Afoot in England: Chapter 10

Chapter 10

The Last of His Name

I came by chance to the village--Norton, we will call it, just
to call it something, but the county in which it is situated
need not be named.  It happened that about noon that day I
planned to pass the night at a village where, as I was
informed at a small country town I had rested in, there was a
nice inn--"The Fox and Grapes"--to put up at, but when I
arrived, tired and hungry, I was told that I could not have a
bed and that the only thing to do was to try Norton, which
also boasted an inn.  It was hard to have to turn some two or
three miles out of my road at that late hour on a chance of a
shelter for the night, but there was nothing else to do, so on
to Norton I went with heavy steps, and arrived a little after
sunset, more tired and hungry than ever, only to be told at
the inn that they had no accommodation for me, that their one
spare room had been engaged!  "What am I to do, then?" I
demanded of the landlord.  "Beyond this village I cannot go
to-night--do you want me to go out and sleep under a hedge?"
He called his spouse, and after some conversation they said
the village baker might be able to put me up, as he had a
spare bedroom in his house.  So to the baker's I went, and
found it a queer, ramshackle old place, standing a little back
from the village street in a garden and green plot with a few
fruit trees growing on it.  To my knock the baker himself came
out--a mild-looking, flabby-faced man, with his mouth full, in
a very loose suit of pyjama-like garments of a bluish floury
colour.  I told him my story, and he listened, swallowing his
mouthful, then cast his eyes down and rubbed his chin, which
had a small tuft of hairs growing on it, and finally said, "I
don't know.  I must ask my wife.  But come in and have a cup
of tea--we're just having a cup ourselves, and perhaps you'd
like one."
I could have told him that I should like a dozen cups and a
great many slices of bread-and-butter, if there was nothing
else more substantial to be had.  However, I only said, "Thank
you," and followed him in to where his wife, a nice-looking
woman, with black hair and olive face, was seated behind the
teapot.  Imagine my surprise when I found that besides tea
there was a big hot repast on the table--a ham, a roast fowl,
potatoes and cabbage, a rice pudding, a dish of stewed fruit,
bread-and-butter, and other things.
"You call this a cup of tea!" I exclaimed delightedly.  The
woman laughed, and he explained in an apologetic way that he
had formerly suffered grievously from indigestion, so that for
many years his life was a burden to him, until he discovered
that if he took one big meal a day, after the work was over,
he could keep perfectly well.
I was never hungrier than on this evening, and never, I think,
ate a bigger or more enjoyable meal; nor have I ever ceased to
remember those two with gratitude, and if I were to tell here
what they told me--the history of their two lives--I think it
would be a more interesting story than the one I am about to
relate.  I stayed a whole week in their hospitable house; a
week which passed only too quickly, for never had I been in a
sweeter haunt of peace than this village in a quiet, green
country remote from towns and stations.  It was a small rustic
place, a few old houses and thatched cottages, and the ancient
church with square Norman tower hard to see amid the immense
old oaks and elms that grew all about it.  At the end of the
village were the park gates, and the park, a solitary, green
place with noble trees, was my favourite haunt; for there was
no one to forbid me, the squire being dead, the old red
Elizabethan house empty, with only a caretaker in the
gardener's lodge to mind it, and the estate for sale.  Three
years it had been in that condition, but nobody seemed to want
it; occasionally some important person came rushing down in a
motor-car, but after running over the house he would come out
and, remarking that it was a "rummy old place," remount his
car and vanish in a cloud of dust to be seen no more.
The dead owner, I found, was much in the village mind; and no
wonder, since Norton had never been without a squire until he
passed away, leaving no one to succeed him.  It was as if some
ancient landmark, or an immemorial oak tree on the green in
whose shade the villagers had been accustomed to sit for many
generations, had been removed.  There was a sense of something
wanting something gone out of their lives.  Moreover, he had
been a man of a remarkable character, and though they never
loved him they yet reverenced his memory.
So much was he in their minds that I could not be in the
village and not hear the story of his life--the story which, I
said, interested me less than that of the good baker and his
wife.  On his father's death at a very advanced age he came, a
comparative stranger, to Norton, the first half of his life
having been spent abroad.  He was then a middle-aged man,
unmarried, and a bachelor he remained to the end.  He was of a
reticent disposition and was said to be proud; formal, almost
cold, in manner; furthermore, he did not share his neighbours'
love of sport of any description, nor did he care for society,
and because of all this he was regarded as peculiar, not to
say eccentric.  But he was deeply interested in agriculture,
especially in cattle and their improvement, and that object
grew to be his master passion.  It was a period of great
depression, and as his farms fell vacant he took them into his
own hands, increased his stock and built model cowhouses, and
came at last to be known throughout his own country, and
eventually everywhere, as one of the biggest cattle-breeders
in England.  But he was famous in a peculiar way.  Wise
breeders and buyers shook their heads and even touched their
foreheads significantly, and predicted that the squire of
Norton would finish by ruining himself.  They were right, he
ruined himself; not that he was mentally weaker than those who
watched and cunningly exploited him; he was ruined because his
object was a higher one than theirs.  He saw clearly that the
prize system is a vicious one and that better results may be
obtained without it.  He proved this at a heavy cost by
breeding better beasts than his rivals, who were all
exhibitors and prizewinners, and who by this means got their
advertisements and secured the highest prices, while he, who
disdained prizes and looked with disgust at the overfed and
polished animals at shows, got no advertisements and was
compelled to sell at unremunerative prices.  The buyers, it
may be mentioned, were always the breeders for shows, and they
made a splendid profit out of it.
He carried on the fight for a good many years, becoming more
and more involved, until his creditors took possession of the
estate, sold off the stock, let the farms, and succeeded in
finding a tenant for the furnished house.  He went to a
cottage in the village and there passed his remaining years.
To the world he appeared unmoved by his reverses.  The change
from mansion and park to a small thatched cottage, with a
labourer's wife for attendant, made no change in the man, nor
did he resign his seat on the Bench of Magistrates or any
other unpaid office he held.  To the last he was what he had
always been, formal and ceremonious, more gracious to those
beneath him than to equals; strict in the performance of his
duties, living with extreme frugality and giving freely to
those in want, and very regular in his attendance at church,
where he would sit facing the tombs and memorials of his
ancestors, among the people but not of them--a man alone and
apart, respected by all but loved by none.
Finally he died and was buried with the others, and one more
memorial with the old name, which he bore last was placed on
the wall.  That was the story as it was told me, and as it was
all about a man who was without charm and had no love interest
it did not greatly interest me, and I soon dismissed it from
my thoughts.  Then one day coming through a grove in the park
and finding myself standing before the ancient, empty,
desolate house--for on the squire's death everything had been
sold and taken away--I remembered that the caretaker had
begged me to let him show me over the place.  I had not felt
inclined to gratify him, as I had found him a young man of a
too active mind whose only desire was to capture some person
to talk to and unfold his original ideas and schemes, but now
having come to the house I thought I would suffer him, and
soon found him at work in the vast old walled garden.  He
joyfully threw down his spade and let me in and then up to the
top floor, determined that I should see everything.  By the
time we got down to the ground floor I was pretty tired of
empty rooms, oak panelled, and passages and oak staircases,
and of talk, and impatient to get away.  But no, I had not
seen the housekeeper's room--I must see that!--and so into
another great vacant room I was dragged, and to keep me as
long as possible in that last room he began unlocking and
flinging open all the old oak cupboards and presses.  Glancing
round at the long array of empty shelves, I noticed a small
brown-paper parcel, thick with dust, in a corner, and as it
was the only movable thing I had seen in that vacant house I
asked him what the parcel contained.  Books, he replied--they
had been left as of no value when the house was cleared of
furniture.  As I wished to see the books he undid the parcel;
it contained forty copies of a small quarto-shaped book of
sonnets, with the late squire's name as author on the title
page.  I read a sonnet, and told him I should like to read
them all.  "You can have a copy, of course," he exclaimed.
"Put it in your pocket and keep it."  When I asked him if he
had any right to give one away he laughed and said that if any
one had thought the whole parcel worth twopence it would not
have been left behind.  He was quite right; a cracked dinner
--plate or a saucepan with a hole in it or an earthenware
teapot with a broken spout would not have been left, but the
line was drawn at a book of sonnets by the late squire.
Nobody wanted it, and so without more qualms I put it in my
pocket, and have it before me now, opened at page 63, on which
appears, without a headline, the sonnet I first read, and
which I quote:--
   How beautiful are birds, of God's sweet air
     Free denizens; no ugly earthly spot
     Their boundless happiness doth seem to blot.
   The swallow, swiftly flying here and there,
   Can it be true that dreary household care
     Doth goad her to incessant flight?
     If not How can it be that she doth cast her lot
   Now there, now here, pursuing summer everywhere?
     I sadly fear that shallow, tiny brain
   Is not exempt from anxious cares and fears,
     That mingled heritage of joy and pain
   That for some reason everywhere appears;
     And yet those birds, how beautiful they are!
     Sure beauty is to happiness no bar.
This has a fault that doth offend the reader of modern verse,
and there are many of the eighty sonnets in the book which do
not equal it in merit.  He was manifestly an amateur; he
sometimes writes with labour, and he not infrequently ends
with the unpardonable weak line.  Nevertheless he had rightly
chosen this difficult form in which to express his inner self.
It suited his grave, concentrated thought, and each little
imperfect poem of fourteen lines gives us a glimpse into a
wise, beneficent mind.  He had fought his fight and suffered
defeat, and had then withdrawn himself silently from the field
to die.  But if he had been embittered he could have relieved
himself in this little book.  There is no trace of such a
feeling.  He only asks, in one sonnet, where can a balm be
found for the heart fretted and torn with eternal cares; when
we have thought and striven for some great and good purpose,
when all our striving has ended in disaster?  His plan, he
concludes, is to go out in the quiet night-time and look at
the stars.
Here let me quote two more sonnets written in contemplative
mood, just to give the reader a fuller idea not of the verse,
as verse, but of the spirit in the old squire.  There is no
title to these two:--
   I like a fire of wood; there is a kind
     Of artless poetry in all its ways:
     When first 'tis lighted, how it roars and plays,
   And sways to every breath its flames, refined
   By fancy to some shape by life confined.
     And then how touching are its latter days;
     When, all its strength decayed, and spent the blaze
   Of fiery youth, grey ash is all we find.
     Perhaps we know the tree, of which the pile
   Once formed a part, and oft beneath its shade
     Have sported in our youth; or in quaint style
      Have carved upon its rugged bark a name
      Of which the memory doth alone remain
   A memory doomed, alas! in turn to fade.
Bad enough as verse, the critic will say; refined, confined,
find--what poor rhymes are these! and he will think me wrong
to draw these frailties from their forgotten abode.  But I
like to think of the solitary old man sitting by his wood
fire in the old house, not brooding bitterly on his frustrate
life, but putting his quiet thoughts into the form of a
sonnet.  The other is equally good--or bad, if the critic
will have it so:--
   The clock had just struck five, and all was still
     Within my house, when straight I open threw
     With eager hand the casement dim with dew.
   Oh, what a glorious flush of light did fill
   That old staircase!  and then and there did kill
     All those black doubts that ever do renew
     Their civil war with all that's good and true
   Within our hearts, when body and mind are ill
     From this slight incident I would infer
     A cheerful truth, that men without demur,
   In times of stress and doubt, throw open wide
   The windows of their breast; nor stung by pride
     In stifling darkness gloomily abide;
     But bid the light flow in on either side.
A "slight incident" and a beautiful thought.  But all I have
so far said about the little book is preliminary to what I
wish to say about another sonnet which must also be quoted.
It is perhaps, as a sonnet, as ill done as the others, but the
subject of it specially attracted me, as it happened to be one
which was much in my mind during my week's stay at Norton.
That remote little village without a squire or any person of
means or education in or near it capable of feeling the
slightest interest in the people, except the parson, an old
infirm man who was never seen but once a week--how wanting in
some essential thing it appeared!  It seemed to me that the
one thing which might be done in these small centres of rural
life to brighten and beautify existence is precisely the thing
which is never done, also that what really is being done is of
doubtful value and sometimes actually harmful.
Leaving Norton one day I visited other small villages in the
neighbourhood and found they were no better off.  I had heard
of the rector of one of these villages as a rather original
man, and went and discussed the subject with him.  "It is
quite useless thinking about it," he said.  "The people here
are clods, and will not respond to any effort you can make to
introduce a little light and sweetness into their lives."
There was no more to be said to him, but I knew he was wrong.
I found the villagers in that part of the country the most
intelligent and responsive people of their class I had ever
encountered.  It was a delightful experience to go into their
cottages, not to read them a homily or to present them with a
book or a shilling, nor to inquire into their welfare,
material and spiritual, but to converse intimately with a
human interest in them, as would be the case in a country
where there are no caste distinctions.  It was delightful,
because they were so responsive, so sympathetic, so alive.
Now it was just at this time, when the subject was in my mind,
that the book of sonnets came into my hands--given to me by
the generous caretaker--and I read in it this one on "Innocent
Amusements":-
   There lacks a something to complete the round
     Of our fair England's homely happiness
     A something, yet how oft do trifles bless
   When greater gifts by far redound
   To honours lone, but no responsive sound
     Of joy or mirth awake, nay, oft oppress,
     While gifts of which we scarce the moment guess
   In never-failing joys abound.
   No nation can be truly great
     That hath not something childlike in its life
     Of every day; it should its youth renew
   With simple joys that sweetly recreate
     The jaded mind, conjoined in friendly strife
     The pleasures of its childhood days pursue.
What wise and kindly thoughts he had--the old squire of
Norton!  Surely, when telling me the story of his life, they
had omitted something!  I questioned them on the point.  Did
he not in all the years he was at Norton House, and later when
he lived among them in a cottage in the village--did he not go
into their homes and meet them as if he knew and felt that
they were all of the same flesh, children of one universal
Father, and did he not make them feel this about him--that
the differences in fortune and position and education were
mere accidents?  And the answer was: No, certainly not! as
if I had asked a preposterous question.  He was the squire,
a gentleman--any one might understand that he could not come
among them like that!  That is what a parson can do because he
is, so to speak, paid to keep an eye on them, and besides it's
religion there and a different thing.  But the squire!--their
squire, that dignified old gentleman, so upright in his
saddle, so considerate and courteous to every one--but he
never forgot his position--never in that way!  I also asked if
he had never tried to establish, or advocated, or suggested to
them any kind of reunions to take place from time to time, or
an entertainment or festival to get them to come pleasantly
together, making a brightness in their lives--something which
would not be cricket or football, nor any form of sport for a
few of the men, all the others being mere lookers-on and the
women and children left out altogether; something which would
be for and include everyone, from the oldest grey labourer no
longer able to work to the toddling little ones; something of
their own invention, peculiar to Norton, which would be their
pride and make their village dearer to them?  And the answer
was still no, and no, and no.  He had never attempted, never
suggested, anything of the sort.  How could he--the squire!
Yet he wrote those wise words:--
   No nation can be truly great
     That hath not something childlike in its life
     Of every day.
Why are we lacking in that which others undoubtedly have, a
something to complete the round of homely happiness in our
little rural centres; how is it that we do not properly
encourage the things which, albeit childlike, are essential,
which sweetly recreate?  It is not merely the selfishness of
those who are well placed and prefer to live for themselves,
or who have light but care not to shed it on those who are not
of their class.  Selfishness is common enough everywhere, in
men of all races.  It is not selfishness, nor the growth of
towns or decay of agriculture, which as a fact does not decay,
nor education, nor any of the other causes usually given for
the dullness, the greyness of village life.  The chief cause,
I take it, is that gulf, or barrier, which exists between men
and men in different classes in our country, or a considerable
portion of it--the caste feeling which is becoming increasingly
rigid in the rural world, if my own observation, extending over
a period of twenty-five years, is not all wrong.

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