Old records show that in ancient times a curious custom was observed on Annual Court Day at Wool. It was known as collecting smoke-pence. It appears that the head of every house was called upon to pay a penny for each of his chimneys as a token that the property belonged to the manor. The money was collected by the constable, who was obliged to bring twenty pence into court, or make up the money himself.
The most characteristic and altogether unique feature of this nook of earth around Bere Regis is that superstition has not ceased to exist among the old people of the land. It is difficult to believe that there is a little district in England where superstition is still a part—a very obscure part, it is true—of the life of the people. But here I have noticed the shadow of witchcraft and magic thrown across the commonplace things of rustic life again and again while talking with old cronies over their beer, or along the winding hill roads. But it must be understood that the Dorset man does not talk to any chance wayfarer on such matters: the subject of the "Borderland" and "spiritual creatures" is strictly set apart for the log fire and chimney corner on winter evenings. It is when the wooden shutters are up to the windows, and the tranquillising clay pipes are sending up their incense to the oak cross-beams, that we may cautiously turn the conversation on to such matters. On one such occasion as I watched the keen, wrinkled faces, on which common sense, shrewdness and long experience had set their marks, I wondered if two local farmers had made such sinners of their memories as to credit their own fancy. But no, I would not believe they were in earnest. It was only their quaint humour asserting itself. They were surely "piling it on" in order to deceive me! However, that was not the solution, for when the time came, somewhere about midnight, for one of the farmers to return home he stolidly refused to face the dark trackway back to his farm, and preferred to spend the night in the arm-chair before the fire. But let one of the dwellers on Bere Heath tell of his own superstitions. Here is old Gover coming over the great Elizabethan bridge which spans the rushy River Frome at Wool. One glance at his cheerful, weather-beaten face will tell you better than a whole chapter of a book that he is no "lablolly" (fool), but a man of sound judgment, easy notions and general good character, like Hardy's Gabriel Oak. Leaning on the ancient stonework of the bridge, and smacking his vamplets (rough gaiters used by thatchers to defend the legs from wet) with a hazel stick, he stops to talk. A motor lorry filled with churns of milk passes on its way to drop its consignment at Wool railway siding.
"Tellee what 'tis," said Gover to me, pointing to the lorry: "'twill be a poor-come-a-long-o'-'t now them motors are taking the place o' horses everywhere. Can't get no manure from them things, and the land is no good without manure. Mr Davis the farmer at Five Mile Bottom hev got five Ford cars now where ten horses used to feed. He sez to me that he don't want any horse manure—chemical manures is good enough for him. But he dunnow nort 't-all-'bout-et! He'll eat the heart out of his soil with his chemicals, and his farm will be barren in a year or so. Ess, by Gor! You bant agwain to do justice to the soil without real manure, and them as thinks they can dawnt know A from a 'oss's 'ead."
Then I asked Gover about the Turberville ghost which we are told haunts this lane, and which is the subject of an allusion in Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles. His keen old face became serious at once. No ghosts or goblins had troubled him, he said, but John Rawles and another chap saw as plain as could be a funeral going along from Woolbridge House to Bere Regis, and they heard the priest singing in front of the coffin, but they could not understand what he did say. There was a cattle gate across the road in those days and Rawles ran to open it, but before he could get there the coffin had passed through the gate and it had all vanished! He had often heard tell of people who had seen ghosts, and he would not be put about if he did see one himself.
"So you have not seen the blood-stained family coach of the Turbervilles?" I inquired.
"No, I never see that," said Gover, shaking his head, "nor never heard of it."
"Then, as it is a tale that every child should know," I said, "I will tell you now, and you shall believe it or no, precisely as you choose. Once upon a time there was a Turberville who deserves to be remembered and to be called, so to speak, the limb of the 'old 'un' himself, for he spent all his days in wickedness, and went roaring to the devil as fast as all his vices could send him. I have heard it said that he snapped his fingers in the face of a good parson who came to see him on his death-bed, saying he did not wish to talk balderdash, or to hear it, and bade him clear out and send up his servant with fighting-cocks and a bottle of brandy. Gradually all the drinking and vice, which had besieged his soul for so long, swept him into a state of temporary madness and he murdered a friend while they were riding to Woolbridge House in the family coach. The friend he struck down had Turberville blood in his veins too, so you may be certain the blame was not all on one side. Ever since the evil night the coach with the demon horses dragging it sways and rocks along the road between Wool and Bere, and the murderer rushes after it, moaning and wringing his hands, but never having the fortune to catch it up. The spectacle of the haunted coach cannot be seen by the ordinary wayfarer; it is only to be seen by persons in which the blood of the Turbervilles is mixed."
"Ah!" nodded old Gover, "I don't hold with that story. If so be as that 'ere Turberville who murdered t'other hev a-gone up above, 'tain't likely as how he'll be wishful to go rowstering after that ripping great coach on a dalled bad road like this." And then he shook his bony finger in my face and added: "And if the dowl have a-got hold on 'im he won't be able to go gallyvanting about—he'll be kept there!"
Wool has another attraction in the ruins of Bindon Abbey, lying in the thick wood seen from the station, a few minutes to the south of the line towards Wareham. The ruins are very scanty. A few slabs and coffins are still preserved, and one stone bears the inscription in Lombardic characters:
ABBAS RICARDUS DE MANERS HIC TUMULATUR