Pomp and Common-sense

Lendal Bridge – geograph.org.uk – 766795 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In and around York (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In these days people remember “Hawkins. J.” chiefly as a as a severe and stern judge feared by the “professional criminals” who came before him. But he was also a man of great experience of the world, and of very wide and human sympathies. And he had a real gift of quiet humour, though he was rightly careful not to exercise it too freely when upon the Bench.

As some of my readers may know, the bridge over the River Ouse at York called “Lendal Bridge” was an ancient Toll-Bridge, until it was freed from Toll a good many years ago.

It must be quite thirty years since at the “Judges’ Breakfast” at York, and with great enjoyment, Mr Justice Hawkins told this story of his adventure upon Lendal Bridge.

‘You have some strong and very determined men in this City of York, my Lord Mayor,’ said Mr Justice Hawkins with a twinkle in his eye,

‘I came across one last night in my walks abroad who was no great respecter of persons. A stout and hardy rogue, indeed, who in fact held me to ransom, very much in the fashion I fancy that would be the common usage towards strangers in this City some generations ago!

‘Oh yes! He knew who I was! That is to say, I told him; but it did not make much difference that I could see! Nothing serious, my Lord Mayor, nothing serious at all: merely a refreshing instance of a man knowing what he wanted: – and getting it!

‘I came out of the Club alone just after mid-night, and I thought that I would take a stroll before returning to my lodgings. It was a fine moon-light night and not at all cold, the street was deserted and my cigar was just at its best, as I decided to finish smoking it upon the bridge.

‘I crossed to the opposite pavement to have a look at the old Abbey and the Bridge Tower, and then paced slowly along the bridge, glancing from time to time at the moon’s reflection in the River.

‘Your ancient Guildhall has a noble frontage, my Lord Mayor, and when I was near the far end of the bridge, I re-crossed the road-way and returned along the pavement on that side to look at it. The Guildhall, with the old buildings alongside it clustering down to the River, reminds one of a part of Bruges, or of one of the old Cities of the Continent.

‘It was all very quiet and peaceful, and I stood in the middle of the bridge for some moments, enjoying the scene.

‘As I turned to move on I was confronted by a short thick-set man, heavily clothed, and buttoned up to the chin in a stout over-coat. This individual, who seemed to have sprung from no-where, completely barred my passage.

‘He stretched out his open palm and said in a rough hoarse voice:

Ah want a ’awp’n’y.”

‘I was startled by his sudden appearance and did not quite understand his speech, so I said: “What is it that you want?”

A ’awp’n’y” repeated the man decisively.

‘A light dawned on me and I said: “Oh, I see! You are asking me for a halfpenny. Why do you want a halfpenny?”

For bein’ on this ‘ere brig”

replied the man.

‘“I do not quite understand you.” said I “If you are in need of some money and will explain why you stop me in this extraordinary way, I will see what I can do for you. But I do not like my walk being interrupted in this fashion.” His reply:

Ah’s waitin’ fer that ’awp’n’y”

was not what I had expected, and did not make things any clearer.

‘My impression then was that this man was holding me up to ransom in some way for this ridiculous sum, for some mysterious purpose – he obviously did not mean to let me pass without paying it.

‘So I thought I had better tell him who I was. The place was quite deserted at that late hour; and, though roughly respectful in his manner he seemed very determined, and slightly truculent.

‘Drawing myself up, and directing a stern glance upon him, I said: “Sir, do you know who I am?”

Noa,” replied he “an’ it disn’t matter: Ah want a ’awp’n’y.”

‘“Sir,” said I “I am Mr Justice Hawkins, Her Majesty’s Senior Judge of Assize and Goal Delivery in this City of York, and I would have you to understand that in my official capacity in this City, I represent the Queen’s Most Excellent Majesty!”

Vărry likely,” replied the man “but I want that ’awp’n’y.”

‘I suppose that nobody particularly likes being told that it does not matter who he is, so in my most severe judicial voice, I said: “Come, come, Sir! You must tell me exactly why you want a half-penny… then I will decide whether I will, or will not, give it to you – not otherwise.”

Nea-body walks on mā̈ brig wi’out paäying me a ’awp’n’y” replied he.

‘“Your bridge!” exclaimed I scornfully. “Since when has this old and public bridge become your property?”

It’s t’ Toäll-Brig,” said he impatiently. “T’ toäll’s a ’awp’n’y, an’ Ah collects it. You owt tĭ know that!”

‘“Oh! A toll-bridge! How interesting!” said I. Then, as an idea struck me, I continued “Her Majesty’s Justices of Assize represent the Crown and therefore do not pay any tolls. Besides, the toll is surely collected for crossing the bridge, and I have not crossed it.”

‘These seemed to me to be both good sound points, Gentlemen, but this man entirely disregarded them, and merely remarked:

Let’s ha’e less of thy talk! An fork out that ’awp’n’y – Ah’s nŭt gie’n’ ti̔ wait ‘ere all t’neët!”

‘I tried a different tack.

‘“But supposing that I declined to pay, my man?” said I, very severely indeed! “What then?”

Ah sŭd chuck yer ower t’brig” said he.

‘“I’ll take very good care you don’t!” cried I. “What!” I went on “What, Sir!” for the loss of a half-penny toll you would throw me over this bridge! Not knowing or caring even whether I could swim or not?!”

Aye” he replied, “that’s it!”

‘“Why I might drown, Sir!”

Yer vărry likely mŭd,” he agreed, quite composedly. “Unless yer a good swimmer. There’s a lot o’ watter in t’ river ti̔-neët.”

‘“Why! That would be a most gross assault! Nay!! It would be MURDER, Sir!! For which the penalty is Death – by hanging.”

Aye” was the sole reply.

‘“So,” cried I “So, Sir! For the sake of a paltry half-penny you would contemplate, without horror and in cold blood, the heinous crime of murdering one of Her Majesty’s lieges? To say nothing of one of Her Majesty’s Justices of Assize! What, Sir! This is incredible!! Can you possibly be in your right mind?!”

Aye” said he.

‘“For a half-penny, a half-penny! You would…!” (words failed me.)

Aye! Ah wŭd!”

‘I stared at him thoughtfully, in silence.

‘Gentlemen, the discussion of an interesting legal question, begun in proper academic form, seemed now to have descended to a lower plane; and in fact to have reached an impasse.

‘I was not really afraid that my opponent would resort to his threatened forcible argumentum ad hominem: but on the other hand it was not at all clear to me how I was to make good my passage to my lodging without distinctly risking a serious loss of dignity!

‘“Well?” said I, at length.

‘The Toll-keeper glanced up at the moon with a speculative eye. Then, smiling in a peculiarly shrewd “pawky” fashion, he said, quite respectfully:

“Ah sŭd think, Sir, ‘at it ‘ud meb-be be t’leäst bother, efther all, for you ti̔ paäy t’ ’awp’n’y?”

‘And, Gentlemen, I paid!

.   .   .   .   .   .

‘We parted in friendly fashion and, as I think, with mutual esteem.

‘I especially liked the way in which, in conducting his case, he had entirely disregarded matters totally irrelevant to the issue!’

‘A Sketch in Dialect’

“On Lendal Bridge”

T’moor poult, July 1923

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please STOP

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Oh, the pain

Very grateful for stronger painkillers today!

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Fauna and (a bit of) Flora

Eye-popping colours! (they were – it just didn’t come out too well!)

Cramped as I am by the restricted movements my spasm-splinted spine will currently allow, one recollection of Hampton Court Flower Show has come into sharper focus than the rest as I rather awkwardly sit down to write. We (that is hubby and me) visited HCFS last Friday, when a cool morning blistered into a sizzling sunny day, and throughout our time there I was continually struck (not literally, I’m glad to say!) by the extraordinary people who, despite the heat and dust, manhandled wheelchairs around the exhibits battling the crowds and the conditions so that their disabled charges could get around the stands and displays. We even saw what appeared to be a hospital trolley complete with drips attached to a clearly very ill person lying prone and still and with his face covered against the sun. He was accompanied by several people, all quite jolly and enjoying the day. Quite humbling.

This limestone pavement effect was quite interesting… (you had to be there)

Our day began with the carefree sense of embarking on a pleasant excursion. The train from Waterloo to Hampton Court gradually filled as the skyline emptied. By Earlsfield, the buildings we were speeding past were low enough to enable me to see for miles across rooftops and trees, while cheery parties of people – predominantly women in flowery dresses, tops and skirts – got on the train and chattered excitedly about the different brands of bubbly they’d bought for a picnic at the show, or how cool it had been in Nottingham as they’d waited for their early morning train to London. A lady and her husband, both of somewhat advanced years, sat opposite us and, as she told us excitedly that the visit to the show was a birthday treat, she hunched her shoulders and glanced at her husband with the smile of a delighted girl. The day was full of moments such as these – delightful little connections between strangers who briefly became friends.

On the whole I’m very not comfortable in crowds, but the atmosphere was so good-natured that, in spite of the jostling and obscured views, I was able to just get on with it, and shuffle to squint between shoulders and past hats with the best of them. However, at one point, when I turned back to see where my husband was, it was clear he hadn’t arrived at any such accommodation of the situation. Head back, chin poked forwards, he was doing a passable imitation of a cross-looking Easter Island head – complete with shades! It didn’t last though – succumbing to the tempting smell of roasting pork (mingled rather bizarrely with the coconut scent of suntan cream), we headed to the hog roast and had a spot of lunch. Sorted!

Gorgeous colours

So what were we all there for? Oh yes – flowers. And plants and all things pertaining to gardens and gardening. Fortified by food, we set off to cruise the plant stalls (the gardens could wait!), our trusty trolley-box at the ready. Surely the sound of RHS flower shows is the rumble of the ubiquitous folding wheeled box with extendable handle, being trundled along ridged metal walkways, brimming with plants! True to form, we bought loads more plants than we should have, including a gorgeous rich crimson Achillea studded with gold dots like an Elizabethan courtier’s doublet, and (well, I had to!) a carnation with a striking scent of cloves. 😉 We bought this from a very helpful collector of carnations in the Plant Heritage Marquee, who told us the Bookham Clove was no longer available. Our carnation is a very respectable stand-in called the Duchess of Roxburghe, don’t y’know. And she smells lovely!

Part of our haul – a luscious crimson Achillea

Allow me to introduce the Duchess of Roxburghe – rather divinely, she smells of cloves – an unexpected delight!

Partway through the day the weather was such that I had to deploy my brolly and scarf. The sun was so scorching I needed more shade than my hat provided and, not entirely trusting the Factor 50 suncream, I also covered up with a silk scarf. Stalls selling parasols were cleaning up, and ice-cream vendors were doing a roaring trade. It was hot!

When it came to the gardens, I was struck by how different they were from the representation on the TV coverage of the Show – inevitable, I guess. Sadly, reality can come off a poor second. For instance, one garden was designed to invoke a child’s eye view of being on a forest floor, but because the gardens are all roped off, none of the adult viewers were able to experience this – although I did see a child rather self-consciously picking her way into the centre of the garden to see for herself (yes – she was allowed, in fact, I think she was chivvied into it!).

Whites, blues and mauves seemed to dominate much of the planting in the gardens – with the odd radical diversion into bright oranges and reds.

In a darkly gothic garden called ‘Ashes to Ashes’ a mound of charcoal and black grass sprouted gravestones and blood red blooms, and was topped by charred and twisted tree trunks. I heard a rather irritable-sounding lady loudly exclaim:

So, isn’t there anything to explain to us what all this is about?

just as I twigged that it concerned Ash dieback.

The green shoots of recovery? (Have we heard that before…?)

Gothic wins over green, I think…

The gravestones were inscribed ‘RIP Chalara Fraxinea’ which – now I’ve looked it up – strikes me as odd, as the ‘chalara’ part refers to the fungus which is causing the dieback of the ‘fraxinus’ (ash tree). Not only that, but Chalara Fraxinea is the name of only one stage of the disease… Oh well. A sort of lava flow led off the mound into a thin trickle of sprouting shoots which widened as it curled round towards another mound, this time green with grass and tender but flourishing ash trees. Anyway – isn’t ‘fraxinus’ a great word?! (‘Spear’, apparently).

I loved the misty blues and earth tones against the huge smooth discs of the steps. Sadly, the stars of this piece – the tiny silver-blue dragonflies – darting about above the plants aren’t really visible. A magical memory, though

As always, pencil-thin Cyprus trees create great punctuation – the seating area was a bit ‘by the way’ really – especially the screen (not really visible rom this angle!)

Velvety grey-blues and misty silvers blended beautifully in my favourite garden. I wasn’t particularly taken by the winch-operated screen of rusted iron rods which could be opened to reveal the vista beyond a seated area at the top of the plot, but I liked the stairway which led up to it. This was made of massive wooden discs turned from joined railway sleepers. I particularly liked the soft hazy effect of the faded sea-washed mauves, blues and greys of the plants burgeoning either side of the sleeper steps. But most magical and memorable of all was the effect of several small fleeting dragonflies darting about this garden like tiny silver-blue needles stitching and weaving an invisible web. They were breathtaking.

Occasionally, we’d see some very exotic butterflies fluttering by, or alighting on a prize cabbage, and we decided they must have escaped from the butterfly dome, set up by the RHS and the Eden Project. I’d love to have gone in to see all of the different types of butterflies flitting about freely inside the dome, but the queue! No way were we going to stand for hours in the sweltering heat. Instead, we gawped in at them from a clear panel in the dome – still amazing.

A thing of beauty – in the making. This large primeval-looking lump, once planted, will give forth the loveliness which is a cyclamen …

Part of our haul – a delicate arc of pink blooms… on a grass! It’s called Angel’s Fishing Rod, which conjures up a lovely image – garden gnome with wings and a halo, maybe?! I wonder if it would’ve appealed to grandfather…

By late afternoon, we had a respectable haul of plants in our trolley-box and heads full of ideas we’re unlikely to implement, and were ready to head home. Rather than take the boat to the station which is a lovely little trip, we trundled past the Palace and over the Lutyens-designed bridge to Hampton Court station. We got a very clear idea of how dreadful the proposed development on the site of the ‘Jolly Boatman’ would look. In fact, I was quite surprised that there was no evidence of the campaign in evidence.Amazed to find seats available on the train we sat, comfortably exhausted, to enjoy the return journey. The train guard welcomed us all on the intercom and listed the stations we’d be stopping at on the half-hour journey back to Waterloo, cheerily reminding us not to leave ‘that expensive rhododenron’ behind. After a few minutes, the pleasantly dozy atmosphere of the train was interrupted by the silky tone of a woman’s voice announcing the availability of a buffet service, and asking us to clear the gangway. We were all beginning to exchange puzzled (and, in my case at least, slightly hopeful) looks through our various fronds of foliage when the guard interrupted her and apologised for pressing the wrong message button. Warming to his theme, said:

I mean, it could have been ‘Mind the gap’ or ‘Next stop Gatport Airwick’… Oh, you know what I mean!

and cut off mid-chuckle. He appeared in our carriage a few minutes later as we stopped at the first station, an affable, portly chap answering questions patiently and seeing people on and off the train.

When we got off at Waterloo, I was delighted to see him on the platform. He shook my hand and gave me a beaming smile – which more than made up for the fact he wasn’t wearing a cap with a carnation in it!

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Humble pie

‘Er… Grandfather?’

His face is screened by the newspaper he’s reading.

‘Hmm?’

‘Um, you know in yesterday’s post…’

A corner of the newspaper is folded down, and he regards me with his stern courtroom frown.

‘Ye-es.’

‘Well, I, I… I guess I was being a bit of a smart-ar… erm, smart-alec.’

Do I detect the ghost of a smirk on his face as his eyebrows slowly rise? I can’t meet his eyes – I look down at the floor.

‘Well. Go on’

I’m squirming with discomfort. ‘It’s the first paragraph in your essay. I, well, I didn’t read it properly and then I took the mickey about what you’d written. I mean – you’d already made the point, hadn’t you?’

‘I had, lass.’

I rush on ‘I was just being stupid – making a silly joke about your ‘tall stature’, and…’ I gulp ‘…and then adding a winking face icon.’ I cringe. My cheeks are burning and I’m overcome with shame.

Silence.

‘I’m so sorry.’ I say, and brave a glance at him.

‘Ah well, lass. Don’t fret.’

He turns back to his newspaper and straightens it with a shake.

He clears his throat, and then exclaims indignantly: ‘But, as for the Bob Flowerdew bit – now, that’s a different matter. I mean – the man wears his hair in a pigtail!’

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The kiss of the sun

Many Happy Returns! unfortunately, my little phone camera couldn’t cope with the strong sun, so it’s rather bleached 😦

‘Happy Returns’ is out! Its buttery yellow face is beaming in a bliss of sunshine. Fantastic! We bought this sweet little lily in the Walled Garden by Helmsley Castle when we were in Yorkshire last year  – I confess, I fell for the name.

It’s gardens all the way, in this post. For starters, we’re dusting off our broad-brimmed hats and Factor 50 in readiness for a scorching day at Hampton Court Flower Show on Friday (can’t wait!), and it turns out that the next essay is a spookily appropriate – ‘Some Easily Grown Flowers’, 1923 (although, curiously, it was written in January).

Of course I fell to wondering if my grandfather had ever suggested to Dorothy, my grandmother, that they take a trip to London to attend what is now known as The Chelsea Flower Show. It’s seeds were sown (sorry – couldn’t resist!) as early as 1862, and it grew (that one’s not too bad, surely?!) into the Royal International Horticultural Exhibition in 1912 staged in the grounds of the Royal Hospital, Chelsea, where it has blossomed (ok – I’ll stop, now!) into a monster of a show.

The Hampton Court Flower Show is a mere upstart by comparison, but to my mind, a much more enjoyable day out. It started in 1990 as a result of a plan to rescue the ailing fortunes of two completely diverse organisations – Hampton Court Palace and Network Southeast. The railway sponsored a flower show at the palace, and the rest is history (the RHS took over when the network withdrew its subsidy in 1992). In addition to sponsoring the show, Network Southeast laid on special trains from Waterloo on which all the porters wore carnations in their hats – I bet that made everyone smile! It’s funny to think that there were porters on trains not all that long ago – and they wore uniforms! (After an admittedly cursory search, I was disappointed not to find any pictures).

As you’d expect, there are plenty of pictures of carnations available, but I did search for one in particular – in vain, sadly. ‘Bookham Clove’ was Grandfather’s favourite apparently: ‘a really gorgeous carnation of a most sturdy habit, and with a real clove scent’. He also expresses a fondness for pinks – Mrs Sinkin’s and Her Majesty in particular: ‘which are the pride of my little garden’.

Page 188 in ‘The Garden’ showing Grandfather’s house and garden – the bottom 3 lines of the caption give details

Unusually, the Frank plot, (which, despite his tall stature, TMP describes as a “small amateur’s garden” 😉  ) was a shared area in Woodbine Terrace, in Leeds, and, as such, is pictured in ‘The Garden – A Celebration of One Thousand Years of British Gardening’. This is a little hardback book which was published (both ‘casebound’ and ‘limpbound’) in 1979 for an exhibition of the same name at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.

Marking the page showing a photograph of grandfather’s garden is a copy of the text of a letter composed in September 1987, printed in the spare, square dot matrix ‘draft’ mode of the time. There is no addressee, but it seems my father had been invited by this unknown person to give a talk about his childhood home, and the letter is his response to the invitation. I don’t know whether he ever gave the talk. I’m sad to say, I doubt he did.

I find the paragraph very poignant. Family lore has it that small children weren’t allowed in Woodbine Terrace (I suspect, given their ages when they moved there, my grandparents weren’t expecting to have a child) and, so I think my dad was probably quite lonely as a young boy. Also, it seems that Grandfather was able to afford to live there partly because he lent his legal services to the running of the terrace in some way, which was also why my dad’s existence was tolerated.

Happily, however, things are different now. When we saw the place last year, there was a colourful tangle of children’s play apparatus installed in one corner of the gardens. The sun didn’t shine on us that day – the rain was coming down in sheets, and we fell foul of a mysterious glitch in the (several) electronic route-finders we had at our disposal, so – as the location seems to be invisible to satnav software and Google Maps alike – we didn’t realise we were being hijacked. (And, no, sadly we didn’t have any old-fangled paper-based street-view technology to hand 😉 ) So we unwittingly swept through the leafy Leeds suburb of Headingley (which was actually our destination) to an anonymous, dispiriting, down-at-heel part of town, and ended up at Back Woodbine Terrace – which was so eerily similar to Woodbine Terrace that we thought it must be the right place. The troubling thing was – the gardens had been built on! I can’t remember how, but we did find the real thing eventually and I snatched some photos through the gateway before we got drenched to the skin.

Woodbine Terrace, Headingley, Leeds on a rainy day in September 2012

Woodbine Terrace gardens, on the other side of the path

It’s funny to think that gardening is now a multi-million pound celebrity endorsed industry. Only thirty-odd years ago Marcus Binney, who took the photo of Woodbine Terrace (in support of the article ‘On the conservation of gardens’ which he contributed to the V & A book) feared for the state of the nation’s gardens – great and small. If Mr Binney ever visits Woodbine Terrace again – or even if he happens to see the above photos – I hope he would be cheered to discover that there is still a sense that the gardens are cared for communally (I like to think this is indicated by the stripes in the lawn going right across the width of the shared space – the like of which my dad would have been proud!), and that the gardens still appear to be flourishing, even when the vista is screened by rain.

Mr Binney is, after all, big on conservation. He was a driving force behind the foundation of SAVE Britain’s Heritage (SAVE) in 1975, and remains its president. He has written numerous books and articles, and is the architectural correspondent for the Times. SAVE campaigns for the salvation of Britain’s architectural heritage, and for the preservation and reuse of endangered historic buildings, placing particular emphasis on finding new uses for them. In fact, he has been awarded an OBE and a CBE in recognition of his conservation work.

In what is turning out to be a truly tangled web – I’ve just unearthed an article written by Marcus Binney for the Times Online in 2008, speaking out against a development near Hampton Court. It can be read here (it’s quite short!): http://www.hamptoncourtrescuecampaign.com/Marcus%20Binney%20The%20Times%20December%2018.pdf

Oh, the irony! Hampton Court Palace and the surrounding area were given a huge boost by Network Southeast in the 1990s – but now, a piece of land currently owned by Network Rail is under threat of a development which will horribly mar the historic beauty of the area. A campaign against the development was begun in 2006, and is still being vigorously fought – and thoroughly reported – at: http://www.hamptoncourtrescuecampaign.com/site.htm

Please check it out and add your email to their petition!

Then spread the word!

(before you ask – yes, I have 😉 )

Anyway – after that breathless diversion – I’m back on track!

My guess is that Mr and Mrs Charles Clark Frank didn’t make the journey from North Yorkshire to London to visit the Royal International Horticultural Exhibition. I suspect they wouldn’t have had the spare cash for what might have been an expensive trip, probably necessitating an overnight stay. Besides, he was busily becoming a cheery garden advisor in his own right, dispensing hints and tips to fellow SES members in his essay. Much of what he suggests is similar to what you might expect from modern gardening pundits (such as the ubiquitous Mr Titchmarsh who also hails from Yorkshire!), but there are some interesting snippets peculiar to the time. He mentions flowers, such as carnations and pinks which are ‘tolerant of soot’ and which ‘the smoke of our great Cities scarcely affects…’ and he advocates the use of ‘coarsely sifted household ashes (weathered first by exposure to the air) [which] will make the soil much more kind for the development and increasing of the “corms”’ for his favourite flower, Lily of the Valley.

And, although it’s a hundred years on, I can almost hear Bob Flowerdew counselling a bemused member of BBC Radio 4’s  ‘Gardener’s Question Time’ audience, that carnations:

…positively revel in old mortar! Get some really old mortar, smash it up into very coarse sand, and mix a handful with the soil when you put each plant in and observe the result. When you have occasion to lift a plant in the following Autumn you will find that it has put forth numerous little “hands” of rootlets and clasped them firmly round bits of the mortar!

Another Flowerdew-esque titbit from TMP, is:

Shirley Poppies seem to like rather a “poor” soil, and if you can get some road scrapings (and free them from petrol and plantain seed!) and add them to the soil this will suit your poppies well.

Road scrapings? Could this mean horse poo? But if so, why would it be covered in petrol?! Not only that – how would you remove said petrol?!

‘Some easily grown flowers’ has no criticisms attached to it, but I can imagine  comments from SES members might have been somewhat droll. As one of TMP’s more ordinary efforts I’ve been surprised and delighted that it has led me on such a meandering trail of discovery (and feel rather churlish being so derogatory about it!). But, as the sun cools, and the shadows lengthen, I’m conscious that a hundred years ago when he was writing his jaunty notes about small frilly suburban flowers, empires were toppling around the globe, new orders were struggling into being, and the seeds of the second World War were germinating.

However, happily for this sceptred isle, Britain was preparing to celebrate a royal wedding. In April 1923 Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon married the Duke of York. Apparently, the bride – the ‘Queen Mum’ as she later became – unexpectedly laid her bouquet at the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior on her way in to the service in Westminster Abbey, in memory of her fallen brother Fergus.

And, as evinced by the shadows in the footage of the wedding, the sun beamed down on the happy couple and cheered the waving crowds:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/events/george_vi_wedding

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In honour of Faffing

I heard a particular word on the radio this morning and it made me smile – so much so, it stayed with me all day, and now insists on being published – so here it is:

faff 

 It’s a word I use quite a lot, but don’t often hear. It’s also an activity I indulge in frequently   😉

Ho hum, better go ‘n’ walk the dog…

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Validation good enough to eat!

Miss Villiers used to trill tunelessly when she wasn’t talking, and seemed to walk on her toes swinging her hands around as she went along. She was my form teacher when I was 13. One of the many random questions she frequently asked out of the blue and apropos of nothing at all spooked me slightly at the time, enough for it to be the only thing I remember her saying (so much for the expensive education!)

Miss Villiers asked us how we knew we were real. Hands flapping, she excitedly warmed to her theme, asking us each to imagine going alone into an empty sound-proofed room and closing the door. How did we know that anyone left outside really existed? Could it be that we didn’t really exist and they did? Maybe we didn’t really exist unless we were in someone else’s presence? What if we sang a song in the empty room – was the activity somehow invalidated because no-one had witnessed it?

I wonder what Miss Villiers would have made of mobile phones. They’ve melted the metaphorical walls of her horrible hollow room, and we can all be ‘validated’ 24/7 these days (even in company 😉 ).

Such musing arose from re-reading the essay ‘Back Again’ after half an hour’s stumbling guitar practice – I fell to wondering about ‘valid’ activities. For no good reason I can think of (except perhaps, that my Dad bought it for me – which is a very good reason now I think of it!), I have kept my guitar since my vain attempts to master the scale of C major when I had a few guitar lessons at school. I’m not particularly musical, and not in the least bit talented, but I’ve always loved the sound of classical guitar. A number of decades and strange quirks of fate later, I found myself at lessons again a few months ago, and have now almost mastered – I use the term very loosely – the lovely ‘Spanish Ballad’ (Anon, 17^th Century). I find I relish the absorption in practice – the ‘walk’ up and down the strings to strengthen my fingers, and the sound of the tune emerging in spite of my clumsy beginner’s mistakes. But in the shadows lurks a sense that I should be doing something else, something useful, something productive – something valid.

I doubt whether my countryman grandfather had such nonsense in his head when he set off for a day’s fishing at the Shallow of the Chestnut Stream in Sinnington on a fine September day in 1922. In ‘Back Again’ he paints beautiful vignettes of nature (and even of the activity of fishing itself!) and is rewarded by his critics with heartily appreciative remarks – rightly so, I feel. Take his recollection of a close encounter with kingfishers some years before on a similar trip, for example:

…I never fish the Shallow now without remembering that moment of intense life and beauty – It was such a breathless affair! – as thrilling in its way as the stoop of a Falcon –

(Punctuationistas, please note – I probably agree with you, but that’s what he wrote a hundred years ago!  😉   )

TMP marvels at the fact that, apart from three years during the War, he fished at Sinnington  “…every season for thirty eight years past, and it is rather singular that the Chestnut Tree Stream has altered so little in that time.”

When we visited Sinnington in September last year a hundred years after ‘Back Again’ was written, it still seemed barely changed – a time-capsule village around a green, along a stream, nestling against a slope of heather-dark moorland. I don’t know how many more seasons grandfather was able to go to fish in this idyllic spot. Change was coming. He travelled to Sinnington by train on the Thirsk & Malton Railway. This line had opened three years after his birth, but by the 1930s, passenger numbers had dwindled to about 35 a week, and the line slowly died – finally closing in 1953, three years after grandfather’s death. Five years’ after he wrote ‘Back Again’, he would become a father for the first time, at the age of fifty-six.

But let us return to ‘Back Again’ and revel in an enchanting description of the autumn foliage over the stream:

To-day the roof was golden in decay and flecked with spaces of blue. …Once I knocked one of the hanging boughs with my rod and a shower of leaves rustled down around and upon me – floating down the water like little fire-ships.

The day’s activity resulted in a catch “…nearly two spans in length; a most noble fish for those waters.” In fact, TMP was so proud of his trophy, he was tempted to leave a record of his triumph, as he and his school fellows had done in years gone by:

I wonder if two marks were cut into a rail near a stream in Yorkshire a hundred years ago – by a tall, slim man with a ruddy face, in his middle years, burdened with canvas bags bulging with fishing gear, and carrying a prize trout. If so, perhaps those marks remained for decades, slowly succumbing to lichen and moss, and the smoothing of hands, while the stream nearby flowed unchanging.

English: Sinnington Footbridge Footbridge crossing the River Seven at the lower end of Sinnington Main Street. The busy A170 runs close by. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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