English Villages | Page 3

seventeenth century, Langley Chapel, Salop. Chalice and paten,
Sandford, Oxfordshire Pre-Reformation plate Censer or thurible Mural
paintings Ancient sanctus bell found at Warwick

CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Local histories--Ignorance and destruction--Advantages of the study of
village antiquities--Description of an English village--The church-- The
manor-house--Prehistoric people--Later inhabitants--Saxons--Village
inn--Village green--Legends.
To write a complete history of any village is one of the hardest literary
labours which anyone can undertake. The soil is hard, and the crop
after the expenditure of much toil is often very scanty. In many cases
the records are few and difficult to discover, buried amidst the mass of
papers at the Record Office, or entombed in some dusty corner of the
Diocesan Registry. Days may be spent in searching for these treasures
of knowledge with regard to the past history of a village without any
adequate result; but sometimes fortune favours the industrious toiler,

and he discovers a rich ore which rewards him for all his pains. Slowly
his store of facts grows, and he is at last able to piece together the
history of his little rural world, which time and the neglect of past
generations had consigned to dusty oblivion.
In recent years several village histories have been written with varied
success by both competent and incompetent scribes; but such books are
few in number, and we still have to deplore the fact that so little is
known about the hamlets in which we live. All writers seem to join in
the same lament, and mourn over the ignorance that prevails in rural
England with regard to the treasures of antiquity, history, and folklore,
which are to be found almost everywhere. We may still echo the words
of the learned author of _Tom Brown's Schooldays_, the late Mr.
Hughes, who said that the present generation know nothing of their
own birthplaces, or of the lanes, woods, and fields through which they
roam. Not one young man in twenty knows where to find the
wood-sorrel, or the bee-orchis; still fewer can tell the country legends,
the stories of the old gable-ended farmhouses, or the place where the
last skirmish was fought in the Civil War, or where the parish butts
stood. Nor is this ignorance confined to the unlearned rustics; it is
shared by many educated people, who have travelled abroad and
studied the history of Rome or Venice, Frankfort or Bruges, and yet
pass by unheeded the rich stores of antiquarian lore, which they witness
every day, and never think of examining closely and carefully. There
are very few villages in England which have no objects of historical
interest, no relics of the past which are worthy of preservation.
"Restoration," falsely so called, conducted by ignorant or perverse
architects, has destroyed and removed many features of our parish
churches; the devastating plough has well-nigh levelled many an
ancient barrow; railroads have changed the character of rustic life and
killed many an old custom and rural festival. Old legends and quaint
stories of the countryside have given place to talks about politics and
newspaper gossip. But still much remains if we learn to examine things
for ourselves, and endeavour to gather up the relics of the past and save
them from the destructive hand of Time.
A great service may thus be rendered not only to the cause of history,

but also to the villagers of rural England, by those who have time,
leisure, and learning, sufficient to gain some knowledge of bygone
times. It adds greatly to the interest of their lives to know something of
the place where they live; and it has been well said that every man's
concern with his native place has something more in it than the amount
of rates and taxes that he has to pay. He may not be able to write a
history of his parish, but he can gather up the curious gossip of the
neighbourhood, the traditions and stories which have been handed
down from former generations. And if anyone is at the pains to acquire
some knowledge of local history, and will impart what he knows to his
poorer neighbours, he will add greatly to their interest in life. Life is a
burden, labour mere drudgery, when a man has nothing in which he can
interest himself. When we remember the long hours which an
agricultural labourer spends alone, without a creature to speak to,
except his horses or the birds, we can imagine how dull his life must be,
if his mind be not occupied. But here, on his own ground, he may find
an endless supply of food for thought, which will afford him much
greater pleasure and satisfaction than thinking and talking about his
neighbours' faults, reflecting upon his wrongs, or imitating the example
of one of his class who, when asked by the