Thomas Hardy's Dorset. R. Thurston Hopkins
a pound in weight) to preserve it. It was first pressed as dry as possible, made into cubes with wooden moulds, and stacked in an airy place to dry. Hovey liked these bricks for fuel in the winter months, and I remember they made a wonderfully clear fire. It was while making up the apple pulp into bricks that my brothers and their friends caught the idea of the game of "hunting." The apple pulp was first made up into a score of heavy, wet balls. Having drawn lots as to who should be the hunter, the winner would take charge of the ammunition and retire to the barn, which was known as the "hunters' shack," while the other boys would shin up the orchard trees, or conceal themselves behind walls, ricks and bushes. A short start was allowed, and then the hunter sallied forth with unrestricted powers to bombard with shot and shell anyone within sight. The first one who made his way home to the "shack" became the next hunter. Many a satisfying flap on the back of the neck have I "got home" with those balls of apple pulp. It was a very primitive game, sometimes a very painful one, and not infrequently it ended in a general hand-to-hand fight. The game was certainly an excellent exercise in the art of encountering the hard knocks of life with a sunny fortitude. In 1916 it was my fortune to suffer rather a sharp period of shell-fire in Palestine with one of the players of this game. My old playmate turned to me and yelled: "Hi, there, Bob! Look out! These coming over are not made of apple pulp!"
Then the smell of the cider-press came full and strong on the night air of the desert, and England and the West Country came back to me in the foolishness of dreams, as the Garden of Hesperides or any other Valley of Bliss my erring feet had trodden in heedless mood.
There is a story of a Dorset vicar who was explaining to his flock the meaning of miracles. He saw that his hearers were dull and inattentive, and did not seem to grasp what he was saying, so he pointed to an old rascal of a villager who always lived riotously yet never toiled, and said in a loud voice: "I will tell you what a miracle is. Look at old Jan Domeny, he hasn't an apple-tree in his garden, and yet he made a barrelful of cider this October. There's a miracle for you."
While cycling out of Swanage to Corfe—a backbreaking and tortuous succession of hills—I had the misfortune to meet a wasp at full speed and receive a nasty sting. I asked a little girl if her mother lived near, as I wished to get some ammonia for it, and was delighted to hear the child call to her mother through an open window: "Lukee, mother, a wapsy 'ath a stinged this maister 'pon 'is feace." Which reminded me of a story in Akerman's Wiltshire Glossary of a woman who wished to show off her lubberly boy to some old dames, and accordingly called him to say his alphabet. She pointed to the letter "A" and asked Tommy to name it. "Dang-my-ole-hat, I dwon't know 'un," said the child, scratching his head. His mother passed this letter by and moved the point of her scissors to the next letter. "What be thuck one, Tommy?" "I knows 'un by zite, but I can't call 'un by's neame," replied the boy. "What is that thing as goes buzzing about the gearden, Tommy?" The boy put his head on one side and considered a moment, then replied, with a sly grin: "Wapsy!"
William Barnes told a good tale of a West Country parson who preached in the rudest vernacular. A rich and selfish dairyman of his flock died, and in place of the customary eulogy at the graveside, he said: "Here lies old——. He never did no good to nobody, and nobody spake no good o' he; put him to bed and let's prache to the living."
And here is a good story related to me by a West Country vicar. A lively old lady in his parish was very ill, and likely, as it seemed, to die. The vicar called on her and talked with professional eloquence of the splendours and joys of heaven. But the bright old creature had no fears for the future, and indeed was not so ill as they supposed. "Yes, sir," she said, "what you say may be very true, and heaven may be a bobby-dazzling place; but I never was one to go a-bell-wavering—old Dorset's good enough for me!"
Inside the old Dorset farm-houses there is much that belongs to other days than these. Many old homes have deep porches, with stone seats on each side, which lead to the large kitchen. It is large because it was built in the days when the farmer had labourers to help in the fields, and the mistress of the house had women servants to help with the spinning and the poultry, and all who lived under the same roof had their meals together in this room.
Many of the doors are as large and solid as church doors, and one that I saw was studded with nails and secured by a great rough wooden bar drawn right across it into an iron loop on the opposite side at night, and in the day-time thrust back into a hole in the thickness of the wall. But the majority are more homely than this and have only a latch inside raised from outside by a leather thong, or by "tirling at the pin," as in the old ballad.
CHAPTER II BARFORD ST MARTIN TO TISBURY AND SHAFTESBURY
And she is very small and very green
And full of little lanes all dense with flowers
That wind along and lose themselves between
Mossed farms, and parks, and fields of quiet sheep.
And in the hamlets, where her stalwarts sleep,
Low bells chime out from old elm-hidden towers.
Geoffrey Howard.
Starting from Salisbury, the pilgrim of the Hardy country, when he has passed through Barford St. Martin and Burcome, might think it worth while to take the road to Tisbury when he arrives at Swallowcliff. The large village of Tisbury is situated on the north side of the River Nadder, on rising ground, and is about twelve miles west of Salisbury. There is much of interest to be seen, and the spacious church, in the flat land at the bottom of the hill and close to the river, is well worth a visit. It contains several monuments to the Arundels, and on an iron bracket near the easternmost window is a good sixteenth-century helmet, which has been gilded in places and is ornamented with a small band of scroll-work round the edges; there is an added spike for a crest. It is a real helmet, not a funeral one; the rivets for the lining remain inside. Tradition says it belonged to the first Lord Arundel of Wardour, who died in 1639. All the seats are of oak and modern, but against the walls is some good linen-fold panelling of the seventeenth century or very late sixteenth century. In the sacrarium is a fine brass to Lawrence Hyde of West Hatch. He was the great-grandfather of Queen Mary, 1689, and Queen Anne, 1702. He is represented standing in a church in front of his six sons, facing his wife and four daughters. The inscription is:
"Here lyeth Lawrence Hyde of West Hatch Esqr. who had issue by Anne his wife six sons and four daughters and died in the year of the incarnation of Our Lord God 1590. Beati qui moriuntur in domino."
The churchyard is a very large one, and the old causeway which was used in times of flood is most picturesque. Two massive black grave slabs at once arrest the eye. In plain, square lead lettering one reads:
JOHN LOCKWOOD KIPLING
C.I.E.
1837–1911.
ALICE MACDONALD
WIFE OF
JOHN LOCKWOOD KIPLING
1910
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