In the collection of English pottery in the Museum is preserved the simple rustic memory of these tillers of the soil, the men who, centuries ago, ploughed like this simple countryman these beautiful English acres, scattering the seed over the furrows in the green flush of spring, and garnering the golden grain beneath the mellow skies of autumn. It is curious that so much of the unwritten history of our race should be preserved by so frail a thing as earthenware. These jugs and mugs, with their quaint mottoes and ornamentation, carry the spectator back to the sports and habits of a bygone age.
‘May the best cock win,’ recalls a brutal sport now almost unknown. The frog at the bottom of the jug is a rebuke to the too greedy toper; while the motto on another cup shows that there were grumblers even in the good old days, and that times were hard then as well as now:
Here’s to thee, mine honest friend,
Wishing these hard times to mend.
Beyond the woodlands and valleys which Mr Jefferies has described so happily, are the vast South Downs, hidden in masses of gray mist. These wide sheep-walks are seemingly endless in their extent. They are profusely covered with flowers in their season, with patches of furze, and with short thick grass, amid which the wild thyme luxuriates, spreading out into soft cushions of purple which might make a seat for a king, and permeating with its aromatic fragrance the whole keen air of the uplands. The furze is full of bird-life. Only game has decreased with the increase of cultivation; and with the decrease of game, foxes have become fewer. A few years ago, they were so abundant, that a shepherd told our author that he had sometimes seen as many as six at a time sunning themselves on the precipitous face of the cliffs at Beachy Head. They ascend and descend the precipice by narrow winding-paths of their own with the greatest ease and in perfect safety, unless a couple have a quarrel on one of the narrow rock-ledges, when fatal results often ensue—one or both toppling over.
‘Lands of gold,’ says our author, ‘have been found, and lands of spices and precious merchandise; but the South Downs are the land of health. There is always the delicious air, turn where you will; and the grass, the very touch of which refreshes.’ Besides all this, there is the peculiar beauty which gives its chief charm to all elevated situations, the interest of the panorama which spreads around and beneath—the distant trees which wave in the freshening breeze; the gleam of light which brings out into strong relief the warm bit of colouring supplied by the tiled roof of yonder farmhouse; the flashes of sunshine which brighten up the gloom, and chase the shadows across the swelling uplands and green low-lying meadows beyond.
Seen in the shifting lights and glooms of a breezy autumn day, this lofty, lonely spot seems a land of enchanted beauty, which holds the spectator spellbound, till masses of cloud, rolling up from the sea, throw deep purple shadows over the peaceful landscape, and warn him that darkness is about to fall over the flower-spangled slopes and gleaming sea beyond.
BY MEAD AND STREAM.
CHAPTER XXIII.—CHANGES.
The arrival of a stranger in Kingshope was not such an unusual occurrence as to attract much particular attention. The villagers were accustomed in the summer to frequent visits of bands of ‘beanfeasters’ or ‘wayzegoose’ parties, as the annual outings of the employees of large city firms are called. On these occasions there were athletic games on the common, pleasant roamings through the Forest, and high revel in the King’s Head or the Cherry Tree afterwards. Then there were itinerant photographers, negro minstrels, and gypsy cheap Jacks, with caravans drawn by animals which may be best described as the skeletons of horses in skin-tights—working the Forest ‘pitch’ or ‘lay’—these being the slang terms for any given scene of operation for the professional vagrant. The bird-snarers and the pigeon-flyers seemed to be always about. In the hunting season there were generally a few guests at the King’s Head; and so, although every new visitor underwent a bovine stare, he was forgotten as soon as he passed out of sight.