VILLAGE ARCHITECTURE--THE COTTAGE PREACHER--COTTAGE SOCIETY--THE
SHEPHERD--EVENTS OF THE VILLAGE YEAR.
Some few farmhouses, with cow-yards and rickyards attached, are planted
in the midst of the village; and these have cottages occupied by the
shepherds and carters, or other labourers, who remain at work for the
same employer all the year. These cottages are perhaps the best in the
place, larger and more commodious, with plenty of space round them, and
fair-sized gardens close to the door. The system of hiring for a
twelvemonth has been bitterly attacked; but as a matter of fact there
can be no doubt that a man with a family is better off when settled in
one spot with constant employment, and any number of odd jobs for his
wife and children. The cottages not attached to any particular farm--
belonging to various small owners--are generally much less convenient;
they are huddled together, and the footpaths and rights of way
frequently cross, and so lead to endless bickering.
Not the faintest trace of design can be found in the ground-plan of the
village. All the odd nooks and corners seem to have been preferred for
building sites; and even the steep side of the hill is dotted with
cottages, with gardens at an angle of forty-five degrees or more, and
therefore difficult to work. Here stands a group of elm trees; there
half-a-dozen houses; next a cornfield thrusting a long narrow strip into
the centre of the place; more cottages built with the back to the road,
and the front door opening just the other way; a small meadow, a well, a
deep lane, with banks built up of loose stone to prevent them slipping--
only broad enough for one waggon to pass at once--and with cottages high
above reached by steps; an open space where three more crooked lanes
meet; a turnpike gate, and, of course, a beerhouse hard by it.
Each of these crooked lanes has its group of cottages and its own
particular name; but all the lanes and roads passing through the village
are known colloquially as `the street'. There is an individuality, so
to say, in these by-ways, and in the irregular architecture of the
houses, which does not exist in the straight rows, each cottage exactly
alike, of the modern blocks in the neighbourhood of cities. And the
inhabitants correspond with their dwelling in this respect--most of
them, especially the elder folk, being `characters' in their way.
Such old-fashioned cottages are practically built around the chimney;
the chimney is the firm nucleus of solid masonry or brickwork about
which the low walls of rubble are clustered. When such a cottage is
burned down the chimney is nearly always the only thing that remains,
and against the chimney it is built up again. Next in importance is the
roof, which, rising from very low walls, really encloses half of the
inhabitable space.
The one great desire of the cottager's heart--after his garden--is
plenty of sheds and outhouses in which to store wood, vegetables, and
lumber of all kinds. This trait is quite forgotten as a rule by those
who design `improved' cottages for gentlemen anxious to see the
labourers on their estates well lodged; and consequently the new
buildings do not give so much satisfaction as might be expected. It is
only natural that to a man whose possessions are limited, things like
potatoes, logs of wood, chips, odds and ends should assume a value
beyond the appreciation of the well-to-do. The point should be borne in
mind by those who are endeavouring to give the labouring class better
accommodation.
A cottage attached to a farmstead, which has been occupied by a steady
man who has worked on the tenancy for the best part of his life, and
possibly by his father before him, sometimes contains furniture of a
superior kind. This has been purchased piece by piece in the course of
years, some representing a a little legacy--cottagers who have a trifle
of property are very proud of making wills--and some perhaps the last
remaining relics of former prosperity. It is not at all uncommon to
find men like this, whose forefathers no great while since held farms,
and even owned them, but fell by degrees in the social scale, till at
last their grandchildren work in the fields for wages. An old chair or
cabinet which once stood in the farmhouse generations ago is still
preserved.
Upon the shelf may be found a few books--a Bible, of course; hardly a
cottager who can read is without his Bible--and among the rest an
ancient volume of polemical theology, bound in leather; it dates back to
the days of the fierce religious controversies which raged in the period
which produced Cromwell. There is a rude engraving of the author for
frontispiece, title in red letter, a tedious preface, and the text is
plentifully bestrewn with Latin and Greek quotations. These add greatly
to its value in the cottager's eyes, for he still looks upon a knowledge
of Latin as the essential of a `scholard.' This book has evidently been
handed down for many generations as a kind of heirloom, for on the blank
leaves may be seen the names of the owners with the inevitable addition
of `his' or `her book.' It is remarkable that literature of this sort
should survive so long.
Even yet not a little of that spirit which led to the formation of so
many contending sects in the seventeenth century lingers in the cottage.
I have known men who seemed to reproduce in themselves the character of
the close-cropped soldiers who prayed and fought by turns with such
energy. They still read the Bible in its most literal sense, taking
every word as addressed to them individually, and seriously trying to
shape their lives in accordance with their convictions.
Such a man, who has been labouring in the hay-field all day, in the
evening may be found exhorting a small but attentive congregation in a
cottage hard by. Though he can but slowly wade through the book, letter
by letter, word by word, he has caught the manner of the ancient writer,
and expresses himself in an archaic style not without its effect.
Narrow as the view must be which is unassisted by education and its
broad sympathies, there is no mistaking the thorough earnestness of the
cottage preacher. He believes what he says, and no persuasion,
rhetoric, or force could move him one jot. His congregation approve his
discourse with groans and various ejaculations. Men of this kind won
Cromwell's victories; but to-day they are mainly conspicuous for upright
steadiness and irreproachable moral character, mingled with some surly
independence. They are not `agitators' in the current sense of the
term; the local agents of labour associations seem chosen from quite a
different class.
Pausing once to listen to such a man, who was preaching in a roadside
cottage in a loud and excited manner, I found he was describing, in
graphic if rude language, the procession of a martyr of the Inquisition
to the stake. His imagination naturally led him to picture the
circumstances as corresponding to the landscape of fields with which he
had been from youth familiar. The executioners were dragging the victim
bound along a footpath across the meadows to the pile which had been
prepared for burning him. When they arrived at the first stile they
halted, and held an argument with the prisoner, promising him his life
and safety if he would recant, but he held to the faith.
Then they set out again, beating and torturing the sufferer along the
path, the crowd hissing and reviling. At the next stile a similar scene
took place--promise of pardon, and scornful refusal to recant, followed
by more torture. Again, at the third and last stile, the victim was
finally interrogated, and, still firmly clinging to his belief, was
committed to the flames in the centre of the field. Doubtless there was
some historic basis for the story; but the preacher made it quite his
own by the vigour and life of the local colouring in which he clothed
it, speaking of the green grass, the flowers, the innocent sheep, the
faggots, and so on, bringing it home to the minds of his audience to
whom faggots and grass and sheep were so well known. They worked
themselves into a state of intense excitement as the narrative
approached its climax, till a continuous moaning formed a deep undertone
to the speaker's voice. Such men are not paid, trained, or organised;
they labour from goodwill in the cause.
Now and then a woman, too, may be found who lectures in the little
cottage room where ten or fifteen, perhaps twenty, are packed almost to
suffocation; or she prays aloud and the rest respond. Sometimes, no
doubt, persons of little sincerity practise these things from pure
vanity and the ambition of preaching--for there is ambition in cottage
life as elsewhere; but the men and women I speak of are thoroughly in
earnest.
Cottagers have their own social creed and customs. In their
intercourse, one point which seems to be insisted upon particularly is a
previous knowledge or acquaintance. The very people whose morals are
known to be none of the strictest--and cottage morality is sometimes
very far from severe--will refuse, and especially the women, to admit a
strange girl, for instance, to sleep in their house for ample
remuneration, even when introduced by really respectable persons.
Servant-girls in the country where railways even now are few and far
between often walk long distances to see mistresses in want of
assistance, by appointment. They get tired; perhaps night approaches
and then comes the difficulty, of lodging them if the house happens to
be full. Cottagers make the greatest difficulty, unless by some chance
it should be discovered that they met the girl's uncle or cousin years
ago.
To their friends and neighbours, on the contrary, they are often very
kind, and ready to lend a helping hand. If they seldom sit down to a
social gathering among themselves, it is because they see each other so
constantly during the day, working in the same fields, and perhaps
eating their luncheon a dozen together in the same outhouse. A visitor
whom they know from the next village is ever welcome to what fare there
is. On Sundays the younger men often set out to call on friends at a
distance of several miles, remaining with them all day; they carry with
them a few lettuces, or apples from the tree in the garden (according to
the season), wrapped up in a coloured handkerchief, as a present.
Some of the older shepherds still wear the ancient blue smock-frock,
crossed with white `facings' like coarse lace; but the rising generation
use the greatcoat of modern make, at which their forefathers would have
laughed as utterly useless in the rain-storms that blow across the open
hills. Among the elder men, too, may be found a few of the huge
umbrellas of a former age, which when spread give as much shelter as a
small tent. It is curious that they rarely use an umbrella in the
field, even when simply standing about; but if they go a short journey
along the highway, then they take it with them. The aged men sling
these great umbrellas over the shoulder with a piece of tar-cord, just
as a soldier slings his musket, and so have both hands free--one to
stump along with a stout stick and the other to carry a flag basket.
The stick is always too lengthy to walk with as men use it in cities,
carrying it by the knob or handle; it is a staff rather than a stick,
the upper end projecting six or eight inches above the hand.
If any labourers deserve to be paid well, it is the shepherds: upon
their knowledge and fidelity the principal profit of a whole season
depends on so many farms. On the bleak hills in lambing time the
greatest care is necessary; and the fold, situated in a hollow if
possible, with the down rising on the east or north, is built as it were
of straw walls, thick and warm, which the sheep soon make hollow inside,
and thus have a cave in which to nestle.
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 passed 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 grass 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 documentary 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 dykes, used as landmarks, are filled with it: the dark mass
of the hill is streaked like the black hull of a ship 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 amusement 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 assemble, 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 brass 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 grass 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 massive yet shapely creatures pull the heavy weight up the
hill, their glossy quarters scarcely straining, but heads held high
showing the noble neck, the hoofs planted with sturdy pride of strength,
the polished brass 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 `shick-shack day'
search for oak-apples and the young leaves of the oak to place with a
spray of ash in their hats or button-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 assembles 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
assemble and enjoy themselves in the old-fashioned 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.