, contemptuously remarking, 'I don't like this yer shallygallee +(flimsy) stuff. Haven't'ee got any gingham tackle?' Whereat the poor +draper would cast down a fresh roll of stoutest material with the +reply: 'Here, ma'am. Here's something that will wear like pin-wire.' +This did better, but was declared to be 'gallus dear.' + +Even within recent years, now and then a servant-girl upon entering +service at the farmhouse would refuse to touch butcher's meat. She had +never tasted anything but bacon at home, and could only be persuaded +to eat fresh meat with difficulty, being afraid she should not like +it. One girl who came from a lonely cottage in a distant +'coombe-bottom' of the Downs was observed never to write home or +attempt to communicate with her parents. She said it was of no use; no +postman came near, and the letters they wrote or the letters written +to them never reached their destination. 'Coombe-bottom' is a curious +duplication--either word being used to indicate a narrow valley or +hollow. An unfortunate child who lived there had never been so well +since the stone roller went over his head. She had a lover, but he was +'a gurt hummocksing noon-naw,' so she was not sorry to leave him. The +phrase might be translated, 'great loose-jointed idiot.' + +They sometimes had lettuce-pudding for dinner, and thought nothing of +eating raw bacon. In the snow the men wound hay-bands round their legs +to serve as gaiters, and found it answered admirably. One poor girl +had been subject to fits ever since a stupid fellow, during the +haymaking, jokingly picked up a snake and threw it round her neck. Yet +even in that far-away coombe-bottom they knew enough to put an +oyster-shell in the kettle to prevent incrustation. + +The rules of pronunciation understood about Okebourne seemed to +consist in lengthening the syllables that are usually spoken quick, +and shortening those that are usually long. Hilary said that years ago +it really appeared as if there was something deficient in the organs +of the throat among the labourers, for there were words they +positively could not pronounce. The word 'reservoir,' for instance, +was always 'tezzievoy;' they could not speak the word correctly. He +could not explain to me a very common expression among the men when +they wished to describe anything unusual or strange for which they had +no exact equivalent. It was always 'a sort of a meejick.' By degrees, +however, we traced it back to 'menagerie.' The travelling shows of +wild beasts at first so much astonished the villagers that everything +odd and curious became a menagerie, afterwards corrupted to 'meejick.' + +'Caddle no man's cattle' was a favourite proverb with a population who +were never in a hurry. 'Like shot out of a show'l,' to express extreme +nimbleness, was another. A comfortless, bare apartment was 'gabern;' +anything stirred with a pointed instrument was 'ucked'--whether a cow +'ucked' the fogger with her horn or the stable was cleaned out with +the fork. The verb 'to uck' was capable indeed of infinite +conjugation, and young Aaron, breaking off a bennet, once asked me to +kindly 'uck' a grain of hay-dust out of his eye with it. When a heron +rose out of the brook 'a moll ern flod away.' + +With all their apparent simplicity some of the cottage folk were quite +up to the value of appearances. Old Aaron had a little shop; he and +his wife sold small packets of tea, tobacco, whipcord, and so forth. +Sometimes while his wife was weighing out the sugar, old +Aaron--wretched old deceiver--would come in rustling a crumpled piece +of paper as if it were a banknote, and handing it to her with much +impressiveness of manner whisper loudly, 'Now you take un and put un +away; and mind you don't mix um. You put he along with the fives and +not with the tens.' + +Hilary once showed me the heel of a boot which had just been mended by +the hedge carpenter and cobbler who worked for him; and offered to bet +that not all the scientific people in Europe, with microscope, +spectrum analysis, all their appliances, could tell what leather the +new heel-piece was made of. Unable to guess, I gave it up; it was of +bacon. A pig that was never a 'good doer' was found in a ditch dead. +There is always a competition among the labourers for a dead pig or +sheep; it was the cobbler's turn, and he had it, cut it up, and salted +it down. But when in course of time he came to partake of his side of +bacon, behold it was so tough and dried up that even he could not gnaw +it. The side hung in the cottage for months, for he did not like to +throw it away, and could not think what to do with it, for the dogs +could not eat it. At last the old fellow hit upon the notion of using +it as leather to mend shoes; so half his customers walked about the +world on bacon heels. + +So far as I could discover, the cottage folk did not now use many +herbs. They made tea sometimes of the tormentil, whose little yellow +flowers appear along the furrows. The leaves of the square-stemmed +figwort, which they called 'cresset' or 'cressil,' were occasionally +placed on a sore; and the yarrow--locally 'yarra'--was yet held in +estimation as a salve or ointment. + +It would be possible for any one to dwell a long time in the midst of +a village, and yet never hear anything of this kind and obtain no idea +whatever of the curious mixture of the grotesque, the ignorance and +yet cleverness, which go to make up hamlet life. But so many labourers +and labouring women were continually in and out of the kitchen at +Lucketts' Place that I had an opportunity of gathering these items +from Mrs. Luckett and Cicely. Years since they had employed even more +labour, before machinery came into use so much: then as many as +twenty-four women might have been counted in one hayfield, all in +regular rank like soldiers, turning the hay 'wallows' with their +rakes. 'There's one thing now you have forgotten,' said Cicely. 'They +pick the canker-roses off the briars and carry them in the pocket as a +certain preventive of rheumatism.' + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +WIND-ANEMONES. THE FISHPOND. + + +The only spot about the Chace where the wind-anemones grew was in a +small detached copse of ash-poles nearly a mile from the great woods. +Between the stoles, which were rather far apart, the ground was quite +covered in spring with dark-green vegetation, so that it was +impossible to walk there without treading down the leaves of +bluebells, anemones, and similar woodland plants. But if you wished to +see the anemones in their full beauty it was necessary to visit the +copse frequently; for if you forgot it, or delayed a fortnight, very +likely upon returning you would find that their fleeting loveliness +was over. Their slender red stems rise but a few inches, and are +surrounded with three leaves; the six white petals of the cup-shaped +flower droop a little and have a golden centre. Under the petal is a +tinge of purple, which is sometimes faintly visible through it. The +leaves are not only three in number, but are each cut deeply thrice; +they are hardy, but the flower extremely delicate. + +On the banks dividing the copse from the meadows around it the blue +dog-violets, which have no perfume, often opened so large and wide as +to resemble pansies. They do not appear like this till just as their +flowering time is almost over. The meadows by the copse were small, +not more than two or three acres each. One which was marshy was white +for weeks together with the lady's-smock or cuckoo-flower. The petals +of these flowers are silvery white in some places, in others tinted +with lilac. The hues of wild flowers vary with their situation: in +shady woodlands the toadflax or butter-and-eggs is often pale--a +sulphur colour; upon the Downs it is a deep and beautiful yellow. In a +ditch, of this marshy meadow was a great bunch of woodruff, above +whose green whorls the white flowers were lifted. Over them the +brambles arched, their leaves growing in fives, and each leaf prickly. +The bramble-shoots, as they touch the ground, take root and rise +again, and thus would soon cross a field were they not cut down. + +Pheasants were fond of visiting this copse, following the hedgerows to +it from the Chace, and they always had one or more nests in it. A +green woodpecker took it in his route, though he did not stay long, +there not being many trees. These birds seem to have their regular +rounds; there are some copses where they are scarcely ever heard. They +prefer old trees; where there is much large and decaying timber, there +the woodpeckers come. Such little meadows as these about the copse are +the favourite resort of birds and the very home of flowers--more so +than extensive woods like the Chace, or the open pastures and arable +fields. Thick hedgerows attract birds, and behind such cover their +motions may be watched. There is, too, more variety of bush and tree. + +In one such hedgerow leading from the copse the maple-bushes in spring +were hung with the green flowers which, though they depend in their +season from so many trees, as the oak, are perhaps rarely observed. +The elder-bushes in full white bloom scented the air for yards around +both by night and day; the white bloom shows on the darkest evening. +Besides several crab-stoles--the buds of the crab might be mistaken +for thorns growing pointed at the extreme end of the twigs--there was +a large crab tree, which bore a plentiful crop. The lads sharpen their +knives by drawing the blade slowly to and fro through a crab-apple; +the acid of the fruit eats the steel like aquafortis. They hide stores +of these crabs in holes in the hayricks, supposing them to improve by +keeping. There, too, they conceal quantities of the apples from the +old orchards, for the fruit in them is often almost as hard and not +much superior in flavour to the crab. These apples certainly become +more mellow after several months in the warm hay. + +A wild 'plum,' or bullace, grew in one place; the plum about twice the +size of a sloe, with a bloom upon the skin like the cultivated fruit, +but lacking its sweetness. Yet there was a distinct difference of +taste: the 'plum' had not got the extreme harshness of the sloe. A +quantity of dogwood occupied a corner; in summer it bore a pleasing +flower; in the autumn, after the black berries appeared upon it, the +leaves became a rich bronze colour, and some when the first frosts +touched them curled up at the edge and turned crimson. There were two +or three guelder-rose bushes--the wild shrub--which were covered in +June with white bloom; not in snowy balls like the garden variety, but +flat and circular, the florets at the edge of the circle often +whitest, and those in the centre greenish. In autumn the slender +boughs were weighed down with heavy bunches of large purplish berries, +so full of red juice as to appear on the point of bursting. As these +soon disappeared they were doubtless eaten by birds. + +Besides the hawthorn and briar there were several species of +willow--the snake-skin willow, so called because it sheds its bark; +the 'snap-willow,' which is so brittle that every gale breaks off its +feeble twigs, and pollards. One of these, hollow and old, had upon its +top a crowd of parasites. A bramble had taken root there, and hung +over the side; a small currant-bush grew freely--both, no doubt, +unwittingly planted by birds--and finally the bines of the noxious +bitter-sweet or nightshade, starting from the decayed wood, supported +themselves among the willow-branches, and in autumn were bright with +red berries. Ash-stoles, the buds on whose boughs in spring are hidden +under black sheaths; nut-tree stoles, with ever-welcome nuts--always +stolen here, but on the Downs, where they are plentiful, staying till +they fall; young oak growing up from the butt of a felled tree. On +these oak-twigs sometimes, besides the ordinary round galls, there may +be found another gall, larger, and formed, as it were, of green scales +one above the other. + +Where shall we find in the artificial and, to my thinking, tasteless +pleasure-grounds of modern houses so beautiful a shrubbery as this old +hedgerow? Nor were evergreens wanting, for the ivy grew thickly, and +there was one holly-bush--not more, for the soil was not affected by +holly. The tall cow-parsnip or 'gicks' rose up through the bushes; the +great hollow stem of the angelica grew at the edge of the field, on +the verge of the grass, but still sheltered by the brambles. Some +reeds early in spring thrust up their slender green tubes, tipped with +two spear-like leaves. The reed varies in height according to the +position in which it grows. If the hedge has been cut it does not +reach higher than four or five feet; when it springs from a deep, +hollow corner, or with bushes to draw it up, you can hardly touch its +tip with your walking-stick. The leaders of the black bryony, lifting +themselves above the bushes, and having just there nothing to cling +to, twist around each other, and two bines thus find mutual support +where one alone would fall of its own weight. + +In the watery places the sedges send up their dark flowers, dusted +with light yellow pollen, rising above the triangular stem with its +narrow, ribbed leaf. The reed-sparrow or bunting sits upon the spray +over the ditch with its carex grass and rushes; he is a graceful bird, +with a crown of glossy black. Hops climb the ash and hang their +clusters, which impart an aromatic scent to the hand that plucks them; +broad burdock leaves, which the mouchers put on the top of their +baskets to shield their freshly gathered watercresses from the +sunshine; creeping avens, with buttercup-like flowers and long stems +that straggle across the ditch, and in autumn are tipped with a small +ball of soft spines; mints, strong-scented and unmistakable; yarrow, +white and sometimes a little lilac, whose flower is perhaps almost the +last that the bee visits. In the middle of October I have seen a wild +bee on a last stray yarrow. + +On the higher and drier bank some few slender square stems of betony, +with leaves in pairs like wings, stand up tall and stiff as the summer +advances. The labiate purplish flowers are all at the top; each flower +is set in the cup by a curve at the lesser end, like a crook; the +leaves and stalk are slightly rough, and have an aromatic bitter +perfume when crushed. On the flower of a great thistle a moth has +alighted, and hidden under its broad wing is a humble-bee, the two +happy together and neither interfering with the other. Sometimes a bee +will visit the white rose on the briar. + +Near the gateway, on the edge of the trodden ground, grows a tall, +stout, bushy plant, like a shrub, with pale greyish-green leaves, much +lobed and divided: the top of each branch in August is thick with +small whitish-green flowers tipped with brown. These, if rubbed in the +hand, emit a strong and peculiar scent, with a faint flavour of +lavender, and yet quite different. This is the mugwort. Still later +on, under the shade of the trees on the mound, there appear bunches of +a pale herb, with greenish labiate flowers, and a scent like hops: it +is the woodsage, and if tasted the leaf will be found extremely +bitter. + +In the mornings of autumn the webs of the spiders hang along the hedge +bowed a little with dew, like hammocks of gossamer slung from thorn to +thorn. Then the hedge-sparrows, perching on the topmost boughs of the +hawthorn, cry 'peep-peep' mournfully; the heavy dew on the grass +beneath arranges itself in two rows of drops along the edges of the +blades. From the day when the first leaf appears upon the hardy +woodbine, in the early year, to the time when the partridge finds the +eggs in the ant-hill, and on again till the last harebell dies, there +is always something beautiful or interesting in these great hedgerows. +Indeed, it is impossible to exhaust them. I have omitted the wild +geranium with its tiny red petals scarce seen in the mass of green, +the mosses, the ferns, and have scarcely said a word about the living +creatures that haunt it. But then one might begin to write a book +about a hedgerow when a boy and find it incomplete in old age. + +A much-neglected path led from the park through some fir plantations +down to the fishpond. After the first turn of the narrow track the +close foliage of the firs, through which nothing could be seen, shut +out the world with green walls. The strip of blue sky visible above +was wider than the path, because the trees sloped away somewhat, their +branches shortening towards the top; still it was so contracted that a +passing woodpigeon was seen but for a second as he went over. Every +step carried me into deeper silence--the sudden call of a jay was +startling in its harsh contrast. Presently the path widened where the +thickly planted firs were succeeded by sycamores, horse-chestnuts, +alders, and aspen--trees which stand farther apart, and beneath which +some underwood grew. Here there were thickets of hawthorn and bramble +and elder bushes which can find no place among firs. + +The ground now sloped rapidly down into a hollow, and upon this +descent numbers of skeleton leaves were scattered. There was no other +spot all over the Chace where they could be seen like this; you might +walk for hours and not find one, yet here there were hundreds. +Sometimes they covered the ground in layers, several leaves one on the +other. In spring violets pushed up through them and blue-bells--sweet +hope rising over grey decay. + +Lower down a large pond almost filled the hollow. It was surrounded on +three sides by trees and thickets; on the fourth an irregular margin +of marshy grass extended. Floating leaves of weeds covered the surface +of the water; these weeds had not been disturbed for years, and there +was no check to their growth except their own profusion, for they +choked each other. The pond had long ceased to supply fish for the +table. Before railways brought the sea so near, such ponds were very +useful. At that time almost everything consumed came from the estate +itself: the bread, the beef, the mutton, the venison, game, fish, all +was supplied by the adjacent woods, the fields, or the water. The lord +in old days hunted the deer on his own domain, brought down game with +a crossbow or captured it with nets, and fished or netted his own +streams and ponds. These great parks and chaces enclosed everything, +so that it was within easy reach of his own door. Sometimes the lord +and his visitors strolled out to see the fishponds netted. + +This pond had originally been one of a series, but the others had been +drained and added to the meadows. It was said to be staked at the +bottom to prevent illicit netting; but if so, the stakes by this time +were probably rotten or buried in mud formed from the decaying weeds, +the fallen leaves, and branches which were gradually closing it up. A +few yards from the edge there was a mass of ivy through which a little +brown thatch could be distinguished, and on approaching nearer this +low roof was found to cover the entrance to a cave. It was an ice-house +excavated in the sloping ground or bank, in which, 'when George the +Third was King,' the ice of the ponds had been preserved to cool the +owner's wine in summer. Ice was then a luxury for the rich only; but +when so large a supply arrived from America, a supply increased by +freezing machines, the ice-house lost its importance. The door, once +so jealously closed, was gone, and the dead leaves of last year had +gathered in corners where the winds had whirled them. + +The heat of a warm June day seemed still more powerful in this hollow. +The sedges, into which two or three moorhens had retired at my +approach, were still, and the leaves on the boughs overhanging the +water were motionless. Where there was a space free from weeds--a +deeper hole near the bank--a jack basked at the surface in the +sunshine. High above on the hill stood a tall dead fir, from whose +trunk the bark was falling; it had but one branch, which stood out +bare and stark across the sky. There came a sound like distant +thunder, but there were no clouds overhead, and it was not possible to +see far round. Pushing gently through the hawthorn bushes and +ash-stoles at the farther end of the pond, I found a pleasant little +stream rushing swiftly over a clear chalky bottom, hastening away down +to the larger brook. + +Beyond it rose a mound and hedgerow, up to which came the meadows, +where, from the noise, the cattle seemed racing to and fro, teased by +insects. Tiny black flies alighting on my hands and face, irritated +the skin; the haymakers call them 'thunder-flies;' but the murmur of +the running water was so delicious that I sat down on a bulging +tree-root, almost over the stream, and listened to the thrushes +singing. Had it been merely warm they would have been silent. They do +not sing in dry sunshine, but they knew what was coming; so that there +is no note so hated by the haymaker as that of the thrush. The birds +were not in the firs, but in the ash-trees along the course of the +rill. + +The voice of the thrush is the most 'cultivated,' so to speak, of all +our birds: the trills, the runs, the variations, are so numerous and +contrasted. Not even the nightingale can equal it: the nightingale has +not nearly such command: the thrush seems to know no limit. I own I +love the blackbird best, but in excellence of varied music the thrush +surpasses all. Few birds, except those that are formed for swimming, +come to a still pond. They like a clear running stream; they visit the +sweet running water for drinking and bathing. Dreaming away the time, +listening to the rush of the water bubbling about the stones, I did +not notice that the sky had become overcast, till suddenly a clap of +thunder near at hand awakened me. Some heavy drops of rain fell; I +looked up and saw the dead branch of the fir on the hill stretched out +like a withered arm across a black cloud. + +Hastening back to the ice-house, I had barely entered the doorway when +the lightning, visible at noonday, flashed red and threatening, the +thunder crackled and snapped overhead, and the rain fell in a white +sheet of water. There were but two of these overpowering discharges +with their peculiar crack and snap; the electricity passed on quickly, +and the next clap roared over the woods. But the rain was heavier than +before, the fall increased after every flash, however distant, and the +surface of the pond was threshed by the drops which bore down with +them many leaves weakened by blight. + +Doubtless the mowers in the meadows had hidden the blades of their +scythes under the swathe, and the haymakers had placed their prongs in +the ditches: nothing is so likely to attract a shock of lightning as a +prong carried on the shoulder with the bright steel points upwards. In +the farmhouses the old folk would cover up the looking-glasses lest +the quicksilver should draw the electric fluid. The haymakers will +tell you that sometimes when they have been standing under a hedge out +of a storm a flash of lightning has gone by with a distinct sound like +'swish,' and immediately afterwards the wet ground has sent forth a +vapour, or, as they say, smoked. + +Woodpigeons and many other birds seem to come home to woods and copses +before and during a storm. The woodpigeon is one of the freest of +birds to all appearance: he passes over the highest trees and goes +straight away for miles. Yet, though it is usual to speak of wild +birds and of their freedom, the more you watch their ways the more you +feel that the wildest have their routes and customs: that they do not +act entirely from the impulse of the moment, but have their unwritten +laws. How do the gnats there playing under the horse-chestnut boughs +escape being struck down by the heavy raindrops, each one of which +looks as if it would drown so small a creature? The numbers of insects +far exceed all that words can express: consider the clouds of midges +that often dance over a stream. One day, chancing to glance at a +steeple, I saw what looked like thin smoke issuing from the top of it. +Now it shot out in a straight line from the gilded beak of the +weathercock, now veered about, or declined from the vane. It was an +innumerable swarm of insects, whose numbers made them visible at that +height. + +Some insects are much more powerful than would be supposed. A garden +was enclosed with fresh palings formed of split oak so well seasoned +(split oak is the hardest of wood) that it was difficult to train any +creepers against them, for a nail could not be driven in without the +help of a bradawl. Passing along the path one afternoon I heard a +peculiar rasping sound like a very small saw at work, and found it +proceeded from four wasps biting the oak for the materials of their +nest. The noise they made was audible four or five yards away, and +upon looking closer I found the palings all scored and marked in short +shallow grooves. The scores and marks extended along that part of the +palings where the sunshine usually fell; there were none on the shady +side, the wasps preferring to work in the sunlight. + +Soon the clouds began to break, and then the sun shone on innumerable +rain-drops. I at once started forth, knowing that such a storm is +often followed by several lesser showers with brief intervals between. +The deserted ice-house was rarely visited--only, perhaps, when some +borage was wanted to put in summer drinks. For a thick growth of +borage had sprung up by it, where perhaps a small garden patch had +once been cultivated, for there was a pear-tree near. The plant, with +its scent of cucumber, grew very strong; the blue flowers when fallen, +if they had not been observed when growing, might be supposed to have +been inserted exactly upside down to their real manner of attachment. +In autumn the leaves of the pear-tree reddened, and afterwards the ivy +over the entrance to the ice-house flowered; then in the cold months of +early spring the birds came for the ivy-berries. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +A FARMER OF THE OLDEN TIMES. + + +The winding paths traced by a hare in spring as he roams over an +arable field show that he must cover a mile within a furlong. From a +gateway one morning I watched a hare busy in this way, restlessly +passing to and fro over the 'lands.' Every motion was visible, +because, although the green wheat was rising in an adjacent field, no +crop had yet appeared here. Now the hare came direct towards me, +running down a furrow; then he turned short and followed a course like +the letter V; next he crossed the angle of the field and came back +along the shore of the ditch, under the hedge. Then away to the centre +of the field, where he stayed some time exploring up one furrow and +down another, his ears and the hump of his back only seen above the +clods. + +But suddenly he caught a scent of something that alarmed him, and away +he went full speed: when on the open ground the peculiar way in which +the hind limbs are thrown forward right under the body, thus giving an +immense 'stride,' was clearly displayed. I had been so interested in +the hare that I had not observed Hilary coming along on the other side +of the low fence, looking at his wheat. The hare, busy as he was and +seeming to see nothing, had crossed his 'wind.' Hilary came to me, and +we walked together along the waggon-track, repassing the wheat. He was +full about it: he was always grieving over the decadence of the wheat +crop. + +There was nothing, he went on, so pleasant to watch as it came up, +nothing that required so much care and skill, nothing so thoroughly +associated with the traditions of English farming as wheat, and yet +nothing so disappointing. Foreign importations had destroyed this the +very mainstay. Now, that crop which he had just left had 'tillered +out' well; but what profit should he get from the many stalks that had +tillered or sprung from each single grain, thus promising a fiftyfold +return? It had been well got in, and, as the old saw had it, 'Well +sown, half grown;' it had been in the ground the proper time ('Long in +the bed, big in the head'); but likely enough the price next autumn +would not much more than pay the expenses of preparation. + +The thunderstorm before Christmas was not perhaps a favourable omen, +since + + Winter's thunder and summer's flood + Bode old England no good. + +Last year showed that 'summer's flood' was as destructive as in the +olden time. But then there would have been a rise of prices, according +to the saying,-- + + When the vale shall feed the hill, + Every man shall eat his fill. + But when the hill shall feed the vale, + The penny loaf shall be but small. + +Now, last season, so far as our home harvests were concerned, the +'hill' did feed the 'vale,' but the penny loaves were as large and as +plentiful as usual, owing to foreign grain. In those old days, seventy +or eighty years since, the whole population of the kingdom watched the +weather with anxiety; and it was then that the signs and tokens of +birds and plants and the set of the wind at particular times were +regarded as veritable oracles to be inquired into not without fear and +trembling. + +Hilary heard all about it when he was a lad from old Jonathan, who had +a corn-farm up on the hills, and where he used to go to plough. Hilary +never stated the exact degree, but there was some relationship between +them--two branches, I fancy, of the same family. He seemed to have a +very bitter memory of the old man (now dead), who had been a hard +master to him in his youth; besides which, some family jar had arisen +over money matters; still, he was fond of quoting Jonathan in reference +to wheat and the heyday of corn-farming. Jonathan remembered when a +load of wheat fetched 55_l._--a load being five quarters or ten +sacks--or 11_l._ a quarter. The present average of wheat was about +2_l._ 6_s._ per quarter. At the same time bread was at 3_s._ a gallon; +it is now about 1_s._ 6_d._ The wages of an agricultural labourer were +6_s._ a week. It was gambling, positive gambling, in the staff of +life. + +No farmer was held in any esteem if he did not keep his wheat ricks +till harvest came again before threshing them out: men grew rich +suddenly and knew not what to do with their money. Farmers who had +been brought up 'hard,' living like labourers, working like labourers, +and with little more amusement than labourers, all at once found their +pockets full of coin. The wheat they had been selling at 5_l._ a load +ran up to 50_l._ With their purses thus crammed full, what were they +to do? There was nothing but drink, and they did drink. + +In those days the farmer in his isolated homestead was more cut off +from the world than the settler at the present time in the backwoods +or on the prairies. The telegraph wires span the continent of America, +and are carried across the dry deserts of Australia. Wherever the +settler may be, he is never very far from the wires or the railway; +the railway meets the ocean steamer; and we can form no conception of +the utter lack of communication in the old world of our immediate +forefathers. The farmer, being away from the main road and the track +of the mail coaches, knew no one but his neighbours, saw no one, and +heard but little. Amusements there were none, other than could be had +at the alehouse or by riding into the market town to the inn there. So +that when this great flush of prosperity came upon them, old Jonathan +and his friends had nothing to do but drink. + +Up at The Idovers, as his place was called, a lonely homestead on a +plain between the Downs, they used to assemble, and at once put up the +shutters, whether it was dark or not, not wishing to know whether it +was day or night. Sometimes the head carter would venture in for +instructions, and be gruffly told to take his team and do so and so. +'Eez, zur,' he would reply, 'uz did thuck job isterday.' His master +had ordered him to do it the day before, but was oblivious that +twenty-four hours had passed. The middle-aged men stood this +continuous drinking without much harm, their constitutions having +become hardened and 'set,' but it killed off numbers of the younger +men. + +They drank ale principally--strong ale, for at that time in lonely +farmhouses they were guiltless of wines and spirits. But the enormous +price of 50_l._ per load suggested luxuries, and it was old Jonathan +at The Idovers who introduced gin. Till then no gin even--nothing but +ale--had been consumed in that far-away spot; but Jonathan brought in +the gin, which speedily became popular. He called it 'spoon-drink' (a +spoon being used with the sugar) as a distinguishing name, and as +spoon-drink accordingly it was known. When any one desired to reduce +the strength of his glass, they did indeed pour him out some more +water from the kettle; but having previously filled the kettle with +the spirit, his last state became worse than the first. + +While thus they revelled, the labourers worked with the flails in the +barn threshing out the truly golden grain. The farmers used to take +pains to slip round upon them unexpectedly, or meet them as they were +going home from work, in order to check the pilfering of the wheat. +The labourer was not paid wholly in cash; he had a bushel of the +'tail,' or second flour, from the mill in lieu of money, settling once +a month. Their life was hard indeed. But the great prosperity which +had come upon the farmers did them no good. In too many cases it +melted away in drink. The habit of drinking became settled in a +family. Bad habits endured after the prosperity had departed; and in +some cases those who had once owned their farms as well as occupied +them had to quit the homes of their forefathers. Here and there one, +however, laid the foundation of a fortune, as fortunes are understood +in the country; and shrewd old Jonathan was one of these. + +Even down to very recent days a spell of drinking--simple drinking--was +the staple amusement of many an otherwise respectable farmer. Not many +years since it was not unusual for some well-to-do farmer of the old +school to ride off on his nag, and not be heard of for a week, till he +was discovered at a distant roadside inn, where he had spent the +interval in straightforward drinking. These habits are now happily +extinct. It was in those old times that wheat was bought and hoarded +with the express object of raising the price to famine pitch: a thing +then sometimes practicable, though not always successful. Thus in 1801 +the price of wheat in March was 55_l._ per load, while in October it +had fallen to 15_l._ Men forgot the misery of the poor in their +eagerness for guineas. + +Hilary, with all his old prejudices, was not so foolish as to desire a +return of times like that. He had undergone privation himself in +youth, for farmers' sons were but a little better off than plough-lads +even in his early days; and he did not wish to make money by another +man's suffering. Still he was always grieving about the wheat crop, +and how it had fallen in estimation. It was a sight to see the gusto +with which he would run his hand into a sack of wheat to sample it. +'Here, feel this,' he would say to me, 'you can slip your hand in up +to your elbow; and now hold up your palm--see, the grains are as plump +as cherry-stones.' + +After hearing Hilary talk so much of old Jonathan I thought I should +like to see the place where he had lived, and later in the season +walked up on the hills for that purpose. The stunted fir-trees on the +Down gave so little shadow that I was glad to find a hawthorn under +whose branches I could rest on the sward. The prevalent winds of +winter sweeping without check along the open slope had bent the +hawthorn before them, and the heat of the sultry summer day appeared +the greater on that exposed height. On either hand hills succeeded to +hills, and behind I knew they extended farther than the eye could +reach. Immediately beneath in front there was a plain, at its extreme +boundary a wood, and beyond that the horizon was lost in the summer +haze. Wheat, barley, and oats--barley and wheat and beans, completely +occupied the plain. It was one vast expanse of cereals, without a sign +of human life; for the reaper had not yet commenced, and the bailiffs' +cottages were hidden among the ricks. There was an utter silence at +noonday; nothing but yellowing wheat beneath, the ramparts of the +hills around, and the sun above. + +But, though out of sight, there was a farmhouse behind a small copse +and clump of elms full of rooks' nests, a short way from the foot of +the Down. This was The Idovers, once the residence of old Jonathan; it +was the last farm before reaching the hill district proper, and from +the slope here all the fields of which it consisted were visible. The +house was small, for in those days farmers did not look to live in +villas, and till within the last few years even the parlour floor was +of stone flags. Rushes used to be strewn in the halls of palaces in +ancient times, and seventy years ago old Jonathan grew his own +carpets. + +The softest and best of the bean straw grown on the farm was selected +and scattered on the floor of the sitting-rooms as warm and dry to the +feet, and that was all the carpet in the house. Just before +sheep-shearing time, too, Jonathan used to have the nettles cut that +flourished round the back of the sheds, and strewn on the floor of the +barn. The nettles shrivelled up dry, and the wool did not stick to +them, but could be gathered easily. + +With his own hands he would carry out a quart of beans to the +pigs---just a quart at a time and no more, that they might eat every +one and that none might be wasted. So, too, he would carry them a few +acorns in his coat-pocket, and watch the relish with which the swine +devoured their favourite food. He saved every bit of crooked wood that +was found about the place; for at that date iron was expensive, and +wood that had grown crooked and was therefore strong as well as curved +was useful for a hundred purposes. Fastened to a wall, for instance, +it did for a hook upon which to hang things. If an apple-tree died in +the orchard it was cut out to form part of a plough and saved till +wanted. + +Jonathan's hard head withstood even the whirl of the days when corn +was at famine prices. But these careful economies, this continual +saving, put more money in his purse than all that sudden flush of +prosperity. Every groat thus saved was as a nail driven into an oak, +fixed and stable, becoming firmer as time went on. How strangely +different the farmers of to-day, with a score of machines and +appliances, with expensive feeding-stuffs, with well-furnished villas! +Each one of Jonathan's beans in his quart mug, each one of the acorns +in his pocket became a guinea. + +Jonathan's hat was made to measure on his own special block by the +hatter in Overboro' town, and it was so hard and stout that he could +sit upon it without injury. His top-boots always hung near the +fireplace, that they might not get mouldy; and he rode into market +upon his 'short-tail horse,' as he called his crop-tail nag. A farmer +was nothing thought of unless he wore top-boots, which seemed a +distinguishing mark, as it were, of the equestrian order of +agriculture. + +But his shoes were made straight; not as now one to each foot--a right +and left--but each exactly alike; and he changed his shoes every +morning, wearing one on one foot one day and on the other the next, +that they might not get worn to either foot in particular. Shoes +lasted a great length of time in those days, the leather being all +tanned with oak bark only, and thoroughly seasoned before it was cut +up. There is even a story of a farmer who wore his best shoes every +Sunday for seven years in Sundays--fifty years--and when he died had +them buried with him, still far from worn out. + +A traveller once returned from America--in those days a very far-off +land--and was recounting the wonders he had seen, and among them how +the folk there used sleighs, not only for driving in but for the +removal of heavy goods. But Jonathan did not think it strange, since +when he was young wheeled vehicles were not so common. He had himself +seen loads of hay drawn home on 'sleds' from English meadows, and +could tell where a 'sled' had last been used. There were aged men +living about the hamlet in his day--if that could be called a hamlet +in which there were barely a score of people, all told--who could +recollect when the first waggon came to The Idovers. At all events, +they pointed out a large field, called the Conigers, where it was +taken to turn it round; for it was constructed in so primitive a style +that the forewheels would not pass under the body, and thus required a +whole field to turn in. + +At that date folk had no banking accounts, but kept their coin in a +strong chest under the bed, sometimes hiding it in strange places. +Jonathan was once visiting a friend, and after they had hobnobbed a +while the old fellow took him, with many precautions that they should +not be observed, into the pig-sty and showed him fifty guineas hid in +the thatch. That was by no means all his property, but the old fellow +said, with a wink, that he liked to have a little hoard of his own +that his wife knew nothing about. + +Some land being put up for sale, after biddings by the well-to-do +residents, an old dealer in a very small way, as was supposed, bid +above them all. The company looked upon him with contempt, and his +offer was regarded as mere folly; but he produced a nail-bag from +under his coat and counted out the money. A nail-bag is made of the +coarsest of all kinds of sacking. In this manner the former +generation, eschewing outward show, collected their money coin by +coin, till at last they became substantial men and owners of real +estate. So few were the conveniences of life that men had often to +leave the road and cross several fields out of their way to light +their pipes at a burning couch-heap or lime-kiln. + +They prided themselves then in that hill district that they had +neither a cow nor a poor married man in the parish. There was no cow, +because it was entirely a corn-growing place. The whole resident +population was not much over a score, and of the labourers they +boasted not one was married. For in those old times each parish kept +its own poor, and consequently disliked an increase of the population. +The farmers met in vestry from time to time to arrange for the support +of the surplus labour; the appearance of a fresh family would have +meant a fresh tax upon them. They regarded additional human beings as +an incumbrance. + +The millers sent their flour round the country then on packhorses; +waggons and carts were not so common as now, while the ways, when you +once quitted the main road, were scarcely passable. Even the main +roads were often in such a state that foot-passengers could not get +along, but left the road and followed a footpath just inside the +hedge. Such footpaths ran beside the roads for miles; here and there +in country places a short section of such tracks may still be found. +'Pack-roads,' too, may be occasionally met with, retaining their +designation to this day. It was the time of the great wars with the +First Napoleon; and the poor people, as the wheat went up to famine +prices, were often in a strait for bread. When the miller's packhorse +appeared the cottagers crowded round and demanded the price: if it had +risen a penny, the infuriated mob of women would sometimes pull the +miller's boy off the horse and duck him in the village pond. + +The memory of those old times is still vivid in farmhouses, and at +Hilary's I have myself handled old Jonathan's walking-staff, which he +and his father before him used in traversing on foot those perilous +roads. It was about five feet long, perhaps more, an inch and a half +in diameter, and shod with an iron ferrule and stout spike. With this +he could prod the sloughs and ascertain their depth, or use it as a +leaping-pole; and if threatened by sturdy rogues whirl it about their +heads as a quarter-staff. + +Wars and famines were then terrible realities--men's minds were full +of them, and superstition flourished. The foggers and shepherds saw +signs in the sky and read the stars. Down at Lucketts' Place one +winter's night, when folk almost fancied they could hear the roar of +Napoleon's cannon, the old fogger came rushing in with the news that +the armies could be seen fighting in the heavens. It was an aurora, +the streamers shooting up towards the zenith, and great red spots +among the stars, the ghastly stains of the wounded. The old fogger +declared that as he went out with his lantern to attend to the cows +calving he could see the blood dripping on the back of his hand as it +fell down from the battling hosts above. + +To us the ignorance even of such comparatively recent times is almost +incredible. As Hilary was telling me of such things as we sat in his +house one evening, there grew upon our ears a peculiar sound, a +humming deep bass, somewhat resembling the low notes of a piano with a +pressure on the pedal. It increased and became louder, coming from the +road which passed the house; it was caused by a very large flock of +sheep driven slowly. The individual 'baa' of each lamb was so mixed, +as it were, with the bleat of its fellow that the swelling sound took +a strange, mysterious tone; a voice that seemed to speak of trouble, +and perplexity, and anxiety for rest. Hilary, as a farmer, must of +course go out to see whose they were, and I went with him; but before +he reached the garden gate he turned back, remarking, 'It's Johnson's +flock; I know the tang of his tankards.' The flat-shaped bells hung on +a sheep's neck are called tankards; and Hilary could distinguish one +flock from another by the varying notes of their bells. + +Reclining on the sweet short sward under the hawthorn on the Down I +looked over the Idover plain, and thought of the olden times. As I +gazed I presently observed, far away beside some ricks, the short +black funnel of an engine, and made it out to be a steam-plough +waiting till the corn should be garnered to tear up the stubble. How +much meaning there lay in the presence of that black funnel! There +were the same broad open fields, the same beautiful crops of golden +wheat, the same green hills, and the same sun ripening the grain. But +how strangely changed all human affairs since old Jonathan, in his +straight-made shoes, with his pike-staff, and the acorns in his +pocket, trudged along the footpaths! + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE CUCKOO-FIELDS. + + +The cuckoos came so frequently to some grass-land just outside the +Chace and sloping down to the brook that I gave the spot the name of +the Cuckoo-fields. There were two detached copses in them of no great +extent, and numerous oaks and hawthorns, while the brook below was +bordered with willow-stoles. This stretch of grass was divided into +two large fields by a line of decaying posts and rails, and it became +a favourite resort of mine in the warm days of spring, because I could +almost always see and hear the cuckoos there. + +Why they should love it so much is not easy to tell, unless on account +of the comparatively barren character of the soil. The earth seemed to +be of a very different kind to that in the rich and fertile meadows +and fields close by; for the grass was rough, short, and thin, and +soon became greyish or brown as the summer advanced, burning or drying +up under the sun. It may often be observed that a piece of waste, like +furze, when in the midst of good land, is much frequented by all birds +and animals, though where there is nothing else but waste they are +often almost entirely absent. + +As the oaks come out into full leaf, the time when the meadows become +beautiful, the notes of the cuckoo sound like a voice crying 'Come +hither' from the trees. Then, sitting on the grey and lichen-covered +rail under the cover of a hawthorn, I saw sometimes two and sometimes +three cuckoos following each other courting, now round the copse, now +by the hedge or the brook, and presently along the rails where they +constantly perched. Occasionally one would alight on the sward among +the purple flowers of the meadow orchis. From the marshy meadow across +the brook apeew it rose from time to time, uttering his plaintive call +and wheeling to and fro on the wing. At the sound a second and a third +appeared in succession, and after beating up and down for a few +minutes settled again in the grass. The meadow might have been called +a plovery--as we say rookery and heronry--for the green plovers or +peewits always had several nests in it. + +The course of the humble bees that went by could be watched for some +way--their large size and darker colour made them visible--as they now +went down into the grass, and now started forward again. The honey +bees, small and somewhat lighter in colour, could not be seen so far. +They were busy in the sunshine, for the hive bee must gather most of +its honey before the end of July, before the scythe has laid the grass +in the last meadow low. Few if any flowers come up after the scythe +has gone over, except the white clover, which almost alone shows in +the aftermath, or, as country people call it, the 'lattermath.' Near +me a titlark every few minutes rose from the sward, and spreading his +wings came down aslant, singing with all his might. + +Some sarsen stones just showed above the grass: the old folk say that +these boulders grow in size and increase in number. The fact is that +in some soils the boulder protrudes more and more above the surface in +the course of time, and others come into view that were once hidden; +while in another place the turf rises, and they seem to slowly sink +into the earth. The monotonous and yet pleasing cry of the peewits, +the sweet titlark singing overhead, and the cuckoos flying round, +filled the place with the magic charm of spring. + +Coming to these Cuckoo-fields day after day, there was always +something to interest me, either in the meadows themselves or on the +way thither. The very dust of the road had something to show. For +under the shadowy elms a little seed or grain had jolted down through +the chinks in the bed of a passing waggon, and there the chaffinches +and sparrows had congregated. As they moved to and fro they had left +the marks of their feet in the thick white dust, so crossed and +intertangled in a maze of tracks that no one could have designed so +delicate and intricate a pattern. If it was cloudy, still, glancing +over the cornfields, just as you turned partly round to look, there +seemed a brilliant streak of sunshine across them. This was a broad +band of charlock: its light yellow is so gaudy and glaring in the mass +that as it first catches the eye it seems as if the land were lit up +by the sun. After it the buttercups appear of a quiet colour, like +dead gold in contrast. + +Under-foot, almost in the very dust of the road, the silverweed opened +its yellow petals, and where there was a dry bank, or by the gateways +leading into the corn, the pink pimpernel grew. For some time I +suspected the pimpernel of not invariably closing its petals before +rain, and at last by precise observation found that it did not. Twice +in a comparatively short period I noted the petals wide open within a +few minutes of a shower. It appears rather to close during the +atmospheric change which occurs previous to rain than to rain itself. +Once now and then a shower seems to come up in the driest weather +without warning or change in the atmosphere: the cloud is over and +gone almost before it seems worth while to take shelter. To the +approach of such shower-clouds the pimpernel does not invariably +respond, but it is perfectly accurate if anything serious be brewing. +By a furrow in the sward by the roadside there grew a little piece of +some species of gorse--so small and delicate, with the tiniest yellow +flowers, that it was well worthy of a place where it would be admired; +for few could have seen it hidden there. + +Birds'-foot lotus covered the sward of one part of the Cuckoo-fields, +on the higher ground near the woods, where the soil was dry; and by +the hedge there were some bushy plants of the rest-harrow, whose +prickly branches repel cattle and whose appearance reproaches the +farmer for neglect. Yet though an outcast with animals and men, it +bears a beautiful flower, butterfly-shaped and delicately tinted with +pink. Now, as the days roll on, the blue succory and the scarlet +poppies stand side by side in the yellow wheat but just outside my +Cuckoo-fields, and one or two stray corncockles bloom; they are not +common here and are perhaps brought from a distance. Here you may walk +many miles and even wait several harvests to see a corncockle. + +The thistledown floats; and see, yonder the white balls are rolling +before the gentle air along the very tips of the bronzing wheat-ears. +By the hedge the straggling stalks of St. John's wort lift the yellow +petals dotted with black specks above the bunches of grass. The +leaves, held up to the light, seem to have numerous eyelets, as if +pricked but not quite through--windows in the leaf. In the grass the +short selfheal shows; and, leaning over the gate, on the edge of the +wheat you may see the curious prickly seed-vessels of the corn +buttercup--the 'hedgehog'--whose spines, however, will not scratch the +softest skin. + +Resting on the rail under the hawthorn for a minute or two in early +spring, when it was too chilly to stay long, I watched a flock of +rooks and jackdaws soaring in the sky. Round and round and ever +upwards they circled, the jackdaws of course betraying their presence +by their call; up towards the blue, as if in the joy of their hearts, +they held a festival, happy in the genial weather and the approach of +the nesting-time. This soaring and wheeling is evidently done for +recreation, like a dance. Presently the flock seems to tumble and +fall, and there comes the rushing sound of the air swiftly parted by +their out-spread wings as they dive a hundred feet in a second. The +noise is audible a quarter of a mile off. This, too, is play; for, +catching themselves and regaining their balance just above the elms, +they resume their steady flight onwards to distant feeding-grounds. +Later in the season, sitting there in the warm evenings, I could hear +the pheasants utter their peculiar roost-cry, and the noise of their +wings as they flew up in the wood: the vibration is so loud that it +might almost be described as thumping. + +By-and-by the cuckoo began to lose his voice; he gurgled and gasped, +and cried 'cuck--kuk--kwai--kash,' and could not utter the soft, +melodious 'oo.' The latest date on which I ever heard the cuckoo here, +to be certain, was the day before St. Swithin, July 14, 1879. The +nightingales, too, lose their sweet notes, but not their voices; they +remain in the hedges long after their song has ceased. Passing by the +hawthorn bushes up to the end of July, you may hear a bird within that +seems to threaten you with a loud 'sweet-kurr,' and, looking in, you +will find it to be a nightingale. The spelling exactly represents the +sound, 'r' being twirled. 'Sweet-kurr-kurr' comes from the interior of +the bushes with an angry emphasis. + +Along the lower part of these meadows there was a brook, and the +brook-sparrows were chattering ceaselessly as I walked among the +willow-stoles by it one morning towards the end of June. On the left +hand the deep stream flowed silently round its gentle curves, and on +the other through the willows and alders the grassy slope of the +Cuckoo-fields was visible. Broad leaves of the marsh marigold, the +flower long since gone, covered the ground; light-green horsetails +were dotted thickly about; and tall grasses flourished, rising to the +knee. Dark shallow pools were so hidden under these grasses and plants +that the presence of the black and yet clear water could not be +perceived until the foot sank into it. + +The sedge-birds kept just in front of me, now busy on a willow-stole, +and concealed in the grasses and moss which grew out of the decaying +wood; now among the sedges covering the mudbanks where the brook had +silted up; now in the hedge which divided the willows from the meadow. +Still the peculiar sparrow-like note, the ringing chirp, came +continually from their throats; the warm sultry day delighted them. +One clung to the side of a slender flag, which scarcely seemed strong +enough to support it, yet did not even bend under its weight; then on +again as I came nearer--but only two or three yards--to recommence +singing immediately. + +Pushing through the brushwood and past the reddish willow-poles, I +entered a very thicket of flags, rising to the shoulder. These were +not ribbed or bayonet-shaped, but flat, like a long sword. Three or +four sprang from a single root, broad and tall, and beside them a +stalk, and on it the yellow iris in fall flower. The marsh seemed lit +up with these bright lamps of colour under the shadowy willows and the +dark alders. There were a dozen at least within a few yards close +around, and others dimly visible through the branches--three large +yellow petals drooping, and on the curve of each brownish mottled +markings or lines delicately stippled, beside them a rolled spike-like +bloom not yet unfolded: a flower of the waters, crowned with gold, +above the green dwellers by the shore. + +Here the sedge-birds left me, doubling back to their favourite +willow-stoles and sedges. Further on, the ground rose, and on the +drier bank the 'gicks' grew shoulder high, towering over the brambles. +It was difficult to move through the tangled underwood, so I went out +into the Cuckoo-fields. Hilary had drained away much of the water that +used to form a far larger marsh about here, and calculated his +levellings in a most ingenious manner with a hollow 'gicks.' He took a +wooden bowl, and filled it to the brim with water. Then cutting a dry +'gicks' so that it should be open at either end, like a tube, he +floated it--the stalk is very light--on the bowl. Looking through this +tube he could get his level almost as accurately as with an engineer's +instrument, though of course it was more cumbrous to use. + +There was a corner here that had not been mown for a long time, and in +the autumn the wild carrots took possession of it, almost to the +exclusion of grass and other plants. The flower of the wild carrot +gathers together as the seeds mature, and forms a framework cup at the +top of the stalk, like a bird's-nest. These 'bird's-nests,' brown and +weather-beaten, endured far into the winter. The brook-sparrows still +sang as I passed by again in the evening; they seem the most unwearied +of birds, for you may hear them all day, all the evening, and at one +o'clock next morning; indeed, at intervals, all night. By night the +note is, or appears to be, less sparrow-like, or perhaps the silence +of night improves it to the ear. I stayed that evening in a corner of +a wheatfield not yet yellow, and watched the shadows of the trees grow +longer and broader as the sun declined. + +As the breeze rushed over the corn there was a play of various shades +of green, the stalks as they bent this and that way taking different +hues. But under the hedge it was still; the wind could not come +through, though it moved the boughs above. A mass of cloud like flocks +of wool, mottled and with small spaces of blue between, drifted slowly +eastwards, and its last edge formed an arch over the western horizon, +under which the sun shone. The yellow vetchling had climbed up from +the ditch and opened its flower, and there were young nuts on the +hazel bough. Far away in a copse a wood-pigeon called; nearer the +blackbirds were whistling; a willow wren uttered his note high in the +elm, and a distant yellowhammer sang to the sinking sun. + +The brook had once been much wider, and in flood times rendered the +Overboro' road almost impassable; for before a bridge was built it +spread widely and crossed the highway--a rushing, though shallow, +torrent fifty yards broad. The stumps of the willows that had grown by +it could still be found in places, and now and then an ancient +'bullpoll' was washed up. This grass is so tough that the tufts or +cushions it forms will last in water for fifty years, even when rooted +up--decayed of course and black, but still distinguishable. In those +times just previous to the construction of railways, when the lord of +the manor came down after Parliament rose, there used to be a +competition to get hold of his coachman. So few agricultural people +travelled, and news came so slowly and in such distorted fashion, that +the coachman became a great authority. Such a brook as this was then +often a serious obstacle. + +There was still an old punt, seldom used, to be found in a rickyard of +Hilary's, close by which was an extensive pond. The punt was thatched +over with flags from the stream. The moorhens were fond of this pond +because it was surrounded with a great quantity of rushes; they were +numerous all up the brook. These birds, being tame and common, are not +much regarded either for sport or the table, yet a moorhen shot at the +right time of the year--not till the frosts have begun--is delicious +eating. If the bird were rare it would be thought to rival the +woodcock; as it is, probably few people ever taste it. The path to +Lucketts' Place from this rickyard passed a stone-quarry, where the +excavated stone was built up in square heaps. In these heaps, in which +there were many interstices and hollows, rabbits often sat out; and by +stopping the entrance and carefully removing the stones they might +occasionally be taken by hand. Next by the barn where in spring the +sparrows made a continuous noise, chirping and quarrelling as they +carried on their nesting operations: they sometimes flew up with long +green bennets and grass fibres as well as with dry straws. + +Then across the road, where the flint-heaps always put me in mind of +young Aaron; for he once gravely assured me that they were the very +best places in the world on which to rest or sleep. The flints were +dry, and preserved the slumbering wayfarer from damp. He had no doubt +proved this when the ale was too strong. At the house, as I passed +through the courtyard, I found him just on the point of starting for +Overboro' with a wallet, to bring back some goods from the shops. The +wallet is almost unknown even in farmsteads now: it is a kind of long +bag closed at each end, but with a slit in the centre for the +insertion of the things to be conveyed. When filled it is slung over +the shoulder, one end in front and the other behind, so as to balance. +Without knowing the shape of a wallet the story of Jack the +Giant-Killer stowing away such enormous quantities of pudding is +scarcely to be understood: children nowadays never see such a thing. +Many nursery tales contain allusions of this kind, the meaning of +which must be obscure to the rising generation. + +Within doors I found a great discussion going forward between Hilary +and a farmer who had called, as to the exact relationship of a man who +had just quitted his tenancy and another who died nearly forty years +before. They could not agree either as to the kinship or the date; +though the visitor was the more certain because he so well remembered +that there was an extraordinary cut of 'turvin' that year. The +'turvin' is the hay made on the leaze, not the meadows, out of the +rough grass and bennets left by the cows. To listen to the zest with +which they entered into the minutest details of the family affairs of +so long ago, concerning people with whom neither had any +connection--how they recollected the smallest particulars--was +astonishing. This marvellous capacity for gossip seemed like a +revelation of a totally different state of society. The memory of +country people for such details is beyond belief. + +When the visitor left with his wife we walked to the gate and saw them +down the road; and it was curious to note that they did not walk side +by side. If you meet a farmer of the old style and his wife walking +together, never do you see them arm-in-arm. The husband walks a yard +or two in front, or else on the other side of the road; and this even +when they are going to church. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +CICELY'S DAIRY. HILARY'S TALK. + + +Just outside the palings of the courtyard at Lucketts' Place, in front +of the dairy, was a line of damson and plum trees standing in a narrow +patch bordered by a miniature box-hedge. The thrushes were always +searching about in this box, which was hardly high enough to hide +them, for the snails which they found there. They broke the shells on +the stone flags of the garden path adjacent, and were often so +intently occupied in the box as to seem to fly up from under the very +feet of any one who passed. + +Under the damson tree the first white snowdrops came, and the +crocuses, whose yellow petals often appeared over the snow, and +presently the daffodils and the beautiful narcissus. There were +cowslips and primroses, too, which the boys last year had planted +upside down that they might come variegated. The earliest violet was +gathered there, for the corner was enclosed on three sides, and +somehow the sunshine fell more genially in that untrimmed spot than in +formal gardens where it is courted. Against the house a pear was +trained, and opened its white bloom the first of all: in its shelter +the birds built their nests. The chaffinches called cheerfully on the +plum-trees and sang in the early morning. When the apples bloomed, the +goldfinches visited the same trees at least once a day. + +A damask rose opened its single petals, the sweetest-scented of all +the roses; there were a few strawberries under the wall of the house; +by-and-by the pears above enlarged, and the damsons were coated with +the bloom. On the tall plum-trees hung the large purplish-red plums: +upon shaking the tree, one or two came down with a thud. The branches +of the damsons depended so low, looking, as it were, right into the +court and pressing the fruit against your very face as you entered, +that you could not choose but take some when it was ripe. A +blue-painted barrel-churn stood by the door; young Aaron turned it in +the morning, while the finches called in the plum-trees, but now and +then not all the strength of his sturdy shoulders nor patient hours of +turning could 'fetch' the butter, for a witch had been busy. + +Sometimes on entering the dairy in the familiar country way, you might +find Cicely, now almost come to womanhood, at the cheese-tub. As she +bent over it her rounded arms, bare nearly to the shoulder, were laved +in the white milk. It must have been from the dairy that Poppæa +learned to bathe in milk, for Cicely's arms shone white and smooth, +with the gleam of a perfect skin. But Mrs. Luckett would never let her +touch the salt, which will ruin the hands. Cicely, however, who would +do something, turned the cheeses in the cheese-room alone. Taking one +corner of the clean cloth in her teeth, in a second, by some dexterous +sleight-of-hand, the heavy cheese was over, though ponderous enough to +puzzle many a man, especially as it had to come over gently that the +shape might not be injured. + +She did it without the least perceptible exertion. At the moment of +the turn, when the weight must have been felt, there was no knot of +muscle visible on her arm. That is the difference; for + + When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw + +the muscles of the man's limb knot themselves and stand out in bold +relief. The smooth contour of Cicely's arm never varied. Mrs. Luckett, +talking about cheese as we watched Cicely one morning, said people's +taste have much altered; for she understood they were now fond of a +foreign sort that was full of holes. The old saying was that bread +should be full of holes, cheese should have none. Just then Hilary +entered and completed the triad by adding that ale should make you see +double. + +So he called for the brown jug, and he and I had a glass. On my side +of the jug stood a sportsman in breeches and gaiters, his gun +presented, and ever in the act to fire: his dog pointed, and the birds +were flying towards Hilary. Though rude in design the scene was true +to nature and the times: from the buttons on the coat to the long +barrel of the gun, the details were accurate and nothing improved to +suit the artist's fancy. To me these old jugs and mugs and bowls have +a deep and human interest, for you can seem to see and know the men +who drank from them in the olden days. + +Now a tall Worcester vase, with all its elegance and gilding, though +it may be valued at 5,000_l._, lacks that sympathy, and may please the +eye but does not touch the heart. For it has never shared in the +jovial feast nor comforted the weary; the soul of man has never +communicated to it some of its own subtle essence. But this hollow +bowl whispers back the genial songs that were shouted over it a +hundred years ago. On the ancient Grecian pottery, too, the hunter +with his spear chases the boar or urges his hounds after the flying +deer; the women are dancing, and you can almost hear the notes of the +flute. These things were part of their daily life; these are no +imaginary pictures of imaginary and impossible scenes: they are simply +scenes in which every one then took part. So I think that the old +English jugs and mugs and bowls are true art, with something of the +antique classical spirit in them, for truly you can read the hearts of +the folk for whom they were made. They have rendered the interpretation +easy by writing their minds upon them: the motto, 'Prosperity to the +Flock,' for instance, is a good one still; and 'Drink fair; don't +swear,' is yet a very pleasant and suitable admonition. + +As I looked at the jug, the cat coughed under the table. 'Ah,' said +Mrs. Luckett, 'when the cat coughs, the cold goes through the house.' +Hilary, returning to the subject of the cheese, said that the best was +made when the herd grazed on old pastures: there was a pasture field +of his which it was believed had been grazed for fully two hundred +years. When he was a boy, the cheese folk made to keep at home for +eating often became so hard that, unable to cut it, they were obliged +to use a saw. Still longer ago, they used to despatch a special cheese +to London in the road-waggon; it was made in thin vats (pronounced in +the dairy 'vates'), was soft, and eaten with radishes. Another hard +kind was oval-shaped, or like a pear; it was hung up in nets to +mature, and traded to the West Indies. + +He looked to see when the moon changed in 'Moore's Almanac,' which was +kept for ready reference on the mantelpiece. Next to Bible and +Prayer-book comes old Moore's rubric in the farmhouse--that rubric +which declares the 'vox stellarum.' There are old folk who still +regret the amendments in the modern issue, and would have back again +the table which laid down when the influence of the constellations was +concentrated in each particular limb and portion of the body. In his +oaken cabinet Hilary had 'Moore' from the beginning of the century, or +farther back, for his fathers had saved them before him. On the narrow +margins during his own time he had jotted down notes of remarkable +weather and the events of the farm, and could tell you the very day +cow 'Beauty' calved twenty years ago. + +I thought the ale good, but Hilary was certain it was not equal to +what he used to brew himself before he had so large an acreage to look +after, and indeed before the old style of farm-life went out of +fashion. Then he used to sit up all night watching--for brewing is a +critical operation--and looking out of doors now and then to pass the +long hours saw the changes of the sky, the constellations rising in +succession one after the other, and felt the slight variations of the +wind and of moisture or dryness in the air which predict the sunshine +or the shower of the coming day. He seemed to have thought a good deal +in those lonely watches; but he passed it off by referring to the +malting. Barn barley was best for malting--_i.e._ that which had been +stored in a barn and therefore kept perfectly dry, for ricks sometimes +get wet before they can be thatched. But barn barley was not often +come by nowadays, as one by one the old barns disappeared: burned +perhaps, and not rebuilt. He had ceased to brew for some time; Cicely +could, however, remember sipping the sweet wort, which is almost too +sweet for the palate after childhood. + +They still baked a batch of bread occasionally, but not all that +was required. Cicely superintended the baking, passing the barm +through a sieve with a wisp of clean hay in it. The hay takes off +any sourness, and ensures it being perfectly sweet. She knew when +the oven was hot enough by the gauge-brick: this particular brick +as the heat increased became spotted with white, and when it had +turned quite white the oven was ready. The wood embers were raked +out with the scraper, and the malkin, being wetted, cleaned out the +ashes. 'Thee looks like a gurt malkin' is a common term of reproach +among the poor folk--meaning a bunch of rags on the end of a stick. +We went out to look at the oven; and then Mrs. Luckett made me taste +her black-currant gin, which was very good. Presently we went into +the orchard to look at the first apple-tree out in bloom. While +there a magpie flew across the meadow, and as I watched it Mrs. +Luckett advised me to turn my back and not to look too long in that +direction. 'For,' said she, 'one magpie is good luck, but two mean +sorrow; and if you should see three--goodness!--something awful +might happen.'[1] + + [1] See Notes. + +One lovely June afternoon as Hilary and I strolled about the fields, +we passed some lambs at play. 'Lamb is never good eating without +sunshine,' said Hilary. Not only wheat and plants generally but +animals also are affected by the absence of sun, so that the epicure +should hope as devoutly as the farmer that the dull and overcast +season of 1879 will not be repeated. Hilary's remark was founded upon +the experience of long years--such experience as is only to be found +in farmhouses where kindred succeed each other, and hand down +practical observations from father to son. + +The thistles were showing rather strongly in the barley--the result of +last year's rain and the consequent impossibility of proper clearing. +These thistles he thought came from portions of the root and not from +seed. Last year all the farmers had been Latter Lammas men. The 1st of +August is Lammas Day; and in the old time if a farmer had neglected +his work and his haymaking was still unfinished on August 13 (_i.e._ +old style), he was called in reproach a Latter Lammas man. But last +year (1879) they were all alike, and the hay was about till September; +yet Hilary could recollect it being all done by St. Swithin's, July +15. + +Sometimes, however, the skilled and careful agriculturist did not +succeed so well as the lazy one. Once in seven years there came a +sloven's year, according to the old folk, when the sloven had a +splendid crop of wheat and hardly knew where to put it. Such a harvest +was as if a man had gone round his farm with the sun in one hand and +the watering-pot in the other! Last year there had been nearly as much +mathern (wild camomile) and willow-wind (convolvulus and buckwheat) as +crop, and he did not want to see the colt's tail in the sky so often +again. The colt's tail is a cloud with a bushy appearance like a +ragged fringe, and portends rain. + +I remarked that it was curious how thunderstorms sometimes returned on +the same day of the week and at the same hour for a month running. +Hilary said they had been known to return every day at the same hour. +The most regular operation on a farm is the milking: one summer his +fogger declared it came on to thunder day after day in the afternoon +just as he took his yoke off his shoulders. Such heavy and continuous +downpour not only laid the crops, but might spoil them altogether; for +laid barley had been known to sprout there and then, and was of course +totally spoiled. It was a mistake to associate thunder solely with hot +weather; the old folk used to say that it was never too cold to +thunder and never too warm to snow. + +A sweet yet faintly pungent odour came on the light breeze over the +next field--a scent like clover, but with a slight reminiscence of the +bean-flower. It arose from the yellow flower of the hop-trefoil: honey +sometimes has a flavour which resembles it. The hop-trefoil is a +favourite crop for sheep, but Hilary said it was too soft for horses. +The poppies were not yet out in the wheat. When in full bloom some of +the cottagers gather the scarlet flowers in great quantities and from +them make poppy wine. This liquor has a fine colour and is very heady, +and those who make it seem to think much of it. Upon the hills where +furze grows plentifully the flowers are also collected, and a dye +extracted from them. Ribbons can thus be dyed a bright yellow, but it +requires a large quantity of the flowers. + +A little farther a sheep-dog looked at us from a gateway; and on +coming nearer we found the shepherd busily engaged cutting the feet of +his sheep one by one with a keen knife. They had got the foot-rot down +in a meadow--they do not suffer from it on the arable uplands where +folded--and the shepherd was now applying a caustic solution. Every +shepherd has his own peculiar specific, which he believes to be the +only certain remedy. + +Tar is used in the sheepfold, just as it used to be when sweet +Dowsabell went forth to gather honeysuckle and lady's-smock nearly +three centuries since. For the shepherd with whom she fell in love +carried + + His tar-boxe on his broad belt hong. + +So, too, + + He leared his sheepe as he him list + When he would whistle in his fist; + +and the shepherd still guides and encourages his sheep by whistling. + +Hilary said that years ago the dogs kept at farmhouses in that +district did not seem of such good breeds, nor were there so many +varieties as at present. They were mostly sheep-dogs, or mongrels of +the sheep-dog cast; for little attention was paid to breed. Dogs of +this kind, with shaggy black coats and stump tails, could be found at +most farms, and were often of a savage disposition; so much so that it +was occasionally necessary to break their teeth that they might not +injure the sheep. From his description the dogs at the present day +must be far superior; indeed, there seems to have been no variety of +dog and no purity of breed at that time (in that neighbourhood); +meaning, of course, outside the gamekeeper's kennels, or the hounds +used for hunting. Shepherds like to keep their flock in hurdles, +folded as much as possible, that they may not rub their wool off and +so get a ragged appearance. Once now and then in wet weather the +ground becomes so soft that a flock will not move, their narrow feet +sinking so deeply in the mud. It is then necessary to 'dog them +out'--to set the dog at them--and the excitement, fright, and exertion +have been known to kill one or more of the flock. + +Passing on to the lower grounds, we entered the meadows, where the men +were at haycart. The cart-horses wore glittering brazen ornaments, +crescent-shaped, in front of the neck, and one upon the forehead. Have +these ornaments a history?[2] The carters and ploughmen have an +old-world vocabulary of their own, saying 'toward' for anything near +or leaning towards you, and 'vrammards' for the reverse. 'Heeld' or +'yeeld,' again, is ploughman's language; when the newly sown corn does +not 'heeld' or 'yeeld' it requires the harrow. In the next field, +which the mowers had but just cut, the men were 'tedding'--_i.e._ +spreading the swathe with their prongs. Hilary said that hay was a +safe speculation if a man could afford to wait; for every few years it +was sure to be extremely dear, so that the old people said, 'Old hay, +old gold.' + + [2] See Notes. + +As we returned towards Lucketts' Place, he pointed out to me a distant +house upon which he said slates had been first used in that +neighbourhood. Fifty or sixty years since no slates were to be seen +there, and when they began to be introduced the old folk manifested +great opposition. They said slate would never last--the moss would eat +through it, and so cause holes; and, in fact, some of the slate that +was brought up did decay and become useless. But that was, of course, +an inferior kind, quite different to what is now employed. In so +comparatively short a period has everything--even the mode of +roofing--changed that the introduction of slates is still in many +places within the memory of man. Hilary had still a lingering +preference for thatch; and though he could not deny the utility of +slate, his inclination was obviously in favour of straw. He assured me +that good straw from a good harvest (for there was much difference in +it), well laid on by a good thatcher, had been known to keep out the +weather for forty-five years. + +We looked into the garden at the Place, where Hilary particularly +called my attention to the kidney-beans; for, said he, if the +kidney-beans run up the sticks well, with a strong vine, then it would +be a capital hop-year. On the contrary, if they were weak and poor, +the hops would prove a failure. Thus the one plant was an index to the +other, though they might be growing a hundred miles apart, both being +particularly sensitive to the same atmospheric influences. + +In a distant tree beyond the rickyard there was something hanging in +the branches that I could not quite make out: it was a limb of a dead +horse. A cart-horse belonging to a neighbouring farmer had met with an +accident and had to be killed, when, according to old custom, portions +were sent round to each adjacent farmstead for the dogs, which then +had a feast. Thus, said Hilary, according to the old saw, the death of +a horse is the life of a dog. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE WATER-MILL. FIELD NAMES. + + +'Our time be a-most gone by,' said the miller looking up from his work +and laying aside the millpeck for a moment as he rubbed his eyes with +his white and greasy sleeve. From a window of the old mill by +Okebourne I was gazing over the plain green with rising wheat, where +the titlarks were singing joyously in the sunshine. A millstone had +been 'thrown off' on some full sacks--like cushions--and Tibbald, the +miller, was dexterously pecking the grooves afresh. + +The millpeck is a little tool like a double adze, or perhaps rather +like two chisels set in the head of a mallet. Though age was stealing +upon him, Tibbald's eye and hand were still true, and his rude +sculpture was executed with curious precision. The grooves, which are +the teeth of the millstone, radiate from the centre, but do not +proceed direct to the edge: they slant slightly. + +'There bean't many as can do this job,' he said, 'I can put in sixteen +or twenty to the inch. These old French burrs be the best stone; they +be hard, but they be mild and takes the peck well.' Ponderous as the +millstones appear, they are capable of being set so that their +surfaces shall grind with extreme accuracy. The nether, called the +'bed stone,' is stationary; the upper millstone, or 'runner,' +revolves, and the grain crushed between the two works out along the +furrows to the edge. + +Now and then the miller feels the grain as it emerges with his pudgy +thumb and finger, and knows by touch how the stones are grinding. It +is perceptibly warm at the moment it issues forth, from the friction: +yet the stones must not grind too close, or they 'kill' the wheat, +which should be only just cracked, so as to skin well. To attain this +end, first, the surfaces of the stones must be level, and the grooves +must be exactly right; and, secondly, the upper stone must be hung at +the exact distance above the other to the smallest fraction of an +inch. The upper millstone is now sometimes balanced with lead, which +Tibbald said was not the case of old. + +'We used to have a good trade at this mill,' he continued, as he +resumed his pecking; 'but our time be a-most gone by. We be too fur +away up in these here Downs. There! Listen to he!' A faint hollow +whistle came up over the plain, and I saw a long white cloud of steam +miles away, swiftly gliding above the trees beneath which in the +cutting the train was running. + +'That be th' express. It be that there steam as have done for us. +Everything got to go according to that there whistle: they sets the +church clock by he. The big London mills as be driven by steam does +the most of the work; and this here foreign wheat, as comes over in +the steamers, puts the market down, so as we yent got a chance to buy +up a lot and keep it till the price gets better. I seed in the paper +as the rate is gone down a penny: the steamers be going to ship the +American wheat a penny a bushel cheaper. So it bean't much good for +Hilary to talk about his wheat. I thenks that'll about do.' + +He laid down the millpeck, and took his millstaff to prove the work he +had done. This was made of well-seasoned oak, two pieces put together +so that they should not warp. He rubbed the edge with ruddle, and, +placing the millstaff on the stone, turned it about on its shorter +axis: where the ruddle left its red mark more pecking would be +required. There was but one small spot, and this he quickly put right. +Even the seasoned oak, however, is not always true, and to be certain +on the point Tibbald had a millstaff prover. This is of rigid steel, +and the staff is put on it; if any daylight is visible between the two +the staff is not accurate--so delicately must these great stones be +adjusted for successful grinding. + +The largest of them are four feet two inches diameter; and dangerous +things they are to move, for if the men do not all heave or 'give' at +the same moment the stone may slip, and the edge will take off a row +of fingers as clean as the guillotine. Tibbald, of course, had his +joke about that part of the machinery which is called the 'damsel.' He +was a righteous man enough as millers go, but your miller was always a +bit of a knave; nor could he forbear from boasting to me how he had +been half an hour too soon for Hilary last Overboro' market. + +He said the vast water-wheel was of elm, but it would not last so long +up so near the springs. Upon a river or brook the wheel might endure +for thirty years, and grind corn for a generation. His millpond was +close to the spring-head, and the spring-water ate into the wood and +caused it to decay much quicker. The spokes used to be mortised in, +now they used flanges, ironwork having almost destroyed the business +of the ancient millwright. Of all manual workers, probably the old +style of millwright employed the greatest variety of tools, and was +the cleverest in handling them. There seemed no end to the number of +his chisels and augers; some of the augers of immense size. In winter +time the millwright made the millstones, for the best stones are not +in one piece but composed of forty or fifty. The French burrs which +Tibbald preferred come over in fragments, and these are carefully +fitted together and stuck with plaster of Paris. Such work required +great nicety: the old millwright was, in fact, a kind of artist in his +handicraft. + +I could not help regretting, as Tibbald dilated on these things, that +the village millwright no longer existed; the care, the skill, the +forethought, the sense of just proportion he exhibited quite took him +out of the ranks of the mere workman. He was a master of his craft, +and the mind he put into it made him an artist. Tibbald went on that +he did not care for the Derby or Welsh millstones. These were in one +piece, but they were too hard for the delicate grinding necessary to +make the fine flour needed for good bread. They answered best for +barley meal. Now, the French burr was not only hard but mild, and +seemed to feel the corn as it crushed it. A sack of wheat lost 4 lb. +in grinding. I asked about the toll: he showed me the old measure, +reckoned at the tenth of a sack; it was a square box. When the lord's +tenants in the olden times were forced to have their corn ground at +the lord's mill, the toll was liable to be abused in a cruel manner; +hence the universal opinion that a miller must be a knave. Even in +much more recent times, when the labourers took part of their wages in +flour, there is said to have been a great deal of sleight-of-hand in +using the toll-box, and the miller's thumb grew fat by continually +dipping into other folk's sacks. + +But Tibbald had an argument even here, for he said that men nowadays +never grew so strong as they used to do when they brought their own +wheat to be ground at the mill, and when they made their bread and +baked it at home. His own father once carried the fattest man in the +parish on his back half a mile; I forget how much he weighed exactly, +but it was something enormous, and the fat man, moreover, held a 56 +lb. weight in each hand. He himself remembered when Hilary used to be +the strongest man in the place; when the young men met together they +contended who should lift the heaviest weight, and he had seen Hilary +raise 5 cwt., fair lifting, with the hands only, and without any +mechanical appliance. Hilary, too, used to write his name with a +carpenter's flat cedar pencil on the whitewashed ceiling of the +brewhouse, holding the while a 1/2 cwt. of iron hung on his little +finger. The difficulty was to get the weight up, lifting it fairly +from the ground; you could lift it very well half-way, but it was just +when the arm was bent that the tug came to get it past the hip, after +which it would go up comparatively easily. + +Now this great strength was not the result of long and special +training, or, indeed, of any training at all; it came naturally from +outdoor life, outdoor work, plain living (chiefly bacon), and good +bread baked at home. At the present time men ate the finest and +whitest of bread, but there was no good in it. Folk grew tall and +big--taller than they used to be, he thought--and they could run +quick, and so forth; but there was no stamina, no power of endurance, +of withstanding exposure like there was formerly. The mere measure of +a man, he was certain, had nothing to do with his strength; and he +could never understand how it was that the army folk would have men +precisely so high and so many inches round. Just then he was called +away to a carter who had brought up his team and waggon at the door, +and as he was gone some time I went up under the roof, whence there +was a beautiful view down over the plain. + +The swifts, which had but just arrived, were rushing through the sky +in their headlong way; they would build presently in the roof. The +mill was built at the mouth of a coombe on the verge of the Downs; the +coombe was narrow and steep, as if nature had begun a cutting with the +view of tunnelling through the mass of the hills. At the upper end of +the coombe the spring issued, and at the lower was the millpond. There +is something peculiarly human in a mill--something that carries the +mind backwards into the past, the days of crossbow and lance and +armour. Possibly there was truth in Tibbald's idea that men grow +larger in the present time without corresponding strength, for is it +not on record that some at least of the armour preserved in +collections will not fit those who have tried it on in recent times? +Yet the knight for whom it was originally made, though less in stature +and size, may have had much more vigour and power of endurance. + +The ceaseless rains last year sent the farmers in some places to the +local millers once more somewhat in the old style. Part of their wheat +proved so poor that they could not sell it at market; and, rather than +waste it, they had it ground at the village mills with the idea of +consuming as much of the flour as possible at home. But the flour was +so bad as to be uneatable. As I parted with Tibbald that morning he +whispered to me, as he leaned over the hatch, to say a good word for +him with Hilary about the throw of oak that was going on in one part +of the Chace. 'If you was to speak to he, he could speak to the +steward, and may be I could get a stick or two at a bargain'--with a +wink. Tibbald did a little in buying and selling timber, and, indeed, +in many other things. Pleased as he was to show me the mill, and to +talk about it by the hour together, the shrewd old fellow still had an +eye to business. + +After a while, in walking along the footpaths of the meadows and by +the woods, a feeling grew upon me that it would be pleasant to know +something of their history. It was through inquiring about the age of +the rookery that this thought took shape. No one could tell me how +long the rooks had built there, nor were there any passing allusions +in old papers to fix the date. There was no tradition of it among the +oldest people; all they knew was that the rooks had always been there, +and they seemed to indicate a belief that there the rooks would always +remain. It seemed to me, however, that the site of their city was +slowly travelling, and in a few generations might be found on the +other side of the Chace. Some of the trees where the nests were most +numerous were decaying, and several were already deserted. As the +trees died, the rooks moved to the next clump, and thus gradually +shifted their city. + +This inquiry led to further reflections about the past of the woods +and meadows. Besides the birds, the flowers, and animals that had been +there for so many, many centuries, there were the folk in the +scattered homesteads, whose ancestors might have left some record. In +these times history is concerned only with great cities or strategical +positions of world-wide renown; interest is concentrated on a siege of +Paris or a march towards Constantinople. In days of yore battles were +often fought in or near what seem to us mere villages; little places +whose very names are uncertain and exact site unascertainable were the +centres of strife. Some of these places are buried under the sward as +completely as Herculaneum under the lava. The green turf covers them, +the mower passes over with his scythe and knows not of them. + +Hilary had observed in one of his meadows that the turf turned brown +or burnt up in squares during hot summer weather. This he conjectured +to be caused by the shallowness of the soil over some ancient +foundations; and some years before he had had the curiosity to open a +hole, and soon came upon a hidden wall. He did not excavate farther, +but the old folk, when they heard of it, remembered a tradition of a +village having once existed there. At present there were no houses +near; the place, whatever it was, had disappeared. The mention of this +meadow led to some conversation about the names of the fields, which +are often very curious. + +Such names as Lea, Leaze, Croft, and so on, are readily explained; but +what was the original meaning of The Cossicles? Then there were +Zacker's Hook, the Conigers,[3] Cheesecake, Hawkes, Rials, Purley, +Strongbowls, Thrupp, Laines, Sannetts, Gaston, Wexils, Wernils, +Glacemere, several Hams, Haddons, and Weddingtons, Slades, and so on, +and a Truelocks. These were quickly put down; scores of still more +singular names might be collected in every parish. It is the meadows +and pastures which usually bear these designations; the ploughed +fields are often only known by their acreage, as the Ten Acre Piece, +or the Twelve Acres. Some of them are undoubtedly the personal names +of former owners. But in others ancient customs, allusions to +traditions, fragments of history, or of languages now extinct, may +survive. + + [3] See Notes. + +There was a meadow where deep trenches could be traced, green now, but +clearly once a moat, but there was not even a tradition about it. On +the Downs overlooking the Idovers was an earthwork or entrenchment, of +which no one knew anything. Hilary believed there was an old book--a +history of Overboro' town--which might perhaps contain some +information, but where it could be found he did not know. After some +consideration, however, he thought there might be a copy at the Crown, +once an old posting-inn, at Overboro': that was about the only place +where I should be likely to find it. So one warm summer day I walked +into Overboro', following a path over the Downs, whose short sward +affords the best walking in the world. + +At the Crown, now no more an inn but an hotel, the archway was blocked +up with two hand-trucks piled with trunks and portmanteaus, the +property of commercial gentlemen and just about to be conveyed to the +station. What with the ostler and the 'boots' and the errand-boys, all +hanging about for their fees, it was a push to enter; and the waiters +within seemed to equally occupy the passage, fetching the dust-coats +and walking-sticks and flourishing coat-brushes. Seeing a door marked +'Coffee-room,' I took refuge, and having ordered luncheon began to +consider how I should open my subject with the landlord, who was +clearly as much up to the requirements of modern life as if his house +had been by a London terminus. Time-tables in gilt-stamped covers +strewed the tables; wine lists stood on edge; a card of the local +omnibus to the station was stuck up where all could see it; the daily +papers hung over the arm of a cosy chair; the furniture was new; the +whole place, it must be owned, extremely comfortable and the service +good. + +But it was town and not country--to-day and not the olden time; and I +did not feel courage enough to ask for the book. I believe I should +have left the place without mentioning it, but, fortunately looking +round the room while the lunch was prepared, I found it in the +bookcase, where there was a strange mixture of the modern and antique. +I took down the history from between Rich's thin grey 'Ruins of +Babylon' and a yellow-bound railway novel. + +Towards the close of the eighteenth century a learned gentleman had +taken much pains to gather together this account of the town. He began +with the story of Brutus, and showed that one of the monarchs +descended from the illustrious Trojan founded a city here. Some fossil +shells, indeed, that had been dug up furnished him with conclusive +proof that the Deluge had not left the site uncovered, since no how +else could they have got there: an argument commonly accepted in his +day. Thus he commenced, like the monks themselves, with the beginning +of the world; but then came a wide gap down to Domesday Book. The +hides and yardlands held by the conquerors--how much was in demesne, +how many acres were wood and how many meadow--the number of servi, and +what the mill paid were duly translated and recorded. + +The descent of the manors through the monasteries and the persons who +purchased them at the Dissolution filled several pages, and was +supplemented with a charter recognising rights of infang and outfang, +assize of bread and ale, and so forth. Finally, there was a list of +the mayors, which some one had carried on in manuscript on a fly-leaf +to within ten years of date. There was an air of precision in the +exact sentences, and the writer garnished his tale with frequent +quotations from Latin writers. In the midst was a wood-cut of a plant +having no sort of relevancy to the subject-matter, but for which he +returned thanks for the loan of the block. + +But he had totally omitted his own times. These quotations, these +lists and charters, the extracts from Domesday, read dry and +formal--curious, and yet not interesting. Had he described the squires +and yeomen, the townspeople of his own day, their lives and manner of +thinking, how invaluable and pleasing his work would have been! + +Hilary said that in these little country towns years ago people had to +be very careful how they acted, lest they should offend some local +magnate. He remembered a tradesman telling him how once he had got +into great disgrace for putting a new knocker on his private side +door, without first asking permission and sending round to obtain the +opinion of an old gentleman. This person had nothing whatever to do +with the property, but lived retired and ruled his neighbours with a +rod of iron. The old knocker was quite worn out, but the new one had +scarcely been fastened on when the unfortunate owner was summoned to +the presence of the irate old gentleman, who demanded with great wrath +what on earth he meant by setting himself up above his station in this +way. It was only by a humble answer, and by begging the old gentleman +to walk down and look at the discarded knocker, promising that it +should be replaced if he thought proper, that he could be appeased. A +man then hardly dared appear in a new hat without first suggesting the +idea to his social superior. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + +THE COOMBE-BOTTOM. CONCLUSION. + + +'There is "two-o'clock bush,"' said Cicely, pointing to a large +hawthorn; 'the shepherds look from the corner of the entrenchment, and +if the sun is over that bush they know it is two o'clock.' She was +driving me in the pony-trap over the Downs, and we were going to call +on Mrs. Luckett's brother, who had a farm among the hills. He had not +been down to Lucketts' Place for more than twelve months, and Cicely +was resolved to make him promise to come. Though they may be in +reality much attached and affectionate, country folk are apt to +neglect even their nearest and dearest. The visit is put off from +month to month; then comes the harvest, and nothing else can be +thought of; and the longer the lapse the more difficult is the remedy. +The footpath of friendship, says the ancient British triad, if not +frequently travelled becomes overgrown with briars. + +Those who live by the land forget the passage of the years. A year is +but a harvest. After the ploughing and sowing and cleaning, the +reaping and thatching and threshing, what is there left of the +twelvemonth? It has gone like a day. Thus it is that a farmer talks of +twenty years since as if it was only last week, and seems unable to +grasp the flight of time till it is marked and emphasised by some +exceptional occurrence. Cicely meant to wake her uncle from this +slumber. + +We started early on a beautiful July morning--partly to avoid the +heat, and partly because Cicely wished to be away when young Aaron +shortened the tails of the puppies in the rickyard. (This he did in +the old-fashioned way, with his teeth.) Besides we thought that, if we +waited till later, Uncle Bennet might be gone to market at Overboro'. +We passed several farmers leaning or sitting on the stiles by the +road, watching for a friend to come along and give them a lift into +town. Some of them had waited like this every market morning for +years. There were fewer on the road than usual, it being near harvest, +when many do not so much care to leave home. + +Upon reaching the foot of the Downs, Cicely left the highway and +entered a narrow lane without hedges, but worn low between banks of +chalk or white rubble. The track was cut up with ruts so deep that the +bed of the pony-trap seemed almost to touch the ground. As we went +rather slowly along this awkward place we could see the wild thyme +growing on the bank at the side. Presently we got on the slope of the +hill, and at the summit passed the entrenchment and the shepherds' +timepiece. Thence our track ran along the ridge, on the short sweet +turf, where there were few or no ruts, and these easily avoided on +that broad open ground. The quick pony now put out his speed, and we +raced along as smoothly as if the wheels were running on a carpet. Far +below, to the right, stretched wheatfield after wheatfield in a plain +between two ranges of the hills. Over the opposite slope, a mile away, +came the shadows of the clouds--then down along the corn towards us. +Stonechats started from the flints and low bushes as we went by; an +old crow--it is always an old crow--rose hastily from behind a fence +of withered thorn; and a magpie fluttered down the hill to the fields +beneath, where was a flock of sheep. The breeze at this height made +the sunshine pleasant. + +Cicely said that once some snow lingered in the fosse of the +entrenchment we had left behind till the haymaking. There was a +snowstorm late in the spring, and a drift was formed in a hollow at +the bottom of the fosse. The weather continued chilly (sometimes even +in June it is chilly, and the flowers seem out of harmony with the +temperature), and this drift, though of course it was reduced, did not +melt but became consolidated like ice: a part still remained when the +haymaking commenced. The pony now slackened his pace at a sharp +ascent, and as he walked up we could hear the short song of the +grasshoppers. There was a fir copse at the summit through which the +track went; by the gateway as we entered there was a convolvulus out. +Cicely regretted to see this sign that the sun had reached his +greatest height: the tide of summer was full. Beyond the copse we +descended by a deep-worn track into a 'coombe-bottom,' or valley, +where were some cottages. + +Cicely, who knew some of the old people, thought she would call, +though most probably they would be away. We stopped at a garden-gate: +it was open, but there was no one about. Cicely lifted the latch of +the door to step in, country fashion, but it was locked; and, hearing +the noise, a cat came mewing round the corner. As if they had started +out of the ground, a brown-faced boy and a thin girl suddenly +appeared, having come through the hedge. + +'Thaay be up to barken' (rickyard), said the boy: so we went on to the +next door. It was locked too, but the key was in the lock outside. +Cicely said that was a signal to callers that the wife had only gone +out for a few minutes and would return soon. The children had followed +us. + +'Where is she?' asked Cicely. + +'Hur be gone to dipping-place,' replied the boy. We went to a third +door, and immediately he cried out, 'Thuck's our feyther's: the kay's +in the thatch.' We looked and could see the handle of the key sticking +out of the eave over the door. + +'Where are they all?' I said. + +'Aw, Bill's in the clauver; and Joe--he's in th' turmuts; and Jack be +at public, a' spose; and Bob's wi' the osses; and----' + +'They will be home to luncheon?' said Cicely. + +'Aw, no um wunt; they wunt be whoam afore night; thaay got thur +nuncheon wi' um.' + +'Is there no one at home in all the place?' I inquired. + +'Mebbe Farmer Bennet. Thur beant nobody in these yer housen.' + +So we went on to Uncle Bennet's, whose house was hidden by a clump of +elms farther down the coombe. There were cottagers in this lonely hill +hamlet, not only old folk but young persons, who had never seen a +train. They had not had the enterprise or curiosity to walk into +Overboro' for the purpose. Some of the folk ate snails, the common +brown shell-snail found in the hedges. It has been observed that +children who eat snails are often remarkably plump. The method of +cooking is to place the snail in its shell on the bar of a grate, like +a chestnut. And well-educated people have been known, even in these +days, to use the snail as an external medicine for weakly children: +rubbed into the back or limb, the substance of the snail is believed +to possess strengthening virtues.[4] + + [4] See Notes. + +We found Uncle Bennet just taking his lunch in the stone-flagged +sitting-room, which, however, had a square of cocoa-nut matting. He +was getting on in years, but very active. He welcomed us warmly: still +I thought I detected some uneasiness in his manner. His conscience +warned him that Cicely was going to attack him for his remissness; and +how was he to defend himself? + +Without any preliminary, she at once demanded why he had not come down +to see them. + +'Mary,' said he, calling the servant, as if he did not hear her, 'Some +ale, and the ginger wine, and the grey-beard--mebbe you'd like a drop +a' shart'--to me; but I declined. She repeated her question, but Uncle +Bennet was looking towards me. + +'The wuts be very forrard,' said he, 'I got some a-most ready to cut.' + +'Do you hear?' cried Cicely, angrily. + +'Niece,' replied the farmer, turning to her, 'there's them summer +apples as you used to like, there be some ready; will 'ee have one?' + +'I don't want your apples; why didn't you come down?' + +'Aw; that's what you be a-talking about.' + +'Yes, that's it.' + +'The turmots wants some rain terrable bad' (to me)--'you med see the +fly a-hopping about 'em.' + +'I hope they will spoil your turnips,' said Cicely; 'you are a very +rude man not to answer a lady when she speaks to you.' + +'You be a-coming on nicely, Cissy,' said he. 'Have 'ee got are a +gage-ring yet?' + +'How dare you!' (blushing). 'Tell me instantly why have you not been +to see us? You know how angry it makes me.' + +'Well, I was a-coming,' deliberately. + +'When were you coming?' + +'Well, I got to see a man down your way, Cissy; a' owes me for a load +a' straw.' + +'Then why don't you come down and get the money?' + +'I telled 'ee I was a-coming. He wants some of our sheep to feed off a +meadow; s'pose I must see about it'--with a sigh, as if the idea of a +decision was insupportable. + +'Why didn't you come before?' + +'Aw, I don't seem to have no time'--farmers having more time than +anybody else. + +'You could have come in June.' + +'Bless 'ee, your feyther's got the hay about; a' don't want no +strangers bothering.' + +'As if you were a stranger! Well, why didn't you come in May?' + +'Lor bless 'ee, my dear.' + +'In April?' + +'Us was main busy a-hoeing.' + +'In March?' + +'I had the rheumatism bad in March.' + +'Well, then,' concluded Cicely, 'now just change your coat and come +to-day. Jump up in the pony-trap--we will make room.' + +'To-day!' in hopeless bewilderment, his breath quite taken away at the +idea of such sudden action. 'Couldn't do't--couldn't do't. Got to go +down to Thirty Acre Corner: got to get out the reaping machine--a' +wants oiling, a' reckon; got some new hurdles coming; 'spects a chap +to call about them lambs;' a farmer can always find a score of reasons +for doing nothing. + +'All rubbish!' cried Cicely, smiling. + +'Nieces be main peart now-a-days,' said he, shutting one eye and +keeping it closed, as much as to say--I won't be driven. Then to me, +'There won't be many at market to-day.' + +'I am hungry,' said Cicely softly; 'I should like some bread and +honey.' + +'Aw; should 'ee?' in gentler tones; 'I'll get 'ee some: will'ee have +it in th' comb? I got a bit left.' + +She knew his pride in his bees and his honey; hill farmers still keep +large stocks. He brought her a slice of home-baked bread and a piece +of comb. She took the comb in her white fingers, and pressed the +liquid gold from the cells; the luscious sweetness gathered from a +thousand flowers making her lips still sweeter. Uncle Bennet offered +me a jar full to the brim: 'Dip your vinger in,' said he. + +'Why is the honey of the hills so much nicer?' asked Cicely, well +knowing, but drawing him on. + +'It be th' clover and th' thyme, and summat in the air. There bean't +no hedges for um to fly up against, and so um carries home a bigger +load.' + +'How many hives have you?' I inquired. + +'Let's see'--he counted them up, touching a finger for each +twenty--'There be three score and sixteen; I have a' had six score +years ago, but folk don't care for honey now sugar be so cheap.' + +'Let us go and see them,' said Cicely. We went out and looked at the +hives; they were all in a row, each protected by large 'pan-sherds' +from heavy rain, and placed along beneath the wall of the garden, +which sheltered them on one side. Uncle Bennet chatted pleasantly +about his bees for an hour, and would, I believe, have gossiped all +day, notwithstanding that he had so little time for anything. Nothing +more was said about the delayed visit, but just as we were on the +point of departure, and Cicely had already taken the reins, he said to +her, as if it were an afterthought, 'Tell your mother, I s'pose I must +look down that way next week.' + +We passed swiftly through the little hamlet; the children had gathered +by a gateway to watch us. Though so far from the world, they were not +altogether without a spice of the impudence of the city arab. A tall +and portly gentleman from town once chanced to visit this 'coombe-bottom' +on business, and strolled down the 'street' in all the glory of +shining boots, large gold watch-chain, black coat and high hat, all +the pomp of Regent-street; doubtless imagining that his grandeur +astonished the rustics. A brown young rascal, however, looking him +up--he was a tall man--with an air of intelligent criticism, audibly +remarked, 'Hum! He be very well up to his ankles--and then a' falls +off!' + +That evening was one of the most beautiful I remember. We all sat in +the garden at Lucketts' Place till ten o'clock; it was still light and +it seemed impossible to go indoors. There was a seat under a sycamore +tree with honeysuckle climbing over the bars of the back; the spot was +near the orchard, but on slightly higher ground. From our feet the +meadow sloped down to the distant brook, the murmur of whose stream as +it fell over a bay could be just heard. Northwards the stars were +pale, the sun seems so little below the horizon there that the glow of +the sunset and the glow of the dawn nearly meet. But southwards shone +the dull red star of summer--Antares, seen while the wheat ripens and +the ruddy and golden tints come upon the fruits. Then nightly +describing a low curve he looks down upon the white shimmering corn, +and carries the mind away to the burning sands and palms of the far +south. In the light and colour and brilliance of an English summer we +sometimes seem very near those tropical lands. + +So still was it that we heard an apple fall in the orchard, thud on +the sward, blighted perhaps and ripe before its time. Under the trees +as the months went on there would rise heaps of the windfalls +collected there to wait for the cider-mill. The mill was the property +of two or three of the village folk, a small band of adventurers now +grown old, who every autumn went round from farm to farm grinding the +produce of the various orchards. They sometimes poured a quantity of +the acid juice into the mill to sharpen it, as cutting a lemon will +sharpen a knife. The great press, with its unwieldy screw and levers, +squeezed the liquor from the cut-up apples in the horse-hair bags: a +cumbersome apparatus, but not without interest; for surely so rude an +engine must date back far in the past. The old fellows who brought it +and put it up with slow deliberative motions were far, far past the +joy with which all the children about the farm hailed its arrival. +With grave faces and indifferent manner they ground the apples, and +departed as slowly and deliberately as they came; verily men of the +autumn, harbingers of the fall of the year. + +As I dreamed with the honeysuckle over my shoulder, and Antares +southwards, Hilary talked at intervals about his wheat as usual and +the weather, but I only caught fragments of it. All the signs were +propitious, and as it had been a fine harvest under similar conditions +before, people said it would be fine this time. But, unlike the law, +the weather acknowledged no precedent, and nobody could tell, though +folk now thought they knew everything. How all things had changed +since the Queen ascended the throne! Not long since Hilary was talking +with a labourer, an elderly man, who went to the feast in Overboro' +town on the day of the coronation. The feast was held in the +market-place, and the puddings, said the old fellow regretfully, were +so big they were brought in on hand-barrows. + +It was difficult since he himself remembered even to learn the state +of the markets. So few newspapers came into country places that before +service on Sundays the farmers gathered round anybody in the +churchyard who was known to take in a paper, to get particulars from +this fortunate individual. Letters rarely came to the farmhouse door +then. The old postman made a very good thing of his office--people +were so eager for news, and it was easy to take a magpie glance at a +newspaper. So he called at the butcher's before he started out, and in +exchange for a peep at the paper got a little bit of griskin, or a +chop, and at the farmhouses as he passed they gave him a few eggs, and +at the inns a drop of gin. Thus a dozen at least read scraps before it +reached the rightful owner. + +If anything very extraordinary had happened he would shout it out as +he went through the hamlet. Hilary said he well remembered being up on +the roof of the house one morning, mending the thatch, when suddenly a +voice--it was the postman's--cried from the road, 'Royal Exchange +burned down!' In this way news got about before the present facilities +were afforded. But some of the old folk still regretted the change and +believed that we should some day be punished for our worship of steam. +Steam had brought us to rely on foreign countries for our corn, and a +day would come when through a war, or a failure of the crops there, +the vast population of this country would be in danger of famine. But +'old folk' are prone to prophesy disaster and failure of all kinds. + +Mrs. Luckett chimed in here, and said that modern ways were not all +improvements, the girls now were so fond of gadding about. This was a +hint for Cicely, who loved a change, and yet was deeply attached to +the old home. She rose at this, doubtless pouting, but it was too +dusky to see, and went indoors, and presently from the open window +came the notes of her piano. As she played I dreamed again, till +presently Mrs. Luckett began to argue with Hilary that the shrubs +about the garden ought to be cut and trimmed. Hilary said he liked to +see the shrubs and the trees growing freely; he objected to cut and +trim them. 'For,' said he, 'God made nothing tidy.' Just then Cicely +called us to supper. + + + + +NOTES. + + +The following interesting correspondence has been received. + +MAGPIE OMENS. _Page 153._--In reference to the superstition that one +magpie is good luck, but two sorrow, 'R. F.' writes from Wiesbaden:--'In +the north of England the contrary belief holds good, witness the +following saw which I heard many years ago in the county of Durham:-- + + "One for sorrow, two for mirth; + Three a marriage, four a birth; + Five for heaven, six for hell, + Seven--the devil's own sel!" + +As to seventeen, which number I once saw together, Mrs. Luckett's +exclamation "Goodness! something awful might happen" might have been +appropriate; only nothing dreadful did occur.' + +CART-HORSE ORNAMENTS. _Page 159._--As to the history of the +crescent-shaped ornaments on carthorses, 'J. D.' writes from Dover: +'Anyone who has lived in Spanish countries must be struck on going to +East Kent by the gay trappings of the farmers' horses on gala days, in +which the national colours of Spain, scarlet and orange yellow, and +the "glittering brazen" ornament of the crescent and the cross, so +generally prevail. Their history must date from the introduction of +the Flemish breed of horses to this country, showing that as the Moors +carried the crescent to Spain, so the Spaniards took it to Flanders, +and the Flemings here, whence it has been adopted pretty generally by +the farmers of England.' + +NAMES OF FIELDS. _Page 176._--'The Conigers is evidently the same as +Coningar, a word sometimes occurring in Scottish local nomenclature, +and which meant a rabbit-warren--Coniger, Coney-garth. I know two +Coningars in Aberdeenshire, but the meaning of the word is as much +forgotten there also.--H. W. L.' + +MEDICINAL USE OF SNAILS. _Page 189._--In Dorset, writes 'S. C. S. S.,' +an extract of snails for external use is still sometimes prepared, +and, mixed with rum, is rubbed into weak backs, or legs, especially of +children. + + +LONDON: PRINTED BY +SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW STREET SQUARE +AND PARLIAMENT STREET + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Round About a Great Estate, by Richard Jefferies + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROUND ABOUT A GREAT ESTATE *** + +***** This file should be named 20528-8.txt or 20528-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/5/2/20528/ + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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