Part 7

Frost, as already intimated, was village bard or poet. I remember well his coming down to the house with a poem on a transaction of my father’s, the advisability of which I now greatly doubt.

In our village, the “revel” was kept up every year on the first Sunday after Trinity Sunday, and the week following. A revel in Devonshire is the equivalent of the wake in other parts of England, and of the feast in Cornwall. It used to be celebrated on the day of the saint to whom the parish church is dedicated. But when the new style came into use, the conservative rustic mind resisted the change and adhered to the computation according to the unrevised calendar. Accordingly, in most places the feast or revel is eleven days after the day of the patron saint. In some places, however, it is movable. Now our church is dedicated to St. Peter, accordingly our revel ought to be on the nearest Sunday after June 29. It is rare indeed that the first Sunday after Trinity should fall so late, and impossible, I believe, that it could synchronise with old-style St. Peter’s Day. In 1899 the first Sunday after Trinity was on June 4—twenty-five days before new-style St. Peter’s Day, and thirty-six before the feast reckoned by the old style.

There is, however, some reason to believe that the earlier dedication was to St. Petrock, whose day is June 4, and that the title of the church was altered in 1261, when reconsecrated. The bishops of Exeter always endeavoured to get rid of the patron saints when belonging to the Celtic Church, and substitute for them some who were in the Roman calendar.

The revel at Lew Trenchard agreed much more closely with St. Petrock’s Day than with that of St. Peter the Apostle.

However, this is neither here nor there. The revel was kept up with shows, a fair, and horse-races, and it must be allowed there was some drunkenness.

My father, as squire, and in those days an autocrat, disapproved of the revel and abolished it, and substituted for it a cottage garden show, on no very determined date. The revel has never recovered, and the flower show, after living for two years, died a natural death.

I do not myself believe in the destruction of any ancient institution. Let it be reformed, but never abolished.

Well, now to the point.

Henry Frost appeared on the occasion of the first flower show with a poem composed to celebrate the birth of the cottage garden exhibition and the burial of the revel. It was very laudatory of my father, and every verse concluded with the refrain—

“For he had a most expansive mind.”

He had used incredible effort to obtain suitable rhymes. In one verse he had—

“In laudable efforts he was not behind, For, &c.”

Another ran—

“To drunken abuses never was blind, For, &c.

Another, in doubtful grammar, ran—

“Among his comperes greatly he shined, For, &c.”

“Ah,” said my father, “all Henry Frost thinks of in his innermost mind is that I should have a most expansive pocket, and that he may be able to get drunk on what he draws from it in reward for his poem.”

When Anne died, then a difficulty arose: under what name was she to be entered in the register? The parson insisted that he could not and he would not enter her as Anne Frost, for that was not her legal name. Then Henry was angry, and carried her off to be buried in another parish, where the parson was unacquainted with the circumstances. I must say that Anne proved an excellent “wife.” She was thrifty, clean, and managed a rough-tempered and rough-tongued man with great tact, and was generally respected. She died in or about 1843.

Much later than that there lived a publican some miles off, whom I knew very well; indeed he was the namesake of and first cousin to a carpenter in my constant employ. He bought his wife for a stone two-gallon jar of Plymouth gin, if I was informed aright. She had belonged to a stonecutter, but as he was dissatisfied with her, he put up a written notice in several public places to this effect—

NOTICE.

This here be to hinform the publick as how G⸺ C⸺ be dispozed to sell his wife by Auction. Her be a dacent, clanely woman, and be of age twenty-five ears. The sale be to take place in the ⸺ Inn, Thursday next at seven o’clock.

In this case also I do not give the names, as the woman is, I believe, still alive. I believe—as I was told—that the foreman of the works remonstrated, and insisted that such a sale would be illegal. He was not, however, clear as to the points of law, and he asserted that it would be illegal unless the husband held an auctioneer’s license, and if money passed. This was rather a damper. However, the husband was very desirous to be freed from his wife, and he held the sale as he had advertised, making the woman stand on a table, and he armed himself with a little hammer. The biddings were to be in kind and not in money. One man offered a coat, but as he was a small man and the seller was stout, when he found that the coat would not fit him he refused it. Another offered a “phisgie,” _i.e._ a pick, but this also was refused, as the husband possessed a “phisgie” of his own. Finally the landlord offered a two-gallon jar of gin, and down fell the hammer with “gone.”

I knew the woman; she was not bad looking. The new husband drank, and treated her very roughly, and on one occasion when I was lunching at the inn she had a black eye. I asked her how she had hurt herself. She replied that she had knocked her face against the door, but I was told that this was a result of a domestic brawl. Now, the remarkable feature in these cases is that it is impossible to drive the idea out of the heads of those who thus deal in wives that such a transaction is not sanctioned by law and religion. In a parish register in my neighbourhood is the following entry—

1756. Robert Elford was baptized, child of Susanna Elford by her sister’s husband; she was married with the consent of her sister, the wife, who was at the wedding.

In this instance there is no evidence of a _sale_, but we may be sure that money did pass and that the contractor of the new marriage believed it was a right and proper union, although perhaps irregular; and the first wife unquestionably believed that she was acting in observance of a legal right in transferring her husband to her sister. There are instances in which country people have gone before a local solicitor and have had a contract of sale drawn up for the disposal of their wives. The Birmingham police court in 1853 had to adjudicate on such a case, and the astounding thing in this instance was that a lawyer could be found to draw up the contract. It is no wonder that the magistrates administered a very severe reprimand. But there was a far earlier case than this—that of Sir William de Paganel. The lady stoutly and indignantly resisted the transfer, and appealed against the contract to the law, which declared the sale to be null and void.

In 1815 a man held a regular auction in the market-place at Pontefract, offering his wife at a minimum bidding of one shilling, but he managed to excite a competition, and she was finally knocked down for eleven shillings.

In 1820 a man named Brouchet led his wife, a decent, pleasant-looking woman, but with a tongue in her mouth, into the cattle-market at Canterbury from the neighbouring village of Broughton. He required a salesman to dispose of her, but the salesman replied that his dealings were with cattle only, and not with women. Brouchet, not to be beaten, thereupon hired a cattle-pen, paying sixpence for the hire, and led his wife into it by the halter that was round her neck. She did not fetch a high figure, being disposed of to a young man of Canterbury for five shillings.

In 1832, on 7th April, a farmer named Joseph Thomson came into Carlisle with his wife, to whom he had been married three years before; he sent the bellman round the town to announce a sale, and this attracted a great crowd. At noon the sale took place. Thomson placed his wife on a chair, with a rope of straw round her neck. He then said—according to the report in the “Annual Register,”—“Gentlemen, I have to offer to your notice, my wife, Mary Anne Thomson, otherwise Williams, whom I mean to sell to the highest and fairest bidder. Gentlemen, it is her wish as well as mine to part for ever. She has been to me only a born serpent. I took her for my comfort, and the good of my home; but she became my tormentor, a domestic curse. Gentlemen, I speak the truth from my heart when I say—may God deliver us from troublesome wives and frolicsome women! Avoid them as you would a mad dog, or a roaring lion, a loaded pistol, cholera morbus, Mount Etna, or any other pestilential thing in nature. Now I have shown you the dark side of my wife, and told you her faults and failings, I will introduce the bright and sunny side of her, and explain her qualifications and goodness. She can read novels and milk cows; she can laugh and weep with the same ease that you could take a glass of ale when thirsty. Indeed, gentlemen, she reminds me of what the poet says of women in general—

‘Heaven gave to women the peculiar grace To laugh, to weep, to cheat the human race.’

She can make butter and scold the maid; she can sing Moore’s melodies, and plait her frills and caps; she cannot make rum, gin, or whisky, but she is a good judge of the quality from long experience in tasting them. I therefore offer her with all her perfections and imperfections for the sum of fifty shillings.”

That this sermon was spoken by Thomson is most improbable—it is doubtless put into his mouth by the editor of the “Annual Register”; it was not to his interest to depreciate the article he desired to sell. After about an hour the woman was knocked down to one Henry Mears, for twenty shillings and a Newfoundland dog. They then parted company in perfect good-humour, each satisfied with his bargain; Mears and the woman went one way, and Thomson and the dog another.

In 1835 a man led his wife by a halter, in precisely the same way, into the market at Birmingham, and sold her for fifteen pounds. She at once went home with the purchaser. She survived both buyer and seller, and then married again. Some property came to her in the course of years from her first husband; for notwithstanding claims put forth by his relatives she was able to maintain in a court of law that the sale did not and could not vitiate her rights as his widow.

Much astonishment was caused in 1837 in the West Riding of Yorkshire by a man being committed to prison for a month with hard labour for selling or attempting to sell his wife by auction in the manner already described. It was generally and firmly believed that he was acting within his rights.

In 1858, in a tavern at Little Horton, near Bradford, a man named Hartley Thomson put up his wife, who is described by the local journals as a pretty young woman, for sale by auction, and he had the sale previously announced by sending round the bellman. He led her into the market with a ribbon round her neck, which exhibits an advance in refinement over the straw halter; and again in 1859, a man at Dudley disposed of his wife in a somewhat similar manner for sixpence. A feature in all these instances is the docility with which the wife submits to be haltered and sold. She would seem to have been equally imbued with the idea that there was nothing to be ashamed of in the transaction, and that it was perfectly legal.

If we look to see whence originated the idea, we shall probably find it in the conception of marriage as a purchase. Among savage races, the candidate for marriage is expected to pay the father for his daughter. A marriageable girl is worth so many cows or so many reindeer. The man pays over a sum of money or its equivalent to the father, and in exchange receives the girl. If he desires to be separated from her he has no idea of giving her away, but receives what is calculated to be her market value from the man who is disposed to relieve him of her. In all dealings for cattle, or horses, or sheep, a handsel is paid, half-a-crown to clinch the bargain, and the transfer of coin constitutes a legal transfer of authority and property over the animal. This is applied to a woman, and when a coin, even a sixpence, is paid over and received, the receiver regards this as releasing him from all further possession of the wife, who at once passes under the hand of the purchaser. There is probably no trace in our laws of women having been thus regarded as negotiable properties, but it is unquestionable that at an early period, before Christianity invaded the island, such a view was held, and if here and there the rustic mind is unable to rise to a higher view of the marriage state, it shows how extremely slow it is for opinions to alter when education has been neglected.

MILK-MAIDS

MILK-MAIDS

It is a sad subject for reflection that, among the extinct animals, we should have to reckon the milk-maids of Old England—the theme of so much poetry, the subject of such charming pictures.

The dodo exists now solely in a few specimens preserved in glass cases in two or at the outside three museums. The mammoth is discovered rarely embedded in blocks of ice under the Arctic Circle. The gigantic moa of New Zealand is recovered only from its scattered bones. The Great Auk was last seen off the coast of Waterford in 1834. Her egg sells for about a hundred pounds. A species of the English milk-maid is said to exist on the High Alps, and is called the _Sennerin_, but is so unlike the milk-maid of English picture and story, that naturalists are disposed to dispute it as a species, and regard it as belonging to a different _genus_.

Again, those temperate and frugal beings who frequent the A.B.C. establishments in London, and get a drink of milk for a penny and sandwiches for twopence, will see there very interesting and even charming specimens of the modern milk-maid, but in build, in plumage, and in habit, totally unlike the milk-maid we knew from nursery rhyme, and from illustrations. The old milk-maid—save the mark! the milk-maid was never old, her youth was perennial—I mean the milk-maid who lived and flourished in Britain till about 1834, when she disappeared along with the _alca impennis_—was fresh faced, rosy cheeked, strongly built, wore light cotton gowns and white aprons; carried her arms bare, sang cheerily as she went about her work, and had a tendency to become “bouncing.” Her habitat was a country farm, and she was to be found frequenting the fields, the cowshed, and the dairy.

The specimens exhibited by the Aerated Bread Company, on the other hand, are pale complexioned, somewhat lily faced, of a willowy build, always with plumage that is black, except for a white apron, the arms are clothed in black save for neat white cuffs about the wrists; they move silently, and are never seen in country pastures, only in A.B.C. refreshment places in London, and such large towns as can maintain these useful establishments.

But the difference extends further. The milk-maid of olden time was not exactly a wading, web-footed being, but she had large feet and shoes of the most solid, broad description, very necessary, as she was constrained to make her way through farm-yards over ankles in mud, or to go through the task of milking cows in byres or linneys that were—well, the reverse of clean. As to the modern milk-maid, it suffices to look at her feet—like those described by Sir John Suckling,

“Her feet beneath her petticoat, Like little mice, steal in and out As if they feared the light,”—

to be quite satisfied that she is not descended from, nor is a true variant of the milk-maid of olden time. The same Sir John Suckling admirably portrays the latter—

“No grape that’s kindly ripe could be, So round, so plump, so soft as she, Nor half so full of juice.”

It is obvious this does not describe the A.B.C. milk-lass. The latter is a banana, the former an apple.

“Where are you going, my pretty maid? I’m going a-milking, sir, she said.”

No maids now go a-milking, that is why there are no true milk-maids. The old order changeth. Nowadays in the country it is the men who milk. Women cannot be found to do it. They object to the trudge through the dirt, and the planting of the three-legged peggy-stool, and their feet in the oozy substance that forms the cushion enveloping the floor of the cow stall. I do not blame them. It is a dirty place.

But the milking of the cows in the byre was itself a novelty. Formerly the operation took place in the meadows, where it was clean enough, and the feet were in the sweet grass. The milk-girl filled her pails, adjusted a hoop that they might not swing against and spill over her cotton dress, and carried the pails to the dairy, singing as she went. But the weather is not always bright, and it was not only unpleasant, but unsafe, to milk out of doors in the rain; so the cattle were driven under cover, and there the dirt speedily grew to be deep, and presently the girls found it intolerable to have to wade in mire, so the final stage was that they abandoned the milking to the men.

Do the cows like it as well? I trow not. Surely the woman’s hand is best for the process. A woman instinctively knows how to milk. All men cannot acquire the art, and cows are well aware as to which are skilful milkers and which are not. A man may be a good milker, a woman always is one. That is the difference. What a charming sketch that is of Caldecott’s of the “maid who milked the cow with the crumpled horn,” in his illustrated story of the House that Jack Built! When our children nowadays recite that nursery doggerel, the words concerning that maid who milked the cow are not understood by them. They are an anachronism; for as soon as they know anything they know that no maiden all forlorn or all smiles, no maiden whatever, does now milk cows. And to conceive the idea of a “man all tattered and torn” approach and kiss such a milk-maid as occupies a position in an Aerated Bread Company’s establishment, is to demand of their young intelligences something too preposterous.

Do you remember old Izaak Walton’s account of the milk-maid with her merry songs? How he asked her to sing to him. “What song was it?” she inquired. “I pray—was it ‘Come, shepherds, deck your heads’; or ‘As at noon Dulcina rested’; or ‘Philida flouts me’; or ‘Chevy Chace’; or ‘Johnny Armstrong’; or ‘Troy Town’?” The memories of the ancient milk-maids were storehouses of delightful old English ballads; now the only persons who know any are ancient silver-headed topers in taverns.

It was formerly the custom for the bonny milk-maids to dance before the houses of their customers in the month of May, to obtain a small gratuity; and there is a dear old English tune, “The merry milk-maids in green,” that was probably the one to which they were wont to dance. To be a milk-maid and to be merry were synonymous terms in the olden time.

Pepys, in his diary, 13th October 1662, says, “With my father took a melancholy walk to Portholme, seeing the country-maids milking their cows there, they being there now at grass; and to see with what mirth they come all home together in pomp with their milk, and sometimes they have music go before them.”

In Beaumont and Fletcher’s play, “The Coxcomb,” printed in 1647, two milk-maids are introduced, Nan and Madge, and the scene in which they are on the stage is so charming, that I venture to quote a good deal of it—the authors have so happily caught the kindliness, the simplicity, the joyousness of the English milk-maid of yore.

But one word I must premise. Viola, the heroine of the play is astray and wandering over the country seeking to conceal whence she is and who she is.

Viola wearied and lost sighs—

“The evening comes and every little flower Droops now, as well as I.”

Then enter Nan and Madge with milk pails.

“_Nan._ Good Madge, Let’s rest a little; by my troth, I’m weary. This new pail is a plaguy heavy one.

_Madge._ With all my heart.

_Viola (aside)._ What true contented happiness dwells here, More than in cities! Would to God my father Had lived like one of these, and bred me up To milk, and do as they do. Methinks ’tis A life that I would choose. Maids! For charity, give a poor wench one draught of milk, That weariness and hunger have nigh famished!

_Nan._ If I’d but one cow’s milk in all the world You should have some on’t: There, drink.

_Madge._ Do you dwell hereabouts?

_Viola._ No; would I did.

_Nan._ Madge, if she does not look as like my cousin Sue O’ th’ Moor Lane, as one thing can look like another.

_Madge._ Nay; Sue has a hazel eye, I know Sue well; And, by your leave, not so trim a body, neither; This is a flat-bodied thing, I can tell you.

_Nan._ She laces close, By the Mass, I warrant you; and so does Sue too.”

Then Viola entreats the two girls to find her where she may not only lodge, but also find work.

“_Nan._ Uds me, our Dorothy went away but last week, And I know my mistress wants a maid, and why May she not be placed there? This is a likely wench, I tell you truly, and a good wench, I warrant her.

_Madge._ And ’tis a hard case if we, that have served Four years apiece, cannot bring in one servant. We will prefer her.… Can you milk a cow? And make a merry-bush?

_Viola._ I shall learn quickly.

_Nan._ And dress a house with flowers? and— This you must do, for we deal in the dairy— And make a bed or two?

_Viola._ I hope I shall.

_Nan._ But be sure to keep the men out; they will mar All that you make else, I know that by myself; For I have been so touz’d among ’em in My days! Come, you shall e’en home with us, And be our fellow; our house is honest, And we serve a very good woman and a gentle woman, And we live as merrily, and dance o’ good days After evensong. Our wake shall be on Sunday; Do you know what a wake is? we have mighty cheer then, And such a coil, ’twould bless ye! You must be our sister, and love us best, And tell us everything: and when cold weather Comes, we’ll lie together: will you do this?

_Viola._ Yes.

_Nan._ Then home again, o’ God’s name.”

We learn that Princess Elizabeth, in Queen Mary’s reign, was closely guarded and only suffered to walk in the gardens of the palace, and not abroad. “In this situation,” says Holingshed, “no marvell if she, hearing upon a time out of her garden at Woodstock, a certain milk-maid singing pleasantlie, wished herself to be a milk-maid as she was; saying that her case was better, and life merrier.”

Sir Thomas Overbury in his “Character of a milk-maid,” in the reign of James I., says, “She dares go alone, and unfold her sheep in the night, and fears no manner of ill, because she means none: yet, to say truth, she is never alone, she is still accompanied with old songs, honest thoughts, and prayers, but short ones.”

There is still a reminiscence of the milk-maid that comes to us every spring, in the fresh flickering cuckoo-flower of the delicate lilac, like the pale cotton, of which the dresses of the girls were made. It is the _Cardamine pratensis_ that bears both the name of “Milk-maids” and “Cuckoo-flower.” The latter name it obtains, says old Gerarde, because it “doth flower in April and Maie, when the cuckoo doth begin to sing her pleasant notes without stammering.” The same plant is also the “Lady’s Smock” of Shakespeare. I suppose it will retain the name of cuckoo-flower, for the cuckoo is still with us, but lose that of “milk-maids,” for, alas—milk-maids are no more.