Country Moods and Tenses

by Edith Olivier

  We have also in the past few years made contact with our kindred towns in America. Alderman Moore of Wilton carried to Wilton in New Hampshire a bound volume containing many pictures of our town, and an illuminated address congratulating the American Wilton on the two hundredth anniversary of its foundation. And now Wilton in Connecticut and Wilton in Massachusetts, and other of our namesake towns, are offering to us unexpected and most heart-cheering sympathy and help during our time of war.

  I should like to describe another picturesque and interesting ceremony which I have been very glad to revive while I have been mayor. Before the old church fell into ruins, close on a hundred years ago, loaves of bread used to be given away at its gate to the poor people at Wilton on every New Year’s Day. Being Wilton’s first lady mayor, I thought I might revive this custom and claim my privilege as the “loaf giver”, for this I believe was the Saxon meaning of the word “ lady”. So each year I don my red robe and my chain of office and distribute bread from the church door. More than once the churchyard has been covered with snow during this ceremony, and this adds greatly to the beauty of the scene.

  The population of Wilton is normally about 2,300, but since the war began this number has almost doubled. Schoolchildren, bombed-out families, civil servants, nurses and soldiers have crowded into the town, and are being cordially welcomed by its inhabitants. Each week I am amazed afresh by the hospitality shown by people possessing very small houses, to whom these unexpected guests mean every day an immense amount of real hard domestic work. This is a strenuous but very happy side of these years of war.

  And now the town is preparing itself for enemy attack. More than a thousand years ago Wilton met and defeated the Danes who came to invade it and her inhabitants are now quite ready to meet the Germans. I pray that they may not be put to such a test; but should it come, I have complete confidence in my fellow-townsmen. May God help them to protect our town whatever may befall.

  3 Country Women Then and Now

  ABOUT FIVE YEARS AGO, THERE WAS PUBLISHED BY THE Oxford Press a small book giving great insight into the lives of country women in the middle of the eighteenth century. It is interesting to compare those days with our own. Ann Cook and Friend is an intimate and detailed record of housekeeping in more than one sphere of life. Ann and her friend were both upper servants in different country houses, and the book is a combination of a diary and a cookery book written by Ann herself. She describes the manner of living in the home of her master and mistress, and when she and her friend marry, we see the daily life of small professional people. Abigail, the “ friend”, married a prosperous architect’s foreman who later became a successful farmer; while Ann’s husband was an unfortunate and impecunious innkeeper. Looking back on those lives lived in the country two hundred years ago, one is at first inclined to believe that this must have been the Golden Age for housekeepers. It was not so. It was rather the Earthenware Age, and we might be said to live in the Tin Age. Ann Cook worked among little pots, stewing pots, galley-pots, tubs, chests, delf, hash-pans, marble mortars, porringers, cullenders, brass-pans, earthen-pots and casks.

  Nineteenth-century kitchens had their dignity of burnished copper and brass, and they usually cooked in huge heavy iron saucepans; but we have taken to the more trivial metals. Frying-pans are mostly made of tin: we cook a good deal in enamel; but best of all we liked aluminium, until it flew over the moon to meet and beat the German aeroplane. Our store cupboards are filled with bottles and tins; and one of the boons for which we can thank the war is that at last we can persuade the salvage men to carry away our multitudes of tins.

  During the Earthenware Age women were much more occupied with exclusively household tasks than they are to-day; and Ann Cook describes in great detail the kind of life they lived.

  In her day, the housekeeper in a great house was a person of considerable importance and responsibility, as well as being a very hard worker. Ours, in fact, is the first generation which has definitely aimed at the reduction of labour. Before the machine age, good results were not expected without hard individual work; and if more work was to be done, the solution was to provide more workers.

  The centre of gravity has changed since the eighteenth century. Domestic occupations then absorbed practically all the energies of country women. This is not the case to-day, and it is interesting to see what the change means for those most concerned.

  Much of the glory has departed from country housekeeping. In Ann Cook’s day, this was a noble art. Cooking did not begin in the, kitchen, for Mrs. Cook well knew that the flavour of her poultry, when it reached the table, depended greatly upon the peaceful and pleasant lives lived previously by the birds. She was Queen of the Poultry Yard. When she went to market and bought what she called her “ feathered flock”, her purchases were at once introduced to her inflexible regime. Her birds were not carried home in baskets of such a size that they were compelled to travel lying on their sides, in which case “the stepping or trotting of the Horses makes them full of Bruises, and puts them into Fevers”. So her poultry made the journey standing upright on their feet. At home, the separate broods were kept apart, “ for as soon as mixt with Strangers, Battle-arrays ensued.… I have found by Reason of their Battles, their Heads have been so sore that they could not feed … the Conquerors got Bruises with their Wings flapping in the Coops with the battling”. Mrs. Cook had no doubt that “intermixing with Strangers is bloody Wars”. She believed that “Poultry have the Sense of smelling, though they have no Noses”, so she surrounded them with pleasant scents. Once a week she drove her “green Geese and Ducks” to wash in the pond, which “gave them great Pleasure”, as well as improving their ultimate flavour. Many hours every day were occupied by the feeding of her various flocks of chickens, turkeys, capons, ducks, and green geese; and she ruled their lives with consummate majesty.

  All this outdoor industry might seem to have been enough, but Mrs. Cook’s indoor responsibilities were equally absorbing. She says that she “resolved to rise early in the Morning, and never to exceed Six o’clock if I was in Health, nor to grudge rising two Hours sooner if I had an elegant Dinner to send up”. And her dinners were, indeed, more than “elegant”. She often provided twenty or thirty dishes to a course, and most of these dishes were exceedingly elaborate. Ann Cook’s “ Ragoo of Ling” contained over twenty ingredients. She modelled the pastry surmounting her “ Hare Pye” into the shape of a hare, “setting the Hare on her Belly as she is in her natural Seat’’: her “Ham Pye” was ornamented “with various Shapes of Paste cut out, as wild Beasts and Flowers”. Being, as she said, “ a good Mechanic”, she made her sweets into “Sham Turkeys … or any sort of wild or tame Fowl, and it may be a great Disappointment to some Gormandizers, and a very agreeable one to others”.

  Besides this daily routine, there was the great business of preserving and conserving for later use. The family “ killed a Beef” once a month; and then Ann stewed its “Houghs and Necks”, as she did her Legs of Veal and her Chicken Bones, boiling them to “ a fine Glue, keeping it six Months, if necessary, with close sealing in little Pots, and if a Mess of Soop is wanted, I have it in a Minute”.

  Mrs. Cook also made marmalades and fruit cheeses, “ Gellies” and confectionery: she “ Mangoed” her apples, pickled her beans, walnuts and mushrooms, and made a wonderful “Cordial Hunter’s Gingerbread” which contained red port, brandy, cinnamon, race ginger, mace, cloves and nutmeg. She remarks that “a small Piece of this is a Dram in the Morning”. No wonder.

  Esquire Goodman and his lady were Abigail’s employers. They were examples of the philanthropy of the eighteenth century, and everything which is now done by what are called the Social Services was carried out in their village by these two people. Mrs. Goodman chose Abigail as her cook-housekeeper because she saw she would help her in the work among the poor. She said when getting rid of Abigail’s predecessor, “ I never liked this fliskey Girl that waited on me, for if she had brought me a Message of any
poor Creature’s Complaint, I see her Countenance turn sour”. She gave Abigail her own old clothes, and allowed her to hire an under-cook at £6 a year, out of which she was to pay her own kitchen maid. Abigail writes: “ No Servants upon Earth were more happy than we were of a worthy Master, a pious, generous and charitable Lady, whose Humanity was such that she fed the Hungry, cloathed the Naked, and was a great Doctress to them afflicted with Sickness”. This excellent squire and his wife built a village school for forty children, for whom they provided clothes as well as education. They also clothed all the old people in the village.

  Abigail was practically the district nurse of the neighbourhood. She writes: “As I was an excellent Horse-woman, and my Lady seldom wanted Patients, I arose two Hours sooner in the Morning than her Maid used to do, and had my little Pad saddled, so visited the Sick every Morning, always telling my Lady what Effects the Medicines had on them that had taken them; this was great Pleasure to her, for she said that my Judgement of the Sick exceeded hers”.

  When Mrs. Cook and her friend visited each other, their tea was “brought in in great Order”. Then they dismissed the footman and agreed that as “ Statesmen have private Interviews in Politicks, Merchants in Commerce, so let ours be upon the Art of Cookery”.

  Esquire Goodman had carried out a considerable amount of rebuilding on his estate, and while this was in progress, the architect’s foreman, a “Youth of beautiful Person and Behaviour”, lodged for three years in the steward’s house. At the end of this time, Abigail says, “ I received a Letter from him, the Contents of which set forth the Beauty of his Wisdom, and likewise the Purity of his Affection, which, in serious Words, declared that he was a Stranger to Love before, but has been captivated ever since he first beheld me”.

  Abigail insisted on another seven years’ “Conversation in Letters” before she at last consented to marry him, and when the long courtship ended, it was found that the architect’s foreman had a very comfortable home, with four feather beds, made from feathers carefully dressed by his wife whilst she was in service. Twenty-two yards of fine homespun linen, and twenty-two of coarse, made their sheets, and Abigail spun a “Web of Diaper” for towels, and one of “ Hugaback” for tablecloths. The Goodmans established them in one of their farms, and their menage was ordered with great efficiency. The servants wore their best gowns in church on Sundays; and “as soon as Divine Service is over we all undress ourselves and put on our Homespun Gowns, so folds up our Clothes. For no Maid in the Family is allowed above one Gown washed in a Quarter of the Year”.

  On one side of Abigail’s storeroom Mrs. Cook saw, on her first visit to the house, “five Partitions for bottled Wines, each containing ten Dozen of Bottles. She opened the Lids, took out a Bottle of each Wine, and called for five Glasses. ‘Now’, said she, ‘ taste the Wines, and give me your Opinion of them. There is Burgundy, French, Red Port, Frontiniack and sweet Mountain.’ So tasting the Wines, which were all as clear as Rock-water, I said, ‘If I had seen these Wines in a Gentleman’s House or in any Tavern, they might have passed for Foreign, for they are strong, and must be of good age’.’’

  From all this it can be seen that two hundred years ago a country woman took so much pride in her home that her work in it was completely absorbing. No one who was at all house-proud could rely on anyone but herself and her household to make her home as she wished it to be. This has been changed in the Tin Age. Housework has been immensely reduced by mechanical appliances. Jams are bought in shops. Meals come out of tins. As the advertisements say: “ You press the button, we do the rest”. Or “Take a book and read. Take your work and sew. Go and mind the baby. And the washer will do the washing”.

  So the country woman is now free for communal work, and she is turning to it with great ability. Those picturesque old village schools have unhappily disappeared, and we have in their place universal education, with all classes of women on their boards of managers. District nurses ride bicycles or drive their Baby Austins in the place of the ladies and their housekeepers on their little “Pads”. The whole village helps with the nurse’s fund.

  But the chief sphere of women’s work in villages is the Women’s Institute. Cottage women are proving themselves to be efficient organisers, and this in a very short time too. It is not so long since I was present at a public dinner when the toast of “the Ladies” was proposed by the oldest gentleman in the room. He remarked on the great change in the position of women which he had seen in his lifetime.

  “When I was a young man”, he said, “ the ladies never went out but once a year, and that was on Good Friday, when they used to go up to the old castle and play kiss-in-the-ring. And now,’’—he concluded dramatically, “ they has votes.’’

  It is indeed a contrast; and to exchange a good game of kiss-in-the-ring for the dreary solitude of a polling booth is a poor alternative; but the Women’s Institutes have humanised the new regime. While they make country women more public-spirited, they simultaneously develop their social gifts. It is quite possible to ridicule the grimly “business” side of the Institutes—their Federations, their Groups, their Elections of Committee with secret ballot and tellers, their bundles of circulars containing National, County and Institute information. All this has to be solemnly tackled at the beginning of every meeting; but no one who has shared their work can fail to see that, within all this rather absurd formality, there has grown up a new and living spirit to inform village life. The Women’s Institutes really are the village social unit. They welcome new comers, and make friends with them. They arrange the tea at the village flower show or cricket match. They collect money for the parish nurse. And then they revive all kinds of country crafts, basket-making, patchwork, embroidery, shoemaking, knitting, umbrella covering—these are their industries. They organise communal jam-making and fruit-bottling. They study gardening and home nursing. They train glee parties who compete in county musical festivals. They produce really good plays. They make cakes and cream cheeses which they sell at market stalls in the country towns. They are indeed re-creating the village life at a time when it had begun to flag sadly because of the fall in the farming population. Unless a means had been discovered of replacing the old self-sufficient cottage life of the days when housewives were entirely responsible for the health, comfort and entertainment of their families, village life must have died of inanition. The Oxford Dictionary tells us that this word means “the action or process of emptying: the condition of being empty”. Women’s Institutes are filling the villages again with occupation and interests.

  On most afternoons in the month a village street is a sleepy place. Hardly a soul can be seen. Fordingbridge in Hampshire goes to such an extreme in this direction that the inhabitants of the neighbouring villages aver that its people only get out of bed every other day. I can vouch for the bareness of its street on a good many afternoons in the year, but if I happened to drive through on the day when the Institute met, I should no doubt have a different impression. At about two o’clock, or else at six-thirty, in most villages, the doors now open all down the street. Out come women of all ages, shapes and sizes. Some push perambulators, some do not; some carry parcels of knitting or needlework; some bring baskets of cakes; one or two hug important looking bundles of minute books and typed circulars. The individuals merge into groups, the groups into a small crowd. The crowd swarms round the door of the village hut and is gradually absorbed into it. Inside, everyone has her traditional part to play. Some elderly members gravitate immediately towards corner seats into which they sink, never to utter (or seemingly to hear) a word from beginning to end of the meeting. Others rush to the kettles, or cut up the cakes. Some place copies of Jerusalem on the seats, or take charge of the lending library. The secretary has an important word for nearly every member. The president puzzles over documents from headquarters. The speaker or demonstrator nervously pushes open the door, to be welcomed by a member specially deputed for this part, who conducts her to a seat on the president’s ri
ght. Bunches of flowers, knitted socks, cakes, pots of jam, home-made wines and collections of potatoes are displayed on the competition table. The sales table exhibits anything possessed by any member of which she would feign be rid at a cheap rate. The members cluster in groups, discussing all these things. The president calls them together in tones which vary from the vague and nervous to the feminist and efficient. Jerusalem is banged out on the piano, if one exists. If not a courageous member lifts up her voice to “start it’’; with the result that the singers are swiftly heard to be either soaring and squeaking in the region of the “top C”, or else are buzzing like aged bees in a honey-pot. It is noticeable that the members are generally far more comfortable in the bass than in the treble. The song ends with a long and sentimental rallentando. “Minutes” and “ Business” are then dealt with; and now the speaker rises, making a brave effort to outshout the chorus of babies’voices which fills the room, giving to the gathering a thoroughly homely atmosphere. Tea is eaten. The “Social Half-hour” produces various odd games in which people run up and down between rows of chairs, or blow balloons at each other. Sometimes the members dress up in their grandmothers’ clothes and parade about, wondering how it was possible that, two generations back, women could wear clothes which are too small even for the dolls of to-day. The skeleton of every meeting is of a rigid formality. It follows certain lines laid down by the Medes and Persians belonging to a mysterious organisation known as “the Federation’’; but this skeleton remains completely invisible. Institutes are generally small enough to be entirely friendly; and the prescribed forms are no more hampering to this friendliness than the cups are felt to hamper the tea as it is poured into them at the close of the meeting.