Christmas also brought snapdragons; and, after seeing the Blue Grotto at Capri, my brother described it as “a large hollow in one of the cliffs, with about a quarter of an acre of water of the colour of a snapdragon fire.” And that, I think, is really quite a good description of it, though I have never seen it described in similar terms elsewhere.
There were immense plum puddings here at Christmas and also on all birthdays. My grandfather usually mentions them in his letters to my father. Thus, 26 December 1858, “The men were here yesterday: goose and plum pudding as usual. Bob had the key of the cider cellar and was butler; so, depend on it, there was no lack of cider. However, they all left in good order.” Again, 4 January 1846, “They were invited in yesterday on a famous piece of roasted pork and plum pudding, and drank the little creature’s good health. I believe they would be glad if Baby’s birthday came every month.” And again, 3 January 1869, “Plum puddings have followed pretty quick of late, but there will be a cessation till April, if my life is spared till that time: if not, of course, no pudding.”
My grandfather writes to my father, 18 March 1844, “I remember going to see old ***** of Crediton about some business, and was sitting down by the fire talking with him, when a great coarse country maid came in and disturbed us. The old man was quite in a rage to see the maid tumbling everything over, and asked what she wanted. She said, ‘Why, us have lost the pudding-cloth six weeks, and as the gentleman is going to dine here, I suppose us shall have a pudding now.’ Turning round to me, the old man said corn was so dear, he could not afford to have puddings. He was a rich old man, grandfather of ***** and *****. I once asked him What news (as he was reading a paper) and he replied, ‘Oh, I don’t know: my paper is a fortnight old: I get it for a ha’penny then’.”
Speaking of people nearer home, he says, 25 January 1846, “Very strange that Mr ***** never takes in a paper, though glad to get one gratis, Mr ***** takes none, so they must trust all to hearsay. Like the rest of the farmers, they are not much of politicians: they see or know but little beyond their own and parish affairs, and seldom go beyond their market towns, where they assemble and talk of the price of cattle and corn and advise each other how to cut down their little tradesmen and labourers. Government may do what it likes to oppress any other class, so as they are not meddled with.... Their cry hitherto has been Church and State, but at the Kingsbridge meeting they seemed to be grieved, and said the tithe was an exclusive burden on them. The parsons hitherto have congregated at those meetings, to support Protection for their own interest. Depend on it, it will not be long before the farmers will be the greatest enemies of the parsons. However, they will never get rid of the tithe. I cannot believe there ever will be a government that will take it off the land, and pay it out of the Consolidated Fund, as they expect.”
There were farmers of another sort, and he finds fault with them as well, 3 June 1843, “They are now apeing the gentleman with their gigs and fine hackneys, and all the household and labourers pinched and begrudged.” But while he blamed both sorts of them for skimping labourers, he only paid the current wage himself. I see from his accounts for 1840 that he was paying 1s. 6d. a day to casual hands, and 10s. 6d. a week to regular hands, for agricultural work. The cost of living went down; and he writes to my father then, 7 February 1850, “No one has dropt the wages in this neighbourhood yet; but it is all very natural that wages should be dropt, if the labourer can live for about half what he has hitherto required.... I have no doubt that wages will come back to the old standard of 1s. 2d. and 1s. 4d. instead of 1s. 6d.”
My grandmother writes to my father, 6 January 1846, “I was at Moreton yesterday morning, and visited the poor and sick in order to distribute your alms; and many poor objects did I find who thankfully received the trifle I gave them. A shilling to them appeared so large a sum that they scarcely knew how to express their gratitude.”
Shillings and pence were of more value then. My grandfather writes on 12 June 1847, “Animal food is from 7 to 8d. the pound, which is thought high here,” and on 10 December 1848, “The butcher is now selling me saddles and haunches for 6½d. the pound.” And it was the same with other things.
Within the last twenty years I have seen an account set out between a blacksmith and a farmer without any reference at all to money. On one side there were horseshoes, ploughshares, etc., and on the other side, pork, butter, geese, etc. And both parties reckoned the items up, and saw that the totals balanced. They seemed to have some weights and measures in their mind that are not found in books, say, 4 horseshoes make 1 duck.
Before the railway brought outsiders in, there was hardly anybody in the place who did not own land or rent it or work on it, and nobody at all who did not talk of it. And naturally my grandfather had a good deal to say about it in the letters that he wrote from here.
He writes on 9 March 1845, “This weather for March is I should say unprecedented. (I am not like the old woman who had known hundreds of Lammas Fairs, but I have known many.) Until within the last twenty years our winters were much colder than since, but I never knew such hard freezing as this: it has been intense. I have sheep in turnips, and these are so frozen that they can only just eat enough to keep them alive.... I should say the farmers must now see the necessity of cultivating the turnip. I have heard many say it was not worth the expense, and now they are running and riding in all directions for keep for cattle, and in all probability will lose more than they will get by cattle for three years to come.”