The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1883-01-02 00:00:00

" DORBET FOLK AND DORSET."

Under the title ef "Dorset Folk and Dorset" the Rev.
W. Bones, BD., contribute. an able and Interesting
article to the current somber of the Weans Hour. lii.
embellished by an illustration of Maiden Castle, which 1.,
by the way,. copied from John Pounces "Illustrated
Dorset." W. Saks the following extract which will
doubtless be read with much interest :—"The Dorset folk,
as fer se they are of &iron kin, may not be likely to differ
very widely from their neighbours of Wessex, or from
the English in most other counties ; and, indeed, the
boundaries of folkommsch and folk-likeness are not so far
those of the counties as are rivers and ridges of Mils.
But shit, wide differenose of land, as those of the rich.
rented and well-timbered vale of Biwtlimoor, and those of
the chalk downs of Southern Dorest, and of the healthy
ground to the south-east of the shirr, would give the
people sundry kinds of mein work. from which, asap,
they would fall Into slightly differing ways of behaviour
sad train of thought and till, Then, again, it is clear
that the Saxon kin of DOraet took, in their earlier times,
a little of the blood of Wekicyn, as King Alfred
called Use Britain in the west or Wessex' for, under
King Ins of Weems.. Bribing of sundry ranks, freemen
es
well as serfs, were living among the Sexiest and by
name, as such, were under the care of his law,; and
Dorset ha. two towns, Shaftesbury and Wareham, which
have had tokane of • time when a British and a Saxon
population were living in two sundry quarters of the
town, and each with churches of it. own speech. They
have had many little churches; Shaftesbury, the British
Caw Paladr, hes hid twelve, and Wareham six or
seven. Some Norman blood must have mingled in
Detest, as elsewhere, with that of the Saxons. Among
Lb. upper ranks, from the Normen landlords (migneurs)—
inch as the Fitapairies, Glanville', Neville's, Manaela,Le
Noires., Romels, and Torbervilles, the names of some
of whoa still cleave to their lande—and among the lower
ranks, from the underlings brought is by the barons and
the Norman heads of the Church, and of the monasteries,
and, with Norman Kaglato law, Norman words of the
Bench and Bar have needs come HILO Minot Beech. But
of the British speech the Dorset tongue is almost if not
quite clear, so that tits Dorset folk are mainly Saxon.
Some Dewiest parishes have • low and some others •
high death-rate. In the school, of some parishes you will
had elaerrings of healthy and corn :Ay children, and in
others children of paler hue and less kindly growth,
showing, it MAP he. differences from their villages, and the
wafers. or. want in their homes.
_

-II; We-la-alit; of -171;r:mif;r1-t. Iv, I believe, of about the
°mom man. Some are born weakly and fade early:
some, In erne' manhood, it. cutoff by mishaps or blood.
Poimalass ; sad some walk spra •kly among grandchildren
of full growth.
The following le taken fronts Dorset paper An old
woman. named Edith Bow, 1)6 teat, of age, has, during
the harvest, tied after int revers muteness sheaves of
wheat on tne farm of Kr. Young, of Piddletrenthide.
This Is rather good work for an oM lady who, if she lime,
will shortly sae the dawning of • second century.'
Among diammis which are the neon nfe is Dorn& are
the inet-spreadiag btood.dm of fames, against which we
hops that unitary improvementa of dwelling., in form,
roominess. 11114 CIIIMALZIaIIe, may make head; aad
rheumatism, frogs the Milling of tho body by loag team-
ing of soaked clothing at work intim dead. A mother said
one day to ms, in speaking of her boy who had been wet
through every day for some wilds, that ski could "hardly
keep a dry dread (thread) on his back, poor twoed I"
"poor toad' Wag given as • name of compassion for his
helplessness against the weather.
Agee, owing perhaps to the draining of watery land, is
lase 'ifs than it formerly was in Dorset.
Rosy children at the doom and Madames dowers in
the window of • cottage, and window gardenias, which is
very COMMIX& in Dorset Sill happy tokeed of a higher
farm of life in th• house. And this drunkard's horn* will
not often show them.

—ilre-r ;Ifs and Oh-4.lva of the drunkard labourer must be
ill-fed, lad the children moot be,o for born from and in
weamsom, and cannot grow up into the fall sins and
strength of man; and so they have to struggles for bread
In labour tar heavy for their weakly bothers, from which
maim spring Mildren more degenerate. Lad what will
be the end of it/ Will time be In those day. 'lento or
dwarfs fer Loglishman I
Dorset folk have done meth against the awful evils of
loomogerance, and ..any are they who strive to says
embers from them, end Many they who would felt be
eared._ . _

"ilas Dant Temperance st mordation and the Church of
Ragland Thaperanos Society have not out a voice of
warmth' and °googol. and have helping workers in all
quarters. So that, ea I learn, then are now in Dorset
a-boot tea thousand aludinents and two hundred socialise.
Ooffes-honese or coffertaverns have been opened in
most of the Donn towns, and I do sot know of one
which has ben °lend as a hopeless failure. By the gray,
I dud. from the diary of Yr. John Richards, of Warmweti,
that there was a cadforlines in Dorchester In 1700. It
snots to have her (requested by the county gentry, as
parcels were left there by on family for another.
Dorset men would be fond, in the mein, of middling
sloe, though we have men tall as well ag osnoll, and a
manly body of moo might be seen In the Minot rromentY
cavalry. The average height of the Dorset militia is 5
feet 5 inches, and that of the Dorchester oorpo of riflemen
is 6 foot 7 balm, which would most Skid., be found about
a fair average for the North alfeet crepe and otters.
But that of Portland—f or the true Portlander, as is
shown by the Portland corps of riflemen, moos others—
in the main, tailor end thicker-boned than the
foreigners, as they formerly called us of tee mainland of
Dorset. _ _

--ffa7n-ss and farming are not quite silk. in the Gus grass
land of North Dorset. the Vol. of Blackmer, and on the
downs of Booth Dorset In Blaciimoor are smaller dairy
farms, on which some of the dairy work Is takes by the
master's own children ; but some of the corn farms of Um
south take each 0,000 or 10,000 ti stock and work them,
and, it may be, a horsed foreman, with the meter, to
idia the widely-spread work ; and of late suck own form,
bay', been tilled at • heavy loss. To the question whether
landlords will Sod this. very broad farms better to let
than smaller once. such bad time.., dime may give an
=ewer. But it seems likely that there ars farms now on
hand that might be taken In two or three smaller rms.
Some of Use homely and working tamers have. ere now,
saved manor and bought lend. The mind of the clams
would be fairly betokened by one whom I have known.
He said to me, some time ago—he had seen the daughters
of • neighbouring farmer going to the mimic master—he
said "While I and my wife we, out 6-atilkim they
mat ions went by, an' I said to bar. • Where be they
maidens agareite an' she nelt 'Oh I they be agwobe to
their music.' An I said, 'Oh agwole to their mu&
at millamisne I That's)) some to soin'ishat that wolL'"
He was • shrewd rosa. Ho rented some land of • land-
owner, whose steward was mostly to the makes uo the
market-day, and he said that If he wanted • n•ve tete or
irow•houm, or any other favour, he kept the steward in
sight till he nighties him talk with souse other man; and
If be smiled and Joked with him, he met him, and pat to
him, in hie most wispiest ways, his petition; but if he
frowned or spoke to his neighbour "6'r a bit snappish, be
sought him not but waited for moiliors tempers on
another market day. He told me that he ems *eked his
landlord his leave to shroud some elms in afield. His land-
owner, however ,did not hold with the maiming of tram,
and asked him, WW you let me out off your arm r "Oh,
sir r said be, 'I didn't Was to cut son so cluose as
that" "Well, then." said the landlord, "will you let me
cut off your thumb r "14 a-doos r said the good vale
yeiromm
Than are in Blacks:soar—and, indeed, elsewhere in
Dorset—farm and houses which were formerly the lands
and Mao el squires of the lower nusk.
The workman is now often caudated from the fanner by
a Ideing bola, and from the landowner by both the
farms and bailiff. It is not implied that the old land.
ownegoe home canuotltm worthily holden by the farmer as
ow& Whatever of good Is found in the Dorset mind is
found In his mind is fully as in that of any other rusk,
but • shifting of • man into the higher place—but not
Into all the drcumstancse of an,Oer- -may naturally make
a change, tot better or worse, to those who ware under the
first
Pew of the pow houashoidere of the Dorset villtges have
any ma,. their old rights of grazing in the commons,
most of which have now been mimed, but irito which
they had formerly the right of petting a cow or donkey,
or MOO geese. These enclosures are thought to be
hammiest& Batten. Bat the gain of good from any
bagerevesnest is not the whole sum of good that lain it,
bet the basses of that good above the good of the thing
of !MAU MB Wu" SA° !"64. _ .

landowner at itkitehruci Dorset. lets out small
stares of gross land to two or rem of the bettermost of
working variableness; with the understanding that they
shall keep sews and NU milk to their rocs neighbours.
Ow Wag may be said spinet the COMMOII bolding of
the rommote—that the commoners did not Widow on
them any rieuunon week of draining or levelling of
eminret-hatte (nabbins) or minoring; but the thickly
bodging amansta.batta may brine in • queer quest on •
whether, 'Moe tkie surface of enuotttbutte (hem
bor• grass or furs*, the commcaere did not Increase the
common ground by their very cariesenem of it it was
more or less nurtured by the erasing animals.
Will us hers is Dorset. at Meer, it May be quartioned
lithe molten silk. Lebourenf Union between wader and
men has net done the labourers mor• harm tluin good. It
has lossuated the wonted good-will with which tie, master
has given the man es hoar or two on some tell of his own
wadn, and the man was willing, to give es much of dine
to the master's strong call to With moms wadi me the
..fam aid has brought in mere of that cold hllll of
no-paying work and no-staying work but by the hand of
the clock; and the tendency of it la that the wartman's
arm sways. sad the master's hand pare, cal, by cont.
palatal of law, and not &leo from kindly heart. The
heart is the dovetail th it bolds together master end men
In all weathers; the pail, only glee that gives out lithe
wet . .

say they cutsot get good servaata sad soots
servants say they cannot Est good masters sad mistresses.
I will sot ark oa widch gide the truth may be toned, but
believe that healthy love walks oa four test sad cannot
very latg keep up on two.
The law el the unles•rating, which war, I believe,
mast to beim mass good to farm labours,. In hoo.ini,
has not, as f as I can use, brought it, but has brought
them soil of soother kind.
. . . . .

A7t-b-ell:Sr-oTaTailin7irtlng now stands, Ifs workman Ii
11l and out of work for eyes a short Nun., • oeeter often
puts him on the anion, on that, intend of affordina him
the whole of his bread, he pays only his own small gnus
of It against the shares of other ratepayero in the union.
I do not reprobate nab blhaviour, tot I do not think
ratepayers on the whole save any pot he the Isw, for
while one payer puts his man on the anim, others play
the same game against hire, so that while ho pays only
the ninth part of his otan's allowance, be pare the ninth
part of the allowances of other matters' men, and so it
may he as much no the man's whole allowance.
Ti,,T orchard, the rather pioudly-holden domain of the
lower householder. in Blaekozoor, wlt4 Its 'rage, sud
little rick of key far the winter, Is • crest kelp to a
household who can keep • 075, and ago& gay dakt
in its full bl 'em In May. and is, I believe, losinell
remembered for its (pleasing shade in the summer,
It, fruit in the fall, sod as • *indwells in the slut r.