Part 4 (1/2)
The shepherd has a distinct individuality, and is generally a much more observant man in his own sphere than the ordinary labourer. He knows every single field in the whole parish, what kind of weather best suits its soil, and can tell you without going within sight of a given farm pretty much what condition it will be found in. Knowledge of this character may seem trivial to those whose days are pa.s.sed indoors; yet it is something to recollect all the endless fields in several square miles of country. As a student remembers for years the type and paper, the breadth of the margin--can see, as it were, before his eyes the bevel of the binding and hear again the rustle of the stiff leaves of some tall volume which he found in a forgotten corner of a library, and bent over with such delight, heedless of dust and 'silver-fish' and the gathered odour of years--so the shepherd recalls _his_ books, the fields; for he, in the nature of things, has to linger over them and study every letter: sheep are slow.
When the hedges are grubbed and the gra.s.s grows where the hawthorn flowered, still the shepherd can point out to you where the trees stood--here an oak and here an ash. On the hills he has often little to do but ponder deeply, sitting on the turf of the slope, while the sheep graze in the hollow, waiting for hours as they eat their way. Therefore by degrees a habit of observation grows upon him--always in reference to his charge; and if he walks across the parish off duty he still cannot choose but notice how the crops are coming on, and where there is most 'keep.' The shepherd has been the last of all to abandon the old custom of long service. While the labourers are restless, there may still be found not a few instances of shepherds whose whole lives have been spent upon one farm. Thus, from the habit of observation and the lapse of years, they often become local authorities; and when a dispute of boundaries or water rights or right of way arises, the question is frequently finally decided by the evidence of such a man.
Every now and then a difficulty happens in reference to the old green lanes and bridle-tracks which once crossed the country in every direction, but get fewer in number year by year. Sometimes it is desired to enclose a section of such a track to round off an estate: sometimes a path has grown into a valuable thoroughfare through increase of population; and then the question comes, Who is to repair it? There is little or no doc.u.mentary evidence to be found--nothing can be traced except through the memories of men; and so they come to the old shepherd, who has been stationary all his life, and remembers the condition of the lane fifty years since. He always liked to drive his sheep along it--first, because it saved the turnpike tolls; secondly, because they could graze on the short herbage and rest under the shade of the thick bushes. Even in the helplessness of his old age he is not without his use at the very last, and his word settles the matter.
In the winter twilight, after a fall of snow, it is difficult to find one's way across the ploughed fields of the open plain, for it melts on the south of every furrow, leaving a white line where it has ledged on the northern side, till the furrows resemble an endless succession of waves of earth tipped with foam-flecks of snow. These are dazzling to the eyes, and there are few hedges or trees visible for guidance. Snow lingers sometimes for weeks on the northern slopes of the downs--where shallow dry d.y.k.es, used as landmarks, are filled with it: the dark ma.s.s of the hill is streaked like the black hull of a s.h.i.+p with its line of white paint. Field work during what the men call 'the dark days afore Christmas' is necessarily much restricted and they are driven to find some amus.e.m.e.nt for the long evenings--such as blowing out candles at the ale-house with muzzle-loader guns for wagers of liquor, the wind of the cap alone being sufficient for the purpose at a short distance.
The children never forget Saint Thomas's Day, which ancient custom has consecrated to alms, and they wend their way from farmhouse to farmhouse throughout the parish; it is usual to keep to the parish, for some of the old local feeling still remains even in these cosmopolitan times.
At Christmas sometimes the children sing carols, not with much success so far as melody goes, but otherwise successfully enough; for recollections of the past soften the hearts of the crustiest.
The young men for weeks previously have been practising for the mumming--a kind of rude drama requiring, it would seem, as much rehearsal beforehand as the plays at famous theatres. They dress in a fantastic manner, with masks and coloured ribbons; anything grotesque answers, for there is little attempt at dressing in character. They stroll round to each farmhouse in the parish, and enact the play in the kitchen or brewhouse; after which the whole company are refreshed with ale, and, receiving a few coins, go on to the next homestead. Mumming, however, has much deteriorated, even in the last fifteen or twenty years. On nights when the players were known to be coming, in addition to the farmer's household and visitors at that season, the cottagers residing near used to a.s.semble, so that there was quite an audience.
Now it is a chance whether they come round or not.
A more popular pastime with the young men, and perhaps more profitable, is the formation of a bra.s.s band. They practise vigorously before Christmas, and sometimes attain considerable proficiency. At the proper season they visit the farms in the evening, and as the houses are far apart, so that only a few can be called at in the hours available after work, it takes them some time to perambulate the parish. So that for two or three weeks about the end of the old and the beginning of the new year, if one chances to be out at night, every now and then comes the unwonted note of a distant trumpet sounding over the fields. The custom has grown frequent of recent years, and these bands collect a good deal of money.
The ringers from the church come too, with their hand-bells and ring pleasant tunes--which, however, on bells are always plaintive--standing on the crisp frozen gra.s.s of the green before the window. They are well rewarded, for bells are great favourites with all country people.
What is more pleasant than the jingling of the tiny bells on the harness of the cart-horses? You may hear the team coming with a load of straw on the waggon three furlongs distant; then step out to the road, and watch the ma.s.sive yet shapely creatures pull the heavy weight up the hill, their glossy quarters scarcely straining, but heads held high showing the n.o.ble neck, the hoofs planted with st.u.r.dy pride of strength, the polished bra.s.s of the harness glittering, and the bells merrily jingling! The carter, the thong of his whip nodding over his shoulder, walks by the shaft, his boy ahead by the leader, as proud of his team as the sailor of his craft: even the whip is not to be lightly come by, but is chosen carefully, bound about with rows of brazen rings; neither could you or I knot the whipcord on to his satisfaction.
For there is a certain art even in so small a thing, not to be learned without time and practice; and his pride in whip, harness, and team is surely preferable to the indifference of a stranger, caring for nothing but his money at the end of the week. The modern system--men coming one day and gone the next--leaves no room for the growth of such feelings, and the art and mystery of the craft loses its charm. The harness bells, too, are disappearing; hardly one team in twenty carries them now.
Those who labour in the fields seem to have far fewer holidays than the workers in towns. The latter issue from factory and warehouse at Easter, and rush gladly into the country: at Whitsuntide, too, they enjoy another recess. But the farmer and the labourer work on much the same, the closing of banks and factories in no way interfering with the tilling of the earth or the tending of cattle. In May the ploughboys still remember King Charles, and on what they call 's.h.i.+ck-shack day'
search for oak-apples and the young leaves of the oak to place with a spray of ash in their hats or b.u.t.ton-holes: the ash spray must have even leaves; an odd number is not correct. To wear these green emblems was thought imperative even within the last twenty years, and scarcely a labourer could be seen without them. The elder men would tell you--as if it had been a grave calamity--that they could recollect a year when the spring was so backward that not an oak leaf or oak-apple could be found by the most careful search for the purpose. The custom has fallen much into disuse lately: the carters, however, still attach the ash and oak leaves to the heads of their horses on this particular day.
Many village clubs or friendly societies meet in the spring, others in autumn. The day is sometimes fixed by the date of the ancient feast.
The club and fete threaten, indeed, to supplant the feast altogether: the friendly society having been taken under the patronage of the higher ranks of residents. Here and there the feast-day, however (the day on which the church was dedicated), is still remembered, as in this village, where the elder fanners invite their friends and provide liberally for the occasion. Some of the gipsies still come with their stalls, and a little crowd a.s.sembles in the evening; but the glory of the true feast has departed.
The elder men, nevertheless, yet reckon by the feast-day; it is a fixed point in their calendar, which they construct every year, of local events. Such and such a fair is calculated to fall so many days after the first full moon in a particular month; and another fair falls so long after that. An old man will thus tell you the dates of every fair and feast in all the villages and little towns ten or fifteen miles round about. He quite ignores the modern system of reckoning time, going by the ancient ecclesiastical calendar and the moon. How deeply the ancient method must have impressed itself into the life of these people to still remain a kind of instinct at this late day!
The feasts are in some cases identified with certain well-recognised events in the calendar of nature; such as the ripening of cherries. It may be noticed that these, chancing thus to correspond pretty accurately on the average with the state of fruit, are kept up more vigorously than those which have no such aid to the memory. The Lady-Day fair and Michaelmas fair at the adjacent market town are the two best recognised holidays of the year. The fair is sometimes called 'the mop,' and stalwart girls will walk eight or nine miles rather than miss it.
Maidservants in farmhouses always bargain for a holiday on fair day.
These two main fairs are the Bank Holidays of rural life. It is curious to observe that the developments of the age, railroads and manufactories, have not touched the traditional prestige of these gatherings.
For instance, you may find a town which, by the incidence of the railroad and the springing up of great industries, has shot far ahead of the other sleepy little places; its population may treble itself, its trade be ten times as large, its attractions one would imagine incalculably greater. Nothing of the kind: its annual fair is not nearly so important an event to the village mind as that of an old-world slumberous place removed from the current of civilisation. This place, which is perhaps eight or nine miles by road, with no facilities of communication, has from time immemorial had a reputation for its fair.
There, accordingly, the scattered rural population wends, making no account of distance and very little of weather: it is a country maxim that it always rains on fair day, and mostly thunders. There they a.s.semble and enjoy themselves in the old-fas.h.i.+oned way, which consists in standing in the streets, buying 'fairings' for the girls, shooting for nuts, visiting all the shows, and so on.
To push one's way through such a crowd is no simple matter; the countryman does not mean to be rude, but he has not the faintest conception that politeness demands a little yielding. He has to be shoved, and makes no objection. A city crowd is to a certain extent mobile--each recognises that he must give way. A country crowd stand stock still.
The thumping of drums, the blaring of trumpets, the tootling of pan-pipes in front of the shows, fill the air with a din which may be heard miles away, and seem to give the crowd intense pleasure--far more than the crack band of the Coldstream Guards could impart. Nor are they ever weary of gazing at the 'pelican of the wilderness' as the showman describes it--a mournful bird with draggled feathers standing by the entrance, a traditional part of his stock-in-trade. One attraction-- perhaps the strongest--may be found in the fact that all the countryside is sure to be there. Each labourer or labouring woman will meet acquaintances from distant villages they have not seen or heard of for months. The rural gossip of half a county will be exchanged.
In the autumn after the harvest the gleaning is still an important time to the cottager, though nothing like it used to be. Reaping by machinery has made rapid inroads, and there is not nearly so much left behind as in former days. Yet half the women and children of the place go out and glean, but very few now bake at home; they have their bread from the baker, who comes round in the smallest hamlets. Possibly they had a more wholesome article in the olden time, when the wheat from their gleanings was ground at the village mill, and the flour made into bread at home. But the cunning of the mechanician has invaded the ancient customs; the very sheaves are now to be bound with wire by the same machine that reaps the corn. The next generation of country folk will hardly be able to understand the story of Ruth.
CHAPTER SIX.
THE HAMLET--COTTAGE ASTROLOGY--GHOST LORE--HERBS--THE WAGGON AND ITS CREW--STILES--THE TRYSTING-PLACE--THE THATCHER--SMUGGLERS--AGUE.
In most large rural parishes there is at least one small hamlet a mile or two distant from the main village. A few houses and cottages stand loosely scattered about the fields, no two of them together; so separated, indeed, by hedges, meadows, and copses as hardly to be called even a hamlet. The communication with the village is maintained by a long, winding narrow lane; but foot-pa.s.sengers follow a shorter path across the fields, which in winter is sure to be ankle-deep in mud, by the gateways and stiles. The lane, at the same time, is crossed by a torrent, which may spread out to thirty yards wide in the hollow, shallow at the edges, but swift and deep in the middle.