SHEPHERD LIFE AMONG THE FELLS
I. A Link with the Past
A voluntary exile from the land of the fells is an old-time shepherd. Instead of among heathery wastes or rocky scaurs, he lives between dismal gray grass-slopes where the Pennine divides Lancashire and Yorkshire. Probably the heart beating within that stout framework which defied the mountain storms of fifty years ago oft turns from the new pursuits to the old. I met him on a cobbled road—what an abomination these inhospitable stones must be to one whose foot for long fell soft and silent on the grass of the uplands!—a weathered, well-made man, with hair and whiskers turning tardily from brown to gray.
Shortly he detected that I knew and loved his own native land of the fells, and then, after rapidly reviewing scenes from many a lovely lake and valley there, our talk lighted upon some phase of shepherdry; and then his eye kindled, and I knew him for what he truly was—a shepherd.
‘You know that dale, eh? I well remember the time when all the high fells you can see from it were open and common to its farmers. Now they are cut up according to the size of the holdings.
‘Before that happened the shepherd’s work was much more difficult. Sheep-smits were a real thing then; you had to know the mark of every farm for miles round, for, unhindered by fences, strays were always coming and going. Lambing-time was often late in May, and a hard time it was. The shepherd had to remain night and day with his flock, oft in a far-off mountain basin, where for a fortnight on end he might never meet a single person. If the weather came stormy, the labour and anxiety was trebled; the ewes and lambs had to be seen to at all cost. One time I was four days and five nights without rest, for first a great blizzard and then a wild rain-storm raged. In my flock alone forty ewes died in those four days; the total loss of lambs was impossible to reckon, for the whole lambing was spoiled. And I was in a sheltered position, too. At such times, and when we worked the highest grass at midsummer, our food had to be brought up to some pre-arranged spot—a rough hut made with turf and a few spruce branches, partially sheltering under some big rock. Often for two or three summer nights, when it was fine, we lay out on the open moor. If a spell of really wet weather set in, of course we came down nearer to the dales. During a thunder-storm we frequently were in danger. I have seen a score sheep struck with lightning—what a horrid smell is that of burning flesh and wool!
‘At all times, fair weather or foul, our work was greatly lightened by our dogs. It is a pleasure for a shepherd to train them for his own use. You can’t buy a first-rate sheep-dog with gold. When I began shepherding, sheep were much wilder than now, less in size, carrying but poor wool, thriving badly. Cross-breeding with the Scotch sheep has imparted a good deal of vigour to the mountain flocks, and the blood of Southern breeds shows in increased size and choicer wool. Often when wandering along the fellsides we shepherds used to sight one another, but, seeing that each had a flock of about four thousand, it wasn’t likely that we could feed our sheep together. If we did come close, our flocks quickly got mixed, and there was half a day’s work sorting them again. In those days, too, as wool fetched a better price on the market by about double what it does now, shepherding was the best-paying farm work. So there were plenty of good fellsmen to be got—men that could clip [shear] and wash and doctor with the best there is to-day.
‘How did we manage to divide the fell up without fences? As I have said, every farm had the right to send a number of sheep to graze on the fell in those days, as they have a claim on so many acres of pasture now. The owners of adjoining smaller farms combined to employ a shepherd among them. Of course, the bigger halls kept shepherds of their own. For farms on the right-side of the valley the shepherd claimed the land from their outermost wall up to the top of the watershed for width, and for length as far as the lowland extended. A shepherd might thus drive over a moor four miles long and six miles wide, with perhaps occasional excursions some eight or more miles.
‘A shepherd’s first job in the spring was to collect the sheep, and to get to know their marks. Then he drove the mass to where there was enough grass for pasturing. When you were walking among the fells’—addressing me more pointedly—‘you would likely notice a great number of sheepfolds. These formerly marked the end of the “heafs,” or pasturages. The shepherd’s work was to drive his flock daily from one set of folds to the other. But, seeing that grass is sparse on these uplands—many an acre is occupied with cliffs and beds of rock and scree—the shepherd had constantly to vary the level of his route.
‘Soon after the flock were on the fell-grass lambing commenced, when the more weakly of his command needed close attention. The sheep didn’t make things any easier by wandering to as remote positions as possible. Lambing-time lasted four weeks as a rule, and after that the summer grass had fully come. As the days began to be hot, we used to let our sheep wander into the deep dark ghylls and the narrow shadows of the boulders while we took a nap. Sometimes, instead of sleeping, we passed the time in trying to avenge ourselves of our natural foes. The raven and the fox particularly had levied toll of the weakest of our flocks at lambing-time, and now we had a chance.