STOCKS AT TOLLARD ROYAL Seven miles south of Tisbury
The village of Tisbury existed in the seventh century, the earliest extant spelling of the name being "Tissebiri" or "Dysseburg," and there was a monastery over which an abbot named Wintra ruled about 647. Mr Paley Baildon, F.S.A., who has devoted considerable time to the investigation of the origin of place names, thinks that without doubt Tisbury is derived from Tissa's-burgh, Tissa or Tyssa being a personal name and owner of the estate; hence it came to be known as Tissa's-burgh.
It was at Tisbury that Rudyard Kipling wrote some of his stories after leaving India, and there can be little doubt that after some years of absence in the East the return to things desperately dear and familiar and intimate exercised a strong effect upon his thoughts and writing, and prepared a way for his delicately fashioned pictures of the Old Country inPuck of Pook's HillandRewards and Fairies.
At Barford St Martin I had the misfortune to burst the back tube and tyre of my motor cycle, and that is the real reason I arrived at Tisbury. I wheeled my machine to the Green Dragon, hoping for a lift to a place where I could get fixed up with a new tyre. A large wagon was standing outside the inn, and as it bore the name, Stephen Weekes, Tisbury, upon it, I penetratedto the bar-parlour, thinking that I might induce the driver to take me with the machine into that village.
The owner of the wagon was sitting inside with two large bottles of stout before him. He was a burly fellow in shirt-sleeves and a broad straw hat. I saw he was fifty or thereabouts—not a mere wagoner, but a small farmer who would have answered to the description of Farmer Oak by Thomas Hardy in his opening toFar from the Madding Crowd. He was of a more jovial type than most Dorset men I have met, and after submitting to his fire of questions I asked him gently, in jest, if he would require any assistance with his two bottles.
"Aye," he answered, quizzing at me with his merry eyes. "I shall require another bottle to assist me, I think."
He looked at me a moment with seriousness and then he laughed to the point of holding his sides. He slapped his knees, shouted, roared and almost rolled with merriment. I looked at the farmer, not without a feeling of admiration. It was perhaps a very poor jest, you will say. But how well a simple jest became the fellow; how gloriously he laughed. Down in my heart I knew that no man could laugh as he did and at the same time possess a mean mind. He was asbroad as the earth, and his laughter was just as limitless. Talk of good things: there may be something finer than a hearty laugh—there may be—perhaps....
At this moment he called for two glasses, and explained to the landlord that now he would drink out of a glass, seeing that he was in company.
"Then tell me," I said, "why do you drink out of the bottle when you are alone?"
"Why, you don't get no virtue out of the beer 'thout you drink it out of the bottle. No, fay! Half of the strength is gone like winky when you pour it into a glass."
"I believe you are right," I said, "and I especially commend you for drinking beer. Ale is a great and generous creature; it contains all health, induces sleep o' nights, titillates the digestion and imparts freshness to the palate."
"'Tis the only drink that will go with bread and cheese and pickling cabbage," dashed in the farmer.
"'Tis a pity," I said, "that so many workers in London take bread and cheese with tea and coffee, for there is no staying power in such a mixture."
"It can't be good," he shouted. "It can't be healthy."
The farmer's name was Mr Weekes—the same as it was painted on the wagon outside—and he said that he would be very glad to take me with my machine into Tisbury, where there was a motor garage. He made an extraordinarily shrill noise with his mouth and a fine greyhound that had been sleeping beneath the table bounded up.
"This long-dog," said Mr Weekes, "is a wonderfully good dog—the best dog of his kind in the world."
Mr Weekes is never half-hearted about things. His enthusiasm is prodigious. He is like a human hurricane when he launches upon any of his pet subjects. At once he fell to explaining the points and final perfection of a perfect greyhound. I remember a quaint rhyme he quoted, which is perhaps worth repetition here:
"The shape of a good greyhound is:—A head like a snake, a neck like a drake;A back like a beam, a belly like a bream;A foot like a cat, a tail like a rat."
"The shape of a good greyhound is:—A head like a snake, a neck like a drake;A back like a beam, a belly like a bream;A foot like a cat, a tail like a rat."
"The shape of a good greyhound is:—A head like a snake, a neck like a drake;A back like a beam, a belly like a bream;A foot like a cat, a tail like a rat."
"The shape of a good greyhound is:—
A head like a snake, a neck like a drake;
A back like a beam, a belly like a bream;
A foot like a cat, a tail like a rat."
The farmer, then, I say, was not the kind of man to qualify any of his remarks, and he reasserted his claim that, in the concrete, in the existent state of things, his dog was the best that breathed.
THE GREEN DRAGON AT BARFORD ST MARTIN IN 1860
This he said for the sixth time, drank up hisstout, and after helping me to lift my machine into the wagon, climbed up on to his seat, I by his side. He then flicked his horses gently with his whip and they began to amble along with the wagon. On the way to Tisbury the farmer talked with the greatest friendliness, and when we arrived at his farm he insisted on bringing me in to supper. He showed me his orchard, barns and a very fine apple-tree of which he was enormously proud, and pulled me an armful of the finest apples he could find.
"Take these apples home," he said, watching me with his merry eyes; "they make the best apple pies in the world."
An armful of apples of prodigious size is not exactly the kind of thing one welcomes with a broken-down motor cycle two hundred miles from home, but I dared not refuse them, and so I stuffed them into all my pockets. Finally my good friend insisted on keeping me under his roof for the night.
After my machine had been repaired next morning I went on my way, thinking what a fine, merry, hospitable fellow the Dorset yeoman is—if you only approach him with a little caution.
* * * * * *
I left my friend the yeoman farmer with regret, regained the main road and soon came intoShaftesbury, orShaston, as it is commonly called. This town is very curiously placed, on the narrow ridge of a chalk hill which projects into the lower country, and rises from it with abruptness. Hence an extensive landscape is seen through the openings between the houses, and from commanding points the eye ranges over the greater part of Dorset and Somerset. To add to the beauty of the position, the scarped slope of the hill is curved on its southern side. Shaftesbury is one of the oldest towns in the kingdom. Its traditions go back to the time of King Lud, who, according to Holinshed, founded it about 1000B.C.A more moderate writer refers its origin to Cassivellaunus. However, it is certain that Alfred, in the year 880, founded here a nunnery, which in aftertimes became the richest in England, and, as the shrine of St Edward the Martyr—whose body was removed to this town from Wareham—the favourite resort of pilgrims. Asser, who wrote theLife of Alfred, has described Shaftesbury as consisting of one street in his time. In that of Edward the Confessor it possessed three mints, sure evidence of its importance; and shortly after the Conquest it had no less than twelve churches, besides chapels and chantries, and a Hospital of St John.
The view from the Castle Hill at the west endof the ridge is very extensive, and from all parts of the town you come unexpectedly upon narrow ravines which go tumbling down to the plain below in the most headlong fashion. The chief trouble in the olden days was the water supply. On this elevated chalk ridge the town was obviously far removed from the sources of spring water, and the supply of this necessary article had been from time out of mind brought on horses' backs from the parish of Gillingham. Hence arose a curious custom which was annually observed here for a great number of years. On the Monday before Holy Thursday the mayor proceeded to Enmore Green, near Motcombe, with a large, fanciful broom, orbyzant, as it was called, which he presented as an acknowledgment for the water to the steward of the manor, together with a calf's head, a pair of gloves, a gallon of ale and two penny loaves of wheaten bread. This ceremony being concluded, the byzant—which was usually hung with jewels and other costly ornaments—was returned to the mayor and carried back to the town in procession.
About 1816 the Mayor of Shaftesbury refused to carry out the custom, and the people of Enmore were so put out by his omission in this respect that they filled up the wells. The Shastonians paid twopence for a horse-load of water and ahalfpenny for a pail "if fetched upon the head." I heard a rather amusing story of the water-carrying days. A rustic who had been working on the land all day in the rain came "slewching" up Gold Hill, feeling very unhappy and out of temper. At the summit of the hill he passed by the crumbling church of St Peter's, but didnotpass the Sun and Moon Inn. Here he cheered his drooping spirits with a measure of old-fashioned Shaftesbury XXX stingo, and, thus strengthened, he went on his way home, expecting to be welcomed with a warm, savoury supper. But the news of his call at the inn had reached his wife before he arrived home, and being rather an ill-natured person, she decided to punish him for loitering on his way. "Oh," she said to him, "as you are so wet already, just you take this steyan [earthenware pot] and fill it with water at Toute Hill spring, and don't go loafing at the Sun and Moon again." The rustic took up the pitcher without a word, filled it and returned to his sour housewife; but instead of putting the pitcher down, he hurled the contents over her, saying: "Nowyouare wet too, so you can go to the spring and fetch the water."
Bimport is a wide and comfortable street which skirts the north crest of Castle Hill. It is a street of honest stone houses, and readers ofJude the Obscurewill look here for Phillotson's school and the "little low drab house in which the wayward Sue wrought the wrecking of her life." Their house, "old Grove's Place"—now called "Ox House"—is not difficult to find. As you come up from the Town Hall and Market House to the fork of the roads which run to Motcombe and East Stower, Bimport turns off to the left, and a hundred or so yards down is Grove's Place, with a projecting porch and mullioned windows. It was here that Sue in a momentary panic jumped out of the window to avoid Phillotson. The name of the house derives from that of a former inhabitant mentioned in an old plan of Shaftesbury. Poor, highly strung Sue Bridehead, with her neurotic temperament, could not throw off the oppressiveness of the old house. "We don't live in the school, you know," said she, "but in that ancient dwelling across the way, called old Grove's Place. It is so antique and dismal that it depresses me dreadfully. Such houses are very well to visit, but not to live in. I feel crushed into the earth by the weight of so many previous lives there spent. In a new place like these schools there is only your own life to support."
The village of Marnhull is situated in the Vale of Blackmoor, six miles from Shaftesbury. It isthe "Marlott" of Hardy's novelTess, the village home of the Durbeyfield family. It contains little of interest. The Pure Drop Inn, where "there's a very pretty brew in tap," may be the "Crown." Here John Durbeyfield kept up Tess's wedding day "as well as he could, and stood treat to everybody in the parish, and John's wife sung songs till past eleven o'clock." There is a Pure Drop Inn at Wooten Glanville and another at Wareham; one of these most probably suggested the name. The fine church is of the eighteenth-century Gothic (1718), and it has often been regarded by strangers as being three hundred years earlier. The font bowl, late Norman, was unearthed in 1898, also the rood staircase and squint and the piscina. Some ancient alabaster effigies, ascribed to the middle of the fifteenth century and representing a man in armour and two female figures, are placed on a cenotaph in the north aisle. Some authorities claim that they represent Thomas Howard, Lord Bindon, and his wives, and are of a later date. Nash Court, a little to the north, is a fine Elizabethan mansion, formerly the seat of the Husseys.
My motor cycle had carried me without a hitch from London to Melbury Abbas—then Fortune scowled on me. With ridiculous ease I had rolled along the roads all day, and I had been tempted to ride through the warm autumnal darkness till I came to the Half Moon Inn at Shaftesbury, where the roads fork away to Melbury Hill, Blandford and Salisbury. But a few hundred yards out of Melbury Abbas, and then Fortune's derisive frown. From a deceptive twist in the road I dashed into a gully, and my machine bumped and rattled and groaned like a demon caught in a trap. It performed other antics with which this chronicle has no concern, and then refused to move an inch farther.
But the song of a nightingale in a grove of elms near the road made full amends for my ill luck! It is beautiful to hear his sobbing, lulling notes when one is alone on a dark night, and Shelley was not far wrong in styling it voluptuous.
"I heard the raptured nightingaleTell from yon elmy grove his taleOf jealousy and love,In thronging notes that seem'd to fallAs faultless and as musicalAs angels' strains above.So sweet, they cast on all things roundA spell of melody profound:They charm'd the river in his flowing,They stay'd the night-wind in its blowing."
"I heard the raptured nightingaleTell from yon elmy grove his taleOf jealousy and love,In thronging notes that seem'd to fallAs faultless and as musicalAs angels' strains above.So sweet, they cast on all things roundA spell of melody profound:They charm'd the river in his flowing,They stay'd the night-wind in its blowing."
"I heard the raptured nightingaleTell from yon elmy grove his taleOf jealousy and love,In thronging notes that seem'd to fallAs faultless and as musicalAs angels' strains above.So sweet, they cast on all things roundA spell of melody profound:They charm'd the river in his flowing,They stay'd the night-wind in its blowing."
"I heard the raptured nightingale
Tell from yon elmy grove his tale
Of jealousy and love,
In thronging notes that seem'd to fall
As faultless and as musical
As angels' strains above.
So sweet, they cast on all things round
A spell of melody profound:
They charm'd the river in his flowing,
They stay'd the night-wind in its blowing."
I lit a pipe and made myself comfortable on the green bank of the roadside. It was simply a matter of waiting for a carter to give me a lift. Soon I heard footsteps approaching me. "Good-evening," said a friendly, quavering voice, and a little, round-faced gentleman in a grey overcoat and straw hat emerged from the shadows. I questioned him as to the distance of the nearest inn or cottage where I could get a shelter for the night, and explained how my machine had failed me.
"The nearest inn is two miles away. I'm afraid they do not accommodate travellers," he replied.
"Is this your home?" I asked.
"Oh yes! Woolpit House is just beyond those elms. I live there. I am not a native of these parts. I have only lived there for the last six months. I am sorry I came here, for the placedoes not suit me. Do you care to leave your motor cycle? You are most welcome to a bed in my house," he added with cheerful simplicity.
"I should be greatly indebted to you. But shan't I be a bother to your family at this time of the night?"
"I have none."
I wheeled my machine through a gate and left it the other side of the hedge, where I hoped it would be safe till morning. We came to the house across a footpath—a small stone-gabled sixteenth-century building. A whisp of mist from a bubbling stream circled the place and gave it an air of isolation. We entered a lit room, which was of solemn aspect, and my friend gave me a deep-seated chair.
"Are you serious in saying that you do not like Dorset?" I questioned.
The little man smiled quietly, sadly.
"It is not Dorset exactly. But since I came to live here I have become a bundle of nerves. It is nothing—I think it's nothing."
"What do you mean?"
"I only think—I only wonder——"
"Yes?"
"This is such an old house. All sorts of things must have happened here. And from the first moment I came into the place I had a suddensensation of there being something unseen and unheard near me. There is an essence in this house—an influence which stifles all laughter and joy. I wonder if you will feel it as I do!"
"Bit creepy," I said, and at the same time I came to the conclusion that the old fellow was a little eccentric, and this idea of the house being on the left side of the sun was merely a foolish weakness.
"Yes, yes," he said, musing; "queer, isn't it? But you don't know the queerest."
He pondered a moment, then suddenly he wagged his crooked fore-finger at me and said: "It is something more than an essence—it is stronger. The other evening when it was getting dusk I got up from my chair to light the candles, and I saw, as I thought, someone about six yards from that window—outside on the flagstones. It was more than a shadowy shape. So without waiting I ran out into the hall and opened the front door, feeling sure I should see a tramp or someone there. But the drive was quite empty—I only looked out into the dusk. But as I looked out something that I could not see slipped through and passed into the house. The same kind of thing has happened a dozen times."
The little old man passed his hand over his brow.
"Here," I said rather brusquely, "you're notwell; you're just a bundle of nerves. Look here, sir, you want a holiday."
"Yes," he said, wiping his brow. "I try to tell myself that it is all rot ... all my fancy. But what wouldyoudo?"
"See a doctor," I replied.
"Doctors?... Bah! I'll tell you," he whispered. "I want a ghost-doctor to rid me of this invisible, pushing thing. It gets stronger every time! At first it just slipped through; just a bit more than a gust of wind. But now it's getting compact. To-night it drove me out of the house: that was how I came to be wandering out on the highroad like a lost soul."
"But ... goodness, sir, such a thing outrages reason."
"You can say what you will, butitis there, and it is growing tangible. Last night I could distinguish his features as he came up close to the window. He smiled at me, but the smile was one of inscrutable evil. He resents me being in this house. I shall have to abandon it."
"This little man is either off his head, or worse," I said to myself.
In spite of the warmth of the room, I felt myself shiver.
At that moment I heard the sound of a stealthy footstep outside the door.
The little old man jumped up.
"I say," he said in an odd voice, "did you hear?"
I pretended I had not heard.
"Ah, you didn't ... and, of course, you didn't feel anything. It must have been my imagination."
A wave of shame ran over me. I knew that I had not the courage to listen to the old fellow's story any longer. I finished my whisky-and-soda and stood up.
"It is very kind of you, sir, to offer me a lodging for the night. I am feeling rather weary and would like to go to bed now, if it is convenient to you."
"Come then, sir," he said, with his old-fashioned politeness, and he walked towards the door.
Then I saw thething. There wasn't a shadow of doubt about it. I saw the little old man open the door. The next moment he started back. Then he thrust forward with his body, and I could see him bearing against something. He swayed, physically, as a man sways when he is wrestling. A second after he was free.
"Well, you've seen it—what do you think of it?" he said presently, as I followed him into the hall. His face had turned cloudy whitish grey.
I laughed, but the full horror of it had soaked into me.
I followed my host up a series of stairs. He carried a candlestick, with his arm extended, so as to give me a guiding light. The old house was dim and chilly in its barrenness. He stopped at a door in a long, narrow corridor and set the candlestick down.
"This is your room."
With a gentle bow and a kindly smile he opened the door for me.
"Good-night, sir. Can you see your way down?" I asked.
"I have a candle in my pocket."
He lit it at mine. Another quiet, friendly smile, and I watched him out of sight along the corridor.
I stood perfectly still for a moment just inside. Then a curious feeling of something dreadful being close at hand was present in my mind. Of course it was all humbug, and my nerves were deceiving me. But I could not shake myself free from the notion that I wasnotalone.
There is an essence in all these old dwellings that comes out to meet one on a first visit. I recognise the truth of that—for how often have I noticed how, under one roof, one breathes a friendly air, and under another queerness runs across the spine like the feet of hurrying mice.In this house there was something sinister and unwholesome. I cursed my luck for driving me into such a place. A night spent under a hedge would have been more desirable. However, I turned into bed and passed rather a broken night, with stretches of dream-haunted sleep interspersed with startled awakenings. The old house seemed to be full of muffled movements, and once (timid fool that I was) I could have sworn that the handle of my door turned. It was with a considerable qualm, I must confess, I lit my candle and opened the door. But the gallery was quite empty. I went back to bed and slept again, and when next I woke the sun was streaming into my room, and the sense of trouble that had been with me ever since entering the house last evening had gone.
When I arrived at the breakfast-table the little old man was seated behind the coffee-pot, and his face was quite glowing and wreathed in smiles. Morning had brought a flood of hard common sense to him, as clear as the crisp sunshine that filled the room. He had already begun and was consuming a plateful of eggs and bacon with the most prosaic and healthy appetite.
"Slept well?" he asked.
"Moderately," I said, feeling ashamed of my timidity in the morning light.
"I am afraid I talked rather wildly last night," remarked the little man, in a voice pregnant with reason.
"Yes—an amazing quantity of nonsense," I consented. "Where did you learn hypnotism?"
My host's brow clouded slightly.
"You see," I continued, "you must have thrown a spell over me, for I really believed in your ghost story, and now I have come to the conclusion that you were joking."
"Never mind. It doesn't matter."
But the little man didn't look up from his plate. He only shook his head.
Well (to get on), we finished breakfast. After smoking a pipe on the verandah with my host (who might have been a wizard for aught I knew, at least this was my fantastic thought) I went out and looked at my machine, and was fortunate enough after an hour's tinkering to get her going again. The little man insisted that I should take a small glass of some liqueur brandy of which he was very proud. So I took some of the wonderful stuff—strong, sufficient, soul-filling, part of the good rich earth—and went out into the sunlight, and taking a foot-bridge over running water put myself out of the little wizard's power.
* * * * * *
About six months later I was hunting in an oldbookseller's shop in Salisbury when by something more than a mere coincidence I came across a small booklet calledTwenty-five Years of Village Life, dealing with the district around Shaftesbury, and I read:
"It is somewhat remarkable that, during the last ten years, two vicars of the parish have died under somewhat mysterious circumstances at Woolpit House. It is not necessary to go into details here, but many wild stories about this picturesque old house are told around the countryside. The country people have an odd way of accounting for the ill fortune that has always attended Woolpit House. They say that it was built by the order of a dissolute old nobleman who had sold his soul to the devil, and in order to pass bad luck to all his successors who might occupy the mansion he caused grave-stones from —— churchyard to be rooted up and built into the walls."
* * * * * *
The Vale of Blackmoor or Blackmore, watered by the upper part of the Stour, was formerly known as the White Hart Forest, but is now a strip of pasturage celebrated among farmers as one of the richest of grazing lands. Its marshy surface is speckled by herds of lazy cattle, and by busier droves of pigs, of which this vale supplies toLondon a larger number than either of the counties of Somerset and Devon. Blackmoor is also known for the vigorous growth of its oaks, which thrive on the tenacious soil. Loudon says it was originally calledWhite Hart Forestfrom Henry III. having here hunted a beautiful white hart and spared its life; and Fuller gives the sequel to the tale. He says that Thomas de la Lynd, a gentleman of fair estate, killed the white hart which Henry by express will had reserved for his own chase, and that in consequence the county—as accessory for not opposing him—was mulched for ever in a fine called "White-hart Silver." "Myself," continues Fuller sorrowfully, "hath paid a share for the sauce who never tasted the meat." Loudon also informs us that the vale containedLosel's Wood, in which stood theRaven's Oakmentioned by White in hisNatural History of Selborne.
The Vale of Blackmore stretches westward from the Melburys north of Cattistock (Melbury Bub, Osmund and Sampford) to Melbury Abbas south of Shaftesbury.
Down beyond Pulham, seven miles south-west of Sturminster Newton, on a flat and dismal road, stands at the King's Stag Bridge across the River Lidden an inn called "King's Stag," with a signboard representing a stag with aring round its neck, and the following lines below:—
"When Julius Cæsar reigned here,I was then but a little deer;When Julius Cæsar reigned king,Upon my neck he placed this ring,That whoso me might overtakeShould spare my life for Cæsar's sake."
"When Julius Cæsar reigned here,I was then but a little deer;When Julius Cæsar reigned king,Upon my neck he placed this ring,That whoso me might overtakeShould spare my life for Cæsar's sake."
"When Julius Cæsar reigned here,I was then but a little deer;When Julius Cæsar reigned king,Upon my neck he placed this ring,That whoso me might overtakeShould spare my life for Cæsar's sake."
"When Julius Cæsar reigned here,
I was then but a little deer;
When Julius Cæsar reigned king,
Upon my neck he placed this ring,
That whoso me might overtake
Should spare my life for Cæsar's sake."
The belief in the longevity of the stag prevails in most countries. Linnæus (Regnum Animale) says of theCervus Elaphus: "Ætas Bovis tantum; fabula est longævitatis cervi."
From a formula, as old as the hills, relating to the length of life of animals and trees we learn that—
"Three old dogs make one horse; three old horses make one old man; three old men, one old red deer; three old red deer, one old oak; three old oaks, one brent-fir [fir or pine dug out of bogs]."
If a dog be supposed to be old at eight years, this will give: horse, 24; man, 72; deer, 216; oak, 648; bog fir, or brent fir, 1944 years.
The proverbs which follow are not folk-sayings, but they are given a place here as being quaint and curious, and not devoid of a certain interest, as they were collected by the author while tramping in the Vale of Blackmore during the summer of 1921:—
"When the gorse is out of blossom, kissing is out of fashion" (i.e.kissing isneverout of fashion).
"Trouble ran off him like water off a duck's back."
"If you sing before breakfast, you'll cry before night."
"Turn your money when you hear the cuckoo, and you'll have money in your purse till the cuckoo comes again."
"Plenty of lady-birds, plenty of hops." (Thecoccinellafeeds upon theaphisthat proves so destructive to the hop-plant.)
"March, search; April, try;May will prove if you live or die."
"March, search; April, try;May will prove if you live or die."
"March, search; April, try;May will prove if you live or die."
"March, search; April, try;
May will prove if you live or die."
"When your salt is damp, you will soon have rain."
"It will be a wet month when there are two full moons in it."
Certainly the maidens of Blackmore have a benediction upon them, granted them for their homeliness and kindness. Their eyes are quiet and yet fearless, and all the maids have something wifely about them. William Barnes, the poet of the Dorset valley, praising the Blackmoor maidens, says:
"Why, if a man would wiveAn' thrive 'ithout a dow'r,Then let en look en out a wifeIn Blackmore by the Stour."
"Why, if a man would wiveAn' thrive 'ithout a dow'r,Then let en look en out a wifeIn Blackmore by the Stour."
"Why, if a man would wiveAn' thrive 'ithout a dow'r,Then let en look en out a wifeIn Blackmore by the Stour."
"Why, if a man would wive
An' thrive 'ithout a dow'r,
Then let en look en out a wife
In Blackmore by the Stour."
William Barnes was not a wild wooer, and he found joy and adventure in a smile and a blush from a Blackmore milkmaid after having carried her pail, and he was satisfied to know that she would have bowed when she took it back had it not been too heavy. Perhaps—O dizzy fancy!—sweet Nan of the Vale would not have refused a little kiss! At all events Barnes knew womanhood in its perfection when he met with it—the maid who was "good and true and fair" was his preference.
If we return, will England beJust England still to you and me?The place where we must earn our bread?—We who have walked among the dead,And watched the smile of agony,And seen the price of Liberty,Which we have taken carelesslyFrom other hands. Nay, we shall dread,If we return,Dread lest we hold blood-guiltilyThe thing that men have died to free.Oh, English fields shall blossom redIn all the blood that has been shed,By men whose guardians are we,If we return.F. W. Harvey.
If we return, will England beJust England still to you and me?The place where we must earn our bread?—We who have walked among the dead,And watched the smile of agony,And seen the price of Liberty,Which we have taken carelesslyFrom other hands. Nay, we shall dread,If we return,Dread lest we hold blood-guiltilyThe thing that men have died to free.Oh, English fields shall blossom redIn all the blood that has been shed,By men whose guardians are we,If we return.F. W. Harvey.
If we return, will England beJust England still to you and me?The place where we must earn our bread?—We who have walked among the dead,And watched the smile of agony,And seen the price of Liberty,Which we have taken carelesslyFrom other hands. Nay, we shall dread,If we return,Dread lest we hold blood-guiltilyThe thing that men have died to free.Oh, English fields shall blossom redIn all the blood that has been shed,By men whose guardians are we,If we return.F. W. Harvey.
If we return, will England be
Just England still to you and me?
The place where we must earn our bread?—
We who have walked among the dead,
And watched the smile of agony,
And seen the price of Liberty,
Which we have taken carelessly
From other hands. Nay, we shall dread,
If we return,
Dread lest we hold blood-guiltily
The thing that men have died to free.
Oh, English fields shall blossom red
In all the blood that has been shed,
By men whose guardians are we,
If we return.
F. W. Harvey.
Blandford, or, to give the town its full title, Blandford Forum, gets its name from the ancient ford of the Stour, on a bend of which river it is pleasingly placed in the midst of a bountiful district. It is called "Shottsford Forum" in Hardy'sFar from the Madding Crowd, and inThe Woodlanderswe are told that "Shottsford is Shottsford still: you can't victual your carcass there unless you've got money, and you can't buy a cup of genuine there whether or no." The long chief street of the town has a bright, modern aspect, due to the great fire of 1731 whichdestroyed all but forty houses in the place. There is nothing to detain the pilgrim here, but it makes a good centre for any who are exploring the country around it.
Five miles of rather hilly road brings us to Winterborne Whitchurch, which has a very interesting church containing a curious old font dated 1450 and a fine old pulpit removed from Milton. The grandfather of John and Charles Wesley was vicar here from 1658 to 1662. Of the poet George Turberville, born here about 1530, very little is known. He was one of the "wild" Turbervilles, and one would like to learn more about him. Anyway, here is a specimen of his verse:
"Death is not so much to be feared as Daylie Diseases are.What? Ist not follie to dread and stand of Death in feareThat mother is of quiet rest, and grief away does weare?Was never none that twist have felt of cruel Death the Knife;But other griefes and pining paines doe linger on thro life,And oftentimes one selfsame corse with furious fits molestWhen Death by one dispatch of life doth bring the soul to rest."
"Death is not so much to be feared as Daylie Diseases are.What? Ist not follie to dread and stand of Death in feareThat mother is of quiet rest, and grief away does weare?Was never none that twist have felt of cruel Death the Knife;But other griefes and pining paines doe linger on thro life,And oftentimes one selfsame corse with furious fits molestWhen Death by one dispatch of life doth bring the soul to rest."
"Death is not so much to be feared as Daylie Diseases are.What? Ist not follie to dread and stand of Death in feareThat mother is of quiet rest, and grief away does weare?Was never none that twist have felt of cruel Death the Knife;But other griefes and pining paines doe linger on thro life,And oftentimes one selfsame corse with furious fits molestWhen Death by one dispatch of life doth bring the soul to rest."
"Death is not so much to be feared as Daylie Diseases are.
What? Ist not follie to dread and stand of Death in feare
That mother is of quiet rest, and grief away does weare?
Was never none that twist have felt of cruel Death the Knife;
But other griefes and pining paines doe linger on thro life,
And oftentimes one selfsame corse with furious fits molest
When Death by one dispatch of life doth bring the soul to rest."
When we arrive at Milborne St Andrews we are within eight miles of Dorchester. The ManorHouse, up a by-road and past the church of St Andrew, is the original of "Welland House" in Hardy'sTwo on a Tower. This was once the residence of the Mansell-Pleydell family, but since 1758 it has been used as a farm-house. The village was formerly an important posting-place between Blandford and Dorchester, and we are reminded of the coaching days by the effigy of a white hart on the cornice of the post office, in time past a busy inn.
Puddletown is our next halt on the road. It is a considerable village whose church has a chapel full of ancient monuments to the Martins of Athelhampton. Canon Carter held the living here in 1838, and when he first arrived the news that he neither shot, hunted nor fished disturbed the rustic flock, and they openly expressed their contempt for him. Then he replaced the village church band with a harmonium, and the story gained so much bulk and robustity in travelling, as such stories do in the country, that I have no doubt he seemed a sort of devastating monster.
After this he did a most appalling thing: he tampered with a very ancient rectorial gift of a mince-pie, a loaf of bread and a quart of old ale to every individual in the parish, not even excluding the babies in arms, and ventured to assert that the funds would be better employed in forming aclothing club for the poor. Carter was a very worthy man, but somehow I cannot forgive him for this. He should have placed himself a little nearer to the full current of natural things. In the essence the ancient gift was "clothing"—solid and straightforward. It was surely in this spirit that Bishop John Still penned his famous drinking song:
"No frost nor snow, no wind, I trow,Can hurt me if I would,I am so wrapt and throughly laptOf jolly good ale and old."
"No frost nor snow, no wind, I trow,Can hurt me if I would,I am so wrapt and throughly laptOf jolly good ale and old."
"No frost nor snow, no wind, I trow,Can hurt me if I would,I am so wrapt and throughly laptOf jolly good ale and old."
"No frost nor snow, no wind, I trow,
Can hurt me if I would,
I am so wrapt and throughly lapt
Of jolly good ale and old."
So at the next tithe-day supper at the Rectory a farmer who had in him the Dorset heart and blood, a very demi-god amongst the poor of Puddletown, arose in his place and asked the good Canon Carter if he still held to his purpose of converting the Christmas ale into nether garments for little boys, and the Canon replied to the effect that it was his intention to carry out that reform.
Then the farmer, full of the West, who had not come to talk balderdash, shouted: "I ban't agwaine tu see the poor folk put upon. I'll be blamed ef I du." His voice was very strong and echoed in the rafters in an alarming way, for he was of the breed that said "good-morning" to a friend three fields away without much effort. Atthis point certain stuffy people folded their hands, and called out "Fie!" and "Shame!" for it was their purpose to curry favour with the vicar, they having many small children in need of nether garments.
But the farmer cried out over them all (and all the other farmers cheered him on): "I tellee what tez. I don't care a brass button for you, with all your penny-loaf ways. That to ye all!" And with that he snapped his fingers in the face of all the company, walked out, mounted his powerful horse and turned back to his great, spacious farm-house. Here he counted out a great bundle of Stuckey's Bank notes, and calling his bailiff sent them post-haste to the landlord of the King's Arms with word to the effect that they were lodged against a quart of Christmas ale for every soul who should care to claim it on Christmas Eve. That is the story of Farmer Dribblecombe, and may we all come out of a trying position as well as he.
But to return to the church. There are the old oak pews of bygone days, a choir gallery with the date 1635, an ancient pulpit and a curious Norman font shaped like a drinking-bowl. The most interesting corner of the church is the Athelhampton aisle, which is entered through a quaint archway guarded by a tomb on which lies an armed knight carved in alabaster. Buriedhere are the Martins of many generations. They once owned the old manor-house, with the great barns behind it and the fertile acres spreading far on every hand. They once went forth swiftly and strongly, on hefty and determined horses, and worked hotly, and came in wearied with long rides and adventures. Now they rest together, "mediævally recumbent," and when their ghosts walk they do not inquire who owns the land where they tread. They let the hot world go by, and wait with patience the day when all the old squires of Athelhampton shall be mustered once again. A great company indeed! The offspring of one noble family, who, following each other for nearly four hundred years, ruled as lords of their little holding in Dorset. The first of the family came to Athelhampton in 1250, and the last in 1595. Everywhere is to be found carved on their tombs the dark and menacing motto, beneath their monkey crest, "He who looks at Martins' Ape, Martins' Ape shall look at him!" The crest is, of course, a play on the word Martin, which is an obsolete word for ape. But the menace of the motto has lost its power these three hundred years, and nothing of the might and affluence of the Martins remains but their mutilated effigies. I have been wondering to-day how they must look out upon us all with our cinematographs,jazzy-dances, lip-sticks, backless gowns, cigarettes, whisky and pick-me-ups, and our immense concern over the immeasurably trivial. I don't know that I said it aloud—such things need not be said aloud—but as I read a touching epitaph which urged a little prayer for two of the family, I turned almost numbly away, while my whole being seemed to cry out: "God rest your souls, God rest your souls."
Here, since we are on the subject, is the touching prayer from the lips of one of the ancient house of the Martins:
"Here lyeth the body of Xpofer Martyn Esquyer,Sone and heyre unto Syr Wm: Martyn, knight,Pray for their souls with harty desyreThat both may be sure of Eternall Lyght;Calling to Remembrance that evoy wyhgtMost nedys dye, and therefore lett us prayAs others for us may do Another day."
"Here lyeth the body of Xpofer Martyn Esquyer,Sone and heyre unto Syr Wm: Martyn, knight,Pray for their souls with harty desyreThat both may be sure of Eternall Lyght;Calling to Remembrance that evoy wyhgtMost nedys dye, and therefore lett us prayAs others for us may do Another day."
"Here lyeth the body of Xpofer Martyn Esquyer,Sone and heyre unto Syr Wm: Martyn, knight,Pray for their souls with harty desyreThat both may be sure of Eternall Lyght;Calling to Remembrance that evoy wyhgtMost nedys dye, and therefore lett us prayAs others for us may do Another day."
"Here lyeth the body of Xpofer Martyn Esquyer,
Sone and heyre unto Syr Wm: Martyn, knight,
Pray for their souls with harty desyre
That both may be sure of Eternall Lyght;
Calling to Remembrance that evoy wyhgt
Most nedys dye, and therefore lett us pray
As others for us may do Another day."
The last of the Martins was the Knight Nicholas who was buried here in 1595, and the last passage of his epitaph are the words, "Good-night, Nicholas!" With these appropriate words they put Nicholas to rest, like a child who had grown sleepy before it was dark. After all, we are all children, and when the shadows lengthen and the birds get back to the protecting eaves, we too grow tired—tired of playing with things much too large for us—much too full of meaning.
The church of Puddletown, or "Weatherbury," brings us to the crowning catastrophe of the sad love tale of Francis Troy and Fanny Robin, for it is the scene of the sergeant's agony of remorse. Having set up a tombstone over the poor girl's grave, Troy proceeds to plant the mound beneath with flowers. "There were bundles of snowdrops, hyacinth and crocus bulbs, violets and double daisies, which were to bloom in early spring, and of carnations, pinks, picotees, lilies of the valley, forget-me-not, summer's farewell, meadow saffron, and others, for the later seasons of the year." The author minutely describes the planting of these by Troy, with his "impassive face," on that dark night when the rays from his lantern spread into the old yews "with a strange, illuminating power, flickering, as it seemed, up to the black ceiling of cloud above." He works till midnight and sleeps in the church porch; and then comes the storm and the doings of the gargoyle. The stream of water from the church roof spouting through the mouth of this "horrible stone entity" rushes savagely into the new-made grave, turning the mould into a welter of mud and washing away all the flowers so carefully planted by Fanny's repentant lover. At the sight of the havoc, we are told, Troy "hated himself." He stood and meditated, a miserablehuman derelict. Where should he turn for sanctuary? But the words that burnt and withered his soul could not be banished: "He that is accursed, let him be accursed still."
The ill-named River Piddle—a rippling, tortoiseshell-coloured stream at times—runs through the streets. An old thatched house is peculiar by reason of the fact that it has broken out into a spacious Georgian bow window—a "window worthy of a town hall," as Sir Frederick Treves has remarked. It is supported by pillars, and has a porch-like space beneath devoted to a flower-bed.
"Weatherbury Upper Farm," the home of Bathsheba, which she inherited from her uncle, is not to be found in Puddletown, but if the pilgrim desires to find it he must proceed up the valley of the Puddle, in the direction of Piddlehinton. Before reaching the village he will come to Lower Walterstone, where a fine Jacobean manor-house, bearing the date 1586, will be easily recognised as the original which Thomas Hardy made to serve as the "Upper Farm" inFar from the Madding Crowd.
In the story the author has placed the farm a mile or more from its actual position, and it is vividly portrayed:
"A hoary building, of the Jacobean stage ofClassic Renaissance as regards its architecture, and of a proportion which told at a glance that, as is so frequently the case, it had once been the manorial hall upon a small estate around it, now altogether effaced as a distinct property, and merged in the vast tract of a non-resident landlord, which comprised several such modest demesnes. Fluted pilasters, worked from the solid stone, decorated its front, and above the roof pairs of chimneys were here and there linked by an arch, some gables and other unmanageable features still retaining traces of their Gothic extraction. Soft brown mosses, like faded velveteen, formed cushions upon the stone tiling, and tufts of the house-leek or sengreen sprouted from the eaves of the low surrounding buildings. A gravel walk leading from the door to the road in front was encrusted at the sides with more moss—here it was a silver-green variety, the nut-brown of the gravel being visible to the width of only a foot or two in the centre. This circumstance, and the generally sleepy air of the whole prospect here, together with the animated and contrasting state of the reverse façade, suggested to the imagination that on the adaptation of the building for farming purposes the vital principle of the house had turned round inside its body to face the other way."