Highways and Byways in Sussex Part 32

And lo! John Grigg in Sunday smock; Begged pardon, pulled an oily lock; Explained: "The mud's above the hough.

"No horse could draw 'ee sir," he said.

"Humph!" quoth the squire and scratched his head.

"Then yoke the oxen in instead."

(A lesser man would gladly turn His chair to fire again, and learn How fancifully logs can burn,

Grateful for such immunity From parson. Not the squire; for see, "True sonne of England's Church" was he.)

So, as he ordered, was it done.

The oxen came forth one by one, Their wide horns glinting in the sun,

And to the coach were yoked. Then--dressed, As squires should be, in glorious best, With wonderful brocaded vest,--

Out came Sir Herbert, took his seat, Waved "Barbara, farewell, my Sweet!"

And off they started, all complete.

Although they drew so light a load (For them!) so heavy was the road, John Grigg was busy with his goad.

The cottagers in high delight Ran out to see the startling sight And make obeisance to the knight,

While floated through the liquid air, And o'er the sunlit meadows fair, The throbbing belfry's call to prayer.

At last, and after many a lurch That shook Sir Herbert in his perch, John Grigg drew up before the church;

Moreover not a minute late.

The villagers around the gate Were filled with wonder at his state,

And, promptly, though 'twas sabbath tide, "Three cheers for squire--Hooray!" they cried....

Such was Sir Herbert Springett's ride.

Sad is the sequel, sad but true-- For while in sermon-time a few Deep snores resounded from the pew

Reserved for squire, by others there The tenth commandment (men declare) Was being broken past repair:

For, thinking how they had to roam Through weary wastes of sodden loam Ere they could win to fire and home,

In spite of parson's fervid knocks Upon his cushion orthodox, They "coveted their neighbour's ox."

[Sidenote: OXEN OF THE HILLS]

Oxen are now rarely seen on the Suss.e.x roads, but on the hill sides a few of the farmers still plough with them; and may it be long before the old custom is abandoned! There is no pleasanter or more peaceful sight than--looking up--that of a wide-horned team of black oxen, smoking a little in the morning air, drawing the plough through the earth, while the ploughman whistles, and the ox-herd, goad in hand, utters his Saxon grunts of incitement or reproof. The black oxen of the hills are of Welsh stock, the true Suss.e.x ox being red. The "kews," as their shoes are called, may still be seen on the walls of a smithy here and there.

Shoeing oxen is no joke, since to protect the smith from their horns they have to be thrown down; their necks are held by a pitchfork, and their feet tied together.

Suss.e.x roads were terrible until comparatively recent times. An old rhyme credits "Sowseks" with "dirt and myre," and Dr. Burton, the author of the _Iter Suss.e.xiensis_, humorously found in it a reason why Suss.e.x people and beasts had such long legs. "Come now, my friend," he wrote, in Greek, "I will set before you a sort of problem in Aristotle's fashion:--Why is it that the oxen, the swine, the women, and all other animals, are so long legged in Suss.e.x? May it be from the difficulty of pulling the feet out of so much mud by the strength of the ankle, that the muscles get stretched, as it were, and the bones lengthened?"

[Sidenote: ROUGH ROADS]

When, in 1703, the King of Spain visited the Duke of Somerset at Petworth he had the greatest difficulty in getting here. One of his attendants has put on record the perils of the journey:--"We set out at six o'clock in the morning (at Portsmouth) to go to Petworth, and did not get out of the coaches, save only when we were overturned or stuck fast in the mire, till we arrived at our journey's end. 'Twas hard service for the prince to sit fourteen hours in the coach that day, without eating anything, and pa.s.sing through the worst ways that I ever saw in my life: we were thrown but once indeed in going, but both our coach which was leading, and his highness's body coach, would have suffered very often, if the nimble boors of Suss.e.x had not frequently poised it, or supported it with their shoulders, from G.o.dalming almost to Petworth; and the nearer we approached the duke's, the more inaccessible it seemed to be. The last nine miles of the way cost six hours time to conquer."

To return to Ringmer, it was there that Gilbert White studied the tortoise (see Letter xiii of _The Natural History of Selborne_). The house where he stayed still stands, and the rookery still exists. "These rooks," wrote the naturalist, "retire every morning all the winter from this rookery, where they only call by the way, as they are going to roost in deep woods; at the dawn of day they always revisit their nest-trees, and are preceded a few minutes by a flight of daws, that act, as it were, as their harbingers." An intermediate owner of the house where Gilbert White resided, which then belonged to his aunt Rebecca Snooke, ordered all nightingales to be shot, on the ground that they kept him awake.

[Sidenote: PLASHETTS]

While at Ringmer, if a glimpse of very rich park land is needed, it would be worth while to walk three miles north to Plashetts, which combines a vast tract of wood with a small park notable at once for its trees, its brake fern, its lakes, and its water fowl. But if one would gain it by rail, Isfield is the station.

CHAPTER x.x.xI

UCKFIELD AND BUXTED

The Crowborough district--Isfield--Another model wife--Framfield--The poet Realf--Uckfield--The Maresfield rocks--Puritan names in Suss.e.x--Buxted park--Heron's Ghyll--A perfect church.

Uckfield, on the line from Lewes to Tunbridge Wells, is our true starting point for the high sandy and rocky district of Crowborough, Rotherfield and Mayfield; but we must visit on the way Isfield, a very pretty village on the Ouse and its Iron River tributary. Isfield is remarkable for the remains of Isfield Place, once the home of the Shurleys (connected only by marriage with the Shirleys of Wiston). The house can never have been so fine as Slaugham Place, but it is evident that abundance also reigned here, as there. Over the main door was the motto "Non minor est virtus quam querere parta tueri," which Horsfield whimsically translates "Catch is a good dog, but Holdfast is a better."

In the Shurley chapel, one of the sweetest spots in Suss.e.x, are bra.s.ses and monuments to the family, notably the canopied altar tomb to Sir John Shurley, who died in 1631, his two wives (Jane Shirley of Wiston and Dorothy Bowyer, _nee_ Goring, of Cuckfield) and nine children, who kneel prettily in a row at the foot. Of these children it is said in the inscription that some "were called into Heaven and the others into several marriages of good quality"; while of Dorothy Shurley it is prettily recorded (this, as we have seen, being a district rich in exemplary wives) that she had "a merite beyond most of her time, ...

her pitty was the clothing of the poore ... and all her minutes were but steppes to heaven." Our county has many fine monuments, but I think that, this is the most charming of all.

[Sidenote: FRAMFIELD]

At Framfield, two miles east of Uckfield, which we may take here, we again enter the iron country, and for the first time see Suss.e.x hops, which are grown largely to the north and east of this neighbourhood.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Framfield._]

[Sidenote: RICHARD REALF]

Framfield has a Tudor church and no particular interest. In 1792 eleven out of fifteen persons in Framfield, whose united ages amounted to one thousand and thirty-four years, offered, through the county paper, to play a cricket match with an equal number of the same age from any part of Suss.e.x; but I do not find any record of the result. Nor can I find that any one at Framfield is proud of the fact that here, in 1834, was born Richard Realf, the orator and poet, son of Suss.e.x peasants. In England his name is scarcely known; and in America, where his work was done, it is not common knowledge that he was by birth and parentage English. Realf was the friend of man, liberty and John Brown; he fought against slavery in the war, and helped the cause with some n.o.ble verses; and he died miserably by his own hand in 1878, leaving these lines beside his body:--

"De mortuis nil nisi bonum." When For me this end has come and I am dead, And the little voluble, chattering daws of men Peck at me curiously, let it then be said By some one brave enough to speak the truth: Here lies a great soul killed by cruel wrong.

Down all the balmy days of his fresh youth To his bleak, desolate noon, with sword and song, And speech that rushed up hotly from the heart, He wrought for liberty, till his own wound (He had been stabbed), concealed with painful art Through wasting years, mastered him, and he swooned, And sank there where you see him lying now With the word "Failure" written on his brow.

But say that he succeeded. If he missed World's honors, and world's plaudits, and the wage Of the world's deft lacqueys, still his lips were kissed Daily by those high angels who a.s.suage The thirstings of the poets--for he was Born unto singing--and a burthen lay Mightily on him, and he moaned because He could not rightly utter to the day What G.o.d taught in the night. Sometimes, nathless, Power fell upon him, and bright tongues of flame, And blessings reached him from poor souls in stress; And benedictions from black pits of shame, And little children's love, and old men's prayers, And a Great Hand that led him unawares.

So he died rich. And if his eyes were blurred With big films--silence! he is in his grave.

Greatly he suffered; greatly, too, he erred; Yet broke his heart in trying to be brave.

Nor did he wait till Freedom had become The popular shibboleth of courtier's lips; He smote for her when G.o.d Himself seemed dumb And all His arching skies were in eclipse.

He was a-weary, but he fought his fight, And stood for simple manhood; and was joyed To see the august broadening of the light And new earths heaving heavenward from the void.

He loved his fellows, and their love was sweet-- Plant daisies at his head and at his feet.

Uckfield's main street is divided sharply into two periods--from the station to the road leading to the church all is new; beyond, all is old. The town is not interesting in itself, but it commands good country, and has a good inn, the Maiden's Head. It is also a good specimen of the quieter market-town of the past--with a brewery (hiding behind a wonderful tree braced with kindly iron bands), a water mill (down by the railway), and several solid comfortable houses for the doctor and the lawyer and the brewer and the parson, with ample gardens behind them.

Uckfield was once the home of Jeremiah Markland, the great cla.s.sic, who acted as tutor here to Edward Clarke, son of the famous William Clarke, rector of Buxted, and father of Edward Daniel Clarke, the traveller. It is agreeable to remember that f.a.n.n.y Burney pa.s.sed through the town with Mrs. Thrale in 1779, although she found nothing to interest her.