Grain and Chaff from an English Manor

The agricultural labourer, and the countryman generally, does not recognize any form of property beyond land, houses, buildings, farm stock, and visible chattels. A groom whom I...

and had he included the trees around a dwelling-house, the epigram would have been equally applicable. Sometimes, of course, it becomes absolutely necessary to cut down an ancie...

"Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay, Might stop a hole to keep the wind away: O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe Should patch a wall to expel the winter's fl...

I saw a good deal of my three successive Vicars, for I was Vicar's churchwarden for a period of nearly twenty years, and was treasurer of the fund for the restoration and enlarg...

Dealers of all kinds were much more frequent callers at farm-houses in the early days of my farming, than latterly when auction sales, to some extent, superseded private negotia...

A curious old punning Latin line, illustrating various meanings of the word _malus_, an apple, seems appropriate, as a commencement, to writing about apples; it is I think very...

Living so many years in one place I had unusual opportunities, as my rounds nearly always took me beside my brooks, of watching their slowly changing courses. The roots of the p...

My farm had the reputation of being a good cheese farm, but a bad butter farm; in spite, however, of this tradition I determined to establish a pedigree Jersey herd for butter-m...

I do not propose to enter upon the ordinary details of arable farming, as not of very general interest, except for those actually engaged thereon. I am aiming especially at the...

The labourers born and bred in the Vale of Evesham are mostly tall and powerful men, and mine were no exception; where the land is good the men compare favourably in size and st...

When I came to Aldington I found that by the energy of the Vicar an elementary school had been built and equipped, and was working well under the voluntary system. I accepted th...

Jim was my first head carter, and he dearly loved a horse. He had, as the saying is, forgotten more about horses than most men ever knew, and what he didn't know wasn't worth kn...

Many specialists, in distinct professions, visited the farm in the course of every twelve months, and each appeared at the season when his particular services were likely to be...

Jarge was one of the most prominent characters among my men. He was not a native of the Vale, coming from the Lynches, a hilly district to the north of Evesham. He was a sturdy...

I had experiences of various shepherds, and the man I remember best was John C. Short, sturdy, strong, and willing, he was somewhat prejudiced and old-fashioned, with many tradi...

We read of the peacocks which Solomon's navy of Tarshish brought once in three years with other rare and precious commodities to contribute to the splendour of his court; and do...

"I may soberly confess that sometimes, walking abroad after my studies, I have been almost mad with pleasure--the effect of nature upon my soul having been inexpressibly ravishi...

In recalling my earliest impressions of the village of Aldington, near Evesham, Worcestershire, the first picture that presents itself is of two chestnut-trees in full bloom in...

In a very rare black-letter book on hop culture, _A Perfite Platforme of a Hoppe Garden_, published in the year 1578 and therefore over 340 years old, the author, Reynolde Scot,...

Though machinery has lightened the labour of manual workers to some extent, it entails much more trouble upon masters and foremen, for breakages are frequent and always occur at...

During the terribly wet summer of 1879 the following lines were written--it was said by the then Bishop of Wakefield--in the visitors' book at the White Lion Hotel at Bala, in W...

"The heart is hard in nature and unfit For human fellowship, as being void Of sympathy, and therefore dead alike To love and friendship both, that is not pleased With sight of a...

"How like a rainbow, sparkling as a dewdrop, Glittering as gold, and lively as a swallow, Each left his grave-shroud and in rapture winged him Up to the heavens." --ANON.

Among village institutions a cricket club was started soon after I first came, and I was able to lend a meadow in which the members could play. I held the sinecure office of Pre...

"A right down hearty one he be as'll make some of our maids look alive. And the worst time of year for such work too, when the May-Dukes is in, and the Hearts a-colouring!" --Cr...

All the above words and phrases the writer has frequently heard used in the neighbourhood in the senses indicated, but to make the list more complete the following are added on...

Compulsory education has eliminated many of the old words and phrases formerly in general use in Worcestershire, and is still striving to substitute a more "genteel," but not al...