Guernsey pictorial directory and stranger's guide

by of Guernsey Thomas Bellamy

The neighbourhood abounds in a deep and rich soil capable of producing the best crops, such as wheat, barley, potatoes and parsnips, which latter crop, if the stranger has been here any time, he must have discovered, is the chief growth of the Guernsey farmer. There are many rich fields in this vicinity that can and do grow about twenty and a quarter tons to the English acre, which, when dug, generally sell at about one shilling per bushel, but afterwards rise in proportion. In the more sheltered parts are waving corn fields, which though equally fine elsewhere, nevertheless are shaken by the winds from the altitude of the situation. Vraic is not so much used as in the Valle.

The King's Mills is a secluded and delightful situation, and more or less is the attraction of all visitors. The orchard scenery is florid, and the ground exceedingly good from being stimulated by the invigorating salts of the vraic, and the cyder has been considered the best in the island. The scenes abound with much interest, and are by no means too clogged for the pencil of the artist. The herbs are generally medical and of the tall kinds.

A little way up the stranger will break upon the most lovely valley he ever sat eyes on. It is in fact a bason, circumgirt on all sides, with a more or less quantity of beautiful trees and underwood. In the centre, on a gentle rising, are the farm premises of Mr Dorey, which is entered from the road by a curious old broken Saxon arch. Adjoining the farmyard, is a gigantic holly-tree, measuring at the base seven feet two inches in circumference, and midway up four feet six inches and one eight, having for its recommendation a clean and healthy stem whereon not a single knot or other imperfection can be traced upon its silver-skinned bark from the root upwards. The tree itself stands about fifty feet, and the trunk twenty-five feet. In the above valley is every thing that can fascinate the poet, the painter, and the admirer of the picturesque, and if the stranger's visit to this charming spot should be in the autumn, he may perhaps indulge with the author; for it was a beautiful day, on the threshold of winter, that he visited it under the following impression:—

Here, fain would we look back or linger where we are, for many charms yet surround us; true, indeed, a fairer vision is receding from us,—brighter skies and a greener earth; but when we look around, and see the beauteous hues which yet garnish the woods, and the few blossoms that still faintly smile upon their stalks, we feel a sympathy with the melancholy cast of the season; and almost fancy that neither the cheerful visions of the spring, the glowing luxuriance of summer, nor the mellow tints of autumn, equal the sombre charm of the closing scene. Surely none speak to the heart with such impressive language, none so full of calm thoughts, sober recollections, and gentle feelings. Who that ever trod this sylvan valley, rustling beneath his feet the heaps of leaves that once danced greenly and gaily on the outstretched bows, but dwells on abject prospects, blighted hopes, joys, loves, affections cherished and buried? Who that hears amid this stillness, the drop of a leaf amid its companions, but is feelingly and touchingly reminded that all natural things decay. He feels that the holiday of youth is past into summer—summer into autumn, and that he too must soon drop as noiseless and as silent as that leaf before him in the winter of his life. But let me for a moment part from this moral strain, and walk in fellow companionship to yonder mound and beat the leaves in our way, for there are many lovely pictures which linger before the eye as we wade through them in the stillness of an October noon; such as the deep red of some, the ashen hue of others, with all the intermediate tints of orange and yellow, and the brown duskier hues that deepen into nothingness and decay. The dark shining green of the holly, with its scarlet berries in connexion with the adjoining laurel, bears to the poetic feeling amalgamized ideas of youth and age,—the berry bearing tribe of bushes bending to the earth with the weight of their neglected riches, and the dark sloe with its hoar-frost film, all tend to form a fit subject for the pen of the immortal Gilpin in his Northern Tints of Forest Scenery, in which peculiar strain he is the most exalted of all living and dead writers—

"The little red leaf, the last of its clan,
That dances as long as dance it can,
Hanging so light and hanging so high
On the top-most twig that looks up to the sky."

Now we have emerged from the trees, let me point to yonder water-mill, that lies immediately under the côtil. How beautifully plays the feathery foam over the wheel, and how it dances and leaps over the little one which so swiftly runs round! In October everything is clear and distinct; there is none of that raw mistiness which in summer clogs the distant prospect, nor any of that dancing vapour which a mid-day sun exhales from the heated earth. We can almost count the leaves of the trees, and as the slanting sun-beam thwarts the level of the meadow, high-taper and fox-glove rise conspicuously into view. It is in October that a boundless prospect is enjoyed to the full, and all that the horizon embraces is distinctly laid before us. Oft do I recollect from Le Hocquette, watching with intense interest the fiery setting of the evening sun, which, as it dipped the horizon sent up rich spires of rays, and as it were in a flood of heavenly light gilding it with an eternal glory, while the heavy gloom of Noirmont point was distinct even to a mushroom on the outline, all contributing to render the scene gorgeous in the extreme.

Connected with this valley, and intersected with a variety of hill and dale, is Woodlands, perhaps the most beautiful estate in the island. The building is somewhat irregular, and unfortunately situated in the lowland that causes dampness, and enforces the idea of gloom. This, however, is amply compensated in the diversity of the scenery, which comprehends a tasteful display of wood, garden, and upland; altogether forming a spot of true monastic seclusion, which the visitor can scarce fail to identify. The intersectional valleys are so screened from the winds, that the magnolia grandiflora is a mere ornamental shrub in the adjoining woods, and attains the extraordinary height of forty feet, and blossoms every year. A species of syringa, from Constantinople, with long pendant flowers, and the spice plant, with many others equally rare, seem to invigorate as though in their native soil. It is here the excellent seedling apple called "la Pomme Susanne," or Mollet Pippin was raised, named from a former proprietor, who left an orchard rich with a variety of sorts.