There is a market-cross in this town, the sight of which is worth a journey of hundreds of miles. Time, with his scythe, and “enlightened Protestant piety,” with its pick-axes and crow-bars; these united have done much to efface the beauties of this monument of ancient skill and taste and proof of ancient wealth; but in spite of all their destructive efforts, this Cross still remains a most beautiful thing, though possibly, and even probably, nearly, or quite, a thousand years old. There is a market-cross lately erected at Devizes, and intended to imitate the ancient ones. Compare that with this, and then you have pretty fairly a view of the difference between us and our forefathers of the “dark ages.”
To-morrow I start for Bollitree, near Ross, Herefordshire, my road being across the county, and through the city of Gloucester.
RIDE, FROM MALMSBURY, IN WILTSHIRE, THROUGH GLOUCESTERSHIRE, HEREFORDSHIRE, AND WORCESTERSHIRE.
Stroud (Gloucestershire),
Tuesday Forenoon, 12th Sept. 1826.
I set off from Malmsbury this morning at 6 o’clock, in as sweet and bright a morning as ever came out of the heavens, and leaving behind me as pleasant a house and as kind hosts as I ever met with in the whole course of my life, either in England or America; and that is saying a great deal indeed. This circumstance was the more pleasant, as I had never before either seen or heard of these kind, unaffected, sensible, sans façons, and most agreeable friends. From Malmsbury I first came, at the end of five miles, to Tutbury, which is in Gloucestershire, there being here a sort of dell, or ravine, which, in this place, is the boundary line of the two counties, and over which you go on a bridge, one-half of which belongs to each county. And now, before I take my leave of Wiltshire, I must observe that, in the whole course of my life (days of courtship excepted, of course), I never passed seventeen pleasanter days than those which I have just spent in Wiltshire. It is, especially in the southern half, just the sort of country that I like; the weather has been pleasant; I have been in good houses and amongst good and beautiful gardens; and in every case I have not only been most kindly entertained, but my entertainers have been of just the stamp that I like.
I saw again this morning large flocks of goldfinches feeding on the thistle-seed on the roadside. The French call this bird by a name derived from the thistle, so notorious has it always been that they live upon this seed. Thistle is, in French, Chardon; and the French call this beautiful little bird Chardonaret. I never could have supposed that such flocks of these birds would ever be seen in England. But it is a great year for all the feathered race, whether wild or tame: naturally so, indeed; for every one knows that it is the wet, and not the cold, that is injurious to the breeding of birds of all sorts, whether land-birds or water-birds. They say that there are this year double the usual quantity of ducks and geese: and, really, they do seem to swarm in the farmyards, wherever I go. It is a great mistake to suppose that ducks and geese need water, except to drink. There is, perhaps, no spot in the world, in proportion to its size and population, where so many of these birds are reared and fatted as in Long Island; and it is not in one case out of ten that they have any ponds to go to, or, that they ever see any water other than water that is drawn up out of a well.
A little way before I got to Tutbury I saw a woman digging some potatoes in a strip of ground, making part of a field, nearly an oblong square, and which field appeared to be laid out in strips. She told me that the field was part of a farm (to the homestead of which she pointed); that it was by the farmer let out in strips to labouring people; that each strip contained a rood (or quarter of a statute acre); that each married labourer rented one strip; and that the annual rent was a pound for the strip. Now the taxes being all paid by the farmer; the fences being kept in repair by him; and, as appeared to me, the land being exceedingly good: all these things considered, the rent does not appear to be too high.—This fashion is certainly a growing one; it is a little step towards a coming back to the ancient small life and lease holds and common-fields! This field of strips was, in fact, a sort of common-field; and the “agriculturists,” as the conceited asses of landlords call themselves at their clubs and meetings, might, and they would if their skulls could admit any thoughts except such as relate to high prices and low wages; they might, and they would, begin to suspect that the “dark age” people were not so very foolish when they had so many common-fields, and when almost every man that had a family had also a bit of land, either large or small. It is a very curious thing that the enclosing of commons, that the shutting out of the labourers from all share in the land; that the prohibiting of them to look at a wild animal, almost at a lark or a frog; it is curious that this hard-hearted system should have gone on, until, at last, it has produced effects so injurious and so dangerous to the grinders themselves that they have, of their own accord, and for their own safety, begun to make a step towards the ancient system, and have, in the manner I have observed, made the labourers sharers in some degree in the uses at any rate of the soil. The far greater part of these strips of land have potatoes growing in them; but in some cases they have borne wheat, and in others barley, this year; and these have now turnips; very young, most of them, but in some places very fine, and in every instance nicely hoed out. The land that will bear 400 bushels of potatoes to the acre will bear 40 bushels of wheat; and the ten bushels of wheat to the quarter of an acre would be a crop far more valuable than a hundred bushels of potatoes, as I have proved many times in the Register.
Just before I got into Tutbury I was met by a good many people, in twos, threes, or fives, some running and some walking fast, one of the first of whom asked me if I had met an “old man” some distance back. I asked what sort of a man: “A poor man.” “I don’t recollect, indeed; but what are you all pursuing him for?” “He has been stealing.” “What has he been stealing?” “Cabbages.” “Where?” “Out of Mr. Glover, the hatter’s, garden.” “What! do you call that stealing; and would you punish a man, a poor man, and, therefore, in all likelihood, a hungry man too, and, moreover an old man; do you set up a hue-and-cry after, and would you punish, such a man for taking a few cabbages, when that Holy Bible, which, I dare say, you profess to believe in, and perhaps assist to circulate, teaches you that the hungry man may, without committing any offence at all, go into his neighbour’s vineyard and eat his fill of grapes, one bunch of which is worth a sack-full of cabbages?” “Yes; but he is a very bad character.” “Why, my friend, very poor and almost starved people are apt to be ‘bad characters;’ but the Bible, in both Testaments, commands us to be merciful to the poor, to feed the hungry, to have compassion on the aged; and it makes no exception as to the ‘character’ of the parties.” Another group or two of the pursuers had come up by this time; and I, bearing in mind the fate of Don Quixote when he interfered in somewhat similar cases, gave my horse the hint, and soon got away; but though doubtless I made no converts, I, upon looking back, perceived that I had slackened the pursuit! The pursuers went more slowly; I could see that they got to talking; it was now the step of deliberation rather than that of decision; and though I did not like to call upon Mr. Glover, I hope he was merciful. It is impossible for me to witness scenes like this; to hear a man called a thief for such a cause; to see him thus eagerly and vindictively pursued for having taken some cabbages in a garden: it is impossible for me to behold such a scene, without calling to mind the practice in the United States of America, where, if a man were even to talk of prosecuting another (especially if that other were poor, or old) for taking from the land, or from the trees, any part of a growing crop, for his own personal and immediate use; if any man were even to talk of prosecuting another for such an act, such talker would be held in universal abhorrence: people would hate him; and, in short, if rich as Ricardo or Baring, he might live by himself; for no man would look upon him as a neighbour.
Tutbury is a very pretty town, and has a beautiful ancient church. The country is high along here for a mile or two towards Avening, which begins a long and deep and narrow valley, that comes all the way down to Stroud. When I got to the end of the high country, and the lower country opened to my view, I was at about three miles from Tutbury, on the road to Avening, leaving the Minching-hampton road to my right. Here I was upon the edge of the high land, looking right down upon the village of Avening, and seeing, just close to it, a large and fine mansion-house, a beautiful park, and, making part of the park, one of the finest, most magnificent woods (of 200 acres, I dare say), lying facing me, going from a valley up a gently-rising hill. While I was sitting on my horse admiring this spot, a man came along with some tools in his hand, as if going somewhere to work as plumber. “Whose beautiful place is that?” said I. “One ’Squire Ricardo, I think they call him, but ...”—You might have “knocked me down with a feather,” as the old women say,... “but” (continued the plumber) “the Old Gentleman’s dead, and” ... “God —— the old gentleman and the young gentleman too!” said I; and, giving my horse a blow, instead of a word, on I went down the hill. Before I got to the bottom, my reflections on the present state of the “market” and on the probable results of “watching the turn of it,” had made me better humoured; and as one of the first objects that struck my eye in the village was the sign of the Cross, and of the Red, or Bloody, Cross too, I asked the landlord some questions, which began a series of joking and bantering that I had with the people, from one end of the village to the other. I set them all a laughing; and, though they could not know my name, they will remember me for a long while.—This estate of Gatcomb belonged, I am told, to a Mr. Shepperd, and to his fathers before him. I asked where this Shepperd was NOW? A tradesman-looking man told me that he did not know where he was; but that he had heard that he was living somewhere near to Bath! Thus they go! Thus they are squeezed out of existence. The little ones are gone; and the big ones have nothing left for it but to resort to the bands of holy matrimony with the turn of the market watchers and their breed. This the big ones are now doing apace; and there is this comfort at any rate; namely, that the connection cannot make them baser than they are, a boroughmonger being, of all God’s creatures, the very basest.