CHAPTER I

COUNTRY PASTIMES

I sing of blossoms, birds and bowers,

Of April, May, of June, and July flowers;

I sing of May-poles, hock-carts, wassails, wakes,
Of bridegrooms, brides, and of their bridal cakes.

THUS the cheerful country parson Herrick, and his is but one voice of a chorus in praise of a country life. Though towns were neither so big nor so ugly as they are now, yet the poets unite in contemning the life of streets and markets, and would fain leave them for the fields and woods, for the sweet contentment the country'man doth find.' Undoubtedly the small house and large garden of Cowley's desires was to be in the country, far from the crowd, the buzz, the murmurings of this 'great hive, the City.' But not poets only, who would naturally appreciate the beauties of nature, extol the charms of a country life, but the doctors were already beginning to order their patients into the country, 'for 'better ayre, and to follow the plow by way of exercise.' Anthony Wood records this prescription of his doctor's for an ague from which he had suffered all winter. This ague, by the way, he had contracted on a rural excursion: in the latter end of August he had gone on a fishing expedition with his friend Will Stamer of Merton to Wheatly Bridge, and by the way they went nutting at Shotover, and the day being warm, got over-heated, which resulted

B

in an obstinate ague which the cold and damp of Oxford increased. So in the spring he went to Cossington and lodged with one Francis Bolton, 'whose house, tho' 'thatched, had a very faire chamber therein with a chimney and a place to lay his books in.' Besides the plow, he took exercise practising on the six bells, and for his diversion studied the violin by ear, stringing and tuning by a method of his own.1

Plain practical men loved their country homes. Sir Edmund Verney was never so happy as at Claydon; his heart was in his farm and gardens, and his letters from the Court are filled, not with descriptions of Court functions, but with minute instructions as to the pleaching of hedges or the management of his horses. But of all

enthusiastic country lovers none can compare with the retired hosier Izaak Walton, who joyfully turned his back on Fleet Street, where he had made his money, and devoted the autumn of his days to the calm joys of angling.

From the moment when, on a fresh May morning,' Piscator encounters Venator and Auceps going towards Ware, and walking with them as far as the Thatched House in Hoddesdon, enters into discourse, he makes us free of their company and transports us through the sweet meadows of Hertfordshire or along by the sparkling trout streams near Winchester till we are ready to say with him, 'No life, my honest scholar, no life so happy and so 'pleasant as the life of a well-governed angler; for when 'the lawyer is swallowed up with business, and the statesman is preventing or contriving plots, then we sit on cowslip banks, hear the birds sing, and possess ourselves in as much quietness as these silent silver streams, 'which we now see glide so quietly by us. Indeed, my ' good scholar, we may say of angling as Dr. Boteler 'said of strawberries, " Doubtless God could have made a " "better berry, but doubtless God never did "; and so, if I

1 Introduction to Athena Oxonienses.

might be the judge, God never did make a more calm, ' quiet, innocent recreation than angling.

'I'll tell you, scholar, when I sat last upon this prim'rose bank, and looked down these meadows, I thought of them as Charles the Emperor did of the city of 'Florence," that they were too pleasant to be looked on, " "but only on holidays." As I then sat on this very grass, 'I turned my thoughts into verse: 'twas a wish which I'll ' repeat to you'-the last stanza of the angler's wish runs thus :

Or, with my Bryan and a book,

Loiter long days near Shawford brook;
There sit by him, and eat my meat;
There see the sun both rise and set;
There bid good-morning to next day;
There meditate my time away;

And angle on, and beg to have

A quiet passage to a welcome grave.

Alas! poor Shawford now! Given over to the tender mercies of the jerry-builder; its fair hedges replaced by boards bearing alternate legends of pills and soap. Let us shut our eyes to to-day, and return to peaceful Hampshire in the olden time.

'But turn out of the way a little, good scholar, 'towards yonder high honeysuckle hedge; there we'll sit ' and sing, whilst this shower falls so gently upon the 'teeming earth, and gives yet a sweeter smell to the 'lovely flowers that adorn these verdant meadows.

'Look! under that broad beech-tree I sat when I was 'last this way a-fishing. And the birds in the adjoining grove seemed to have a friendly contention with an 'echo, whose dead voice seemed to live in an hollow tree, near to the brow of that primrose hill. There I sat 'viewing the silver streams glide silently towards their centre, the tempestuous sea; yet sometimes opposed by rugged roots and pebblestones, which broke their waves, ' and turned them into foam. And sometimes I beguiled. 'time by viewing the harmless lambs; some leaping

'securely in the cool shade, whilst others sported them'selves in the cheerful sun; and saw others craving 'comfort from the swollen udders of their bleating dams. As I thus sat, these and other sights had so fully possessed my soul with content, that I thought, as the poet hath happily expressed it

I was for that time lifted above earth,

And possessed joys not promised in my birth.

'As I left this place, and entered into the next field, a 'second pleasure entertained me; 'twas a handsome 'milkmaid, that had not yet attained so much age and 'wisdom as to load her mind with fears of many things 'that will never be, as too many men often do; but she 'cast away all care, and sang like a nightingale: her ' voice was good, and the ditty fitted for it it was that smooth song that was made by Kit Marlow, now at 'least fifty years ago; and the milkmaid's mother sang an answer to it which was made by Sir Walter Raleigh ' in his younger days.

'They were old-fashioned poetry, but choicely good, I think much better than the strong lines that are now in 'fashion in this critical age. Look yonder! on my word, 'yonder they both be a-milking again. I will give her the 'chub, and persuade her to sing those two songs to us.'

There follows a dialogue with the milkmaid and her mother, in which it appears that their repertoire of songs was considerable and included such choice favourites as 'At noon Dulcina rested,' 'Phillida flouts me,' 'Chevy 'Chace,' 'Johnny Armstrong,' and 'Troy Town,' as well as the delightful pair of lyrics he had asked for, 'Come, 'live with me, and be my love,' and 'If all the world and 'love were young.'

Venator, much pleased, remarks that 'it was not with' out cause that our good Queen Elizabeth did so often ' wish herself a milkmaid all the month of May, because they are not troubled with fears and cares, and sing

sweetly all the day, and sleep securely all the night; ' and without doubt, honest, innocent, pretty Maudlin does so.' No doubt she did, especially if she lived in the house hard by which so took Venator's fancy for a resting-place, 'because the linen looks white and smells ' of lavender, and I long to lie in a pair of sheets that ' smells so.'

I am not sure that the Devonshire parson did not even exceed this dear lover of the country; for while our well-beloved angler praises early summer and the tranquil pleasures of angling, interrupted by nothing more serious than a summer shower, Herrick hymns the whole year round with its changing seasons, its work and its play, the toil of ploughman and of shepherd, the joy of harvest home, the mirth of Christmas games, the mummings and the junketings with which the country folk solaced themselves when snow lay thick and ways were foul, no less than the charm of spring mornings when the maids went out to the fields laden with wicker arks to bear the ' richer cowslips home.'

Mr. Endymion Porter was a dear friend of the poetparson, and in his London home often sighed for the green fields and for the simple farming life at Woodhall, where his 'little partridges' played about in their grandmother's care, in delightful familiarity with pigs, chickens, and little lambs. One of Herrick's most charming descriptive pieces is addressed to him in praise of country life contrasted to that of the Court. It begins

Sweet country life, to such unknown

Whose lives are others', not their own!

A farmer's life, as here depicted, is indeed idyllic, rising early

When now the cock (the ploughman's horn)

Calls forth the lily-wristed morn;

Then to thy cornfields thou dost go,

Which, though well-soiled, yet thou dost know

That the best compost for the lands

Is the wise master's feet and hands.