The Countryman's Jewel - Days in the Life of a Sixteenth Century Squire

CHAPTER I

A SIXTEENTH-CENTURY SQUIRE

ON an afternoon of June, in the fifteen-seventies, Leonard Mascall, writer of books, and country squire, set out from the town of Lewes on the last stage of his journey from London to his home, some five miles distant from Lewes, under the South Downs. As was usual in those days, he had travelled through the forest in a mixed company which held together for companionship and for safety from the attacks of robbers and highwaymen. But now, going across the open Downs, with his horse, and that of his servant, rested and baited, he had no fears and, perhaps, would have enjoyed an encounter with anything short of an armed band. He was riding his favourite chestnut, with a merry look and wild of countenance, to use his own words, and with a white feather on the forehead and one white foot. His man carried a cross-bow, but Mascall himself was unarmed except for a dagger in his belt. He was simply dressed; a light cloak covered a sleeveless jacket of homespun cloth, worn over a soft white shirt. His leather riding boots had been freshly cleaned by the ostler at the inn.

As he rode across the flowering turf, golden green in the sunshine, the Squire looked back into the past. There were mounds in which were buried those who fell on the battle-field of Lewes on a day in May, 1264. He thought of all the mysterious earthworks on the Downs, camps that brought back the memory of the Danes, the Saxons, the Romans and the prehistoric tribes whose cattle-tracks and dew-ponds, some of them half as old as the Pyramids, were a feature of these hills. Mount Harry (or Harrow), the slopes of which he ascended, was once marked by a heathen hearg or place of worship. The track, which he followed along the brow of the Downs, was a prehistoric trade-route, and in part had been made a Roman road, which descended the face of the Downs just beyond his own property, running on through a park, or game-preserve, belonging to the Earls of Derby, northward into the Weald. The forest had been scarcely penetrated or inhabited before the time of the Saxons; they were the pioneers who had begun the endless clearings in the woodlands, setting up farms, building churches, and giving boundaries and names to the parishes. The history of his own manor began in those days.

He watched a bustard sailing by overhead with the majestic flight of an eagle, and saw, in the distance, a herd of deer moving through the bracken. He was glad to be back on these Downs that he loved. Here the first herds and flocks had fed; here, on these uplands had been the beginning of agriculture.

The Squire was a scholar, and had enjoyed the advantage of being attached to the household of the learned Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury, if in no more exalted a position than clerk of the kitchen. He did not know that the earth moved round the sun, but he liked to think of blue-painted savages, thousands of years before his time, dwelling round the spring which fed his moat, of Roman soldiers encamping by the water, or of the first Saxon squatters. The Primate him-self had shown him, in the Domesday Book, the record of his own manor as it was in the time of Edward the Confessor and William the Conqueror, with its church and two mills, as in his own day; it had belonged to Earl Godwin, the father of Harold, and the place had been held by a priest of the name of Godwin—was he a thane who became a priest, as many thanes did, or a priest who, in the natural order of things, became a thane?

At all events there must have been a thane’s hall on the site of his house, a wooden, barn-like building, painted in gay colours. Had theNormans rebuilt it in flint?—at best the old hall would have been no finer than one of his own granaries. And now what a comfortable home was his, with fireplaces and chimney, staircases and glass in the windows!—a delightful place, part of half-timber walls, part of brick. It had been in a measure rebuilt in ’68, as a stone testified, bearing that date, and the initials of Edward and John Mascall, and, in his mind, were plans for further improvements. The gardens—his thoughts turned to them gladly. He was compiling a book on Orchards and had in mind another, on Fishing.

Afternoon merged into evening. The shepherds had led their flocks from the hills to their folds in the laines—or open pastures—below; the teams of oxen, ploughing the upland fields, had been taken back to the farms. On his ride, he had seen no living being on the Downs, but now made out, in the distance, the graceful figure of a young girl, leading a dog. It was his favourite greyhound, brought by his ward, Amicia, to meet him. Slipped from its lead, it sped over the plain, and he swung from the saddle for the greeting. Amicia, herself running, shared the welcome.

You are late, Squire, she said, half unconsciously eyeing his saddle-bag and wondering what faring he had brought her from London. Or perhaps it is only that waiting for you has made the time seem long? She slipped her hand in his arm, and he, giving his horse to his servant, began with her a direct descent of the slopes of the Downs. At one glance he could see below them his beloved fields and woods, the little brick parsonage on a foothill, the hedge-row ale-house nearby, his own house among its trees, with the water about it and the mill-pond in which was reflected the water-mill and the miller’s cottage; there were his barns and stables, the old church round which an almost vanished mediæval village had once stood, and beyond, in a hollow, the farmhouse of his bailiff, Wales.

Our home stands yet, I see, he said. You have had no alarms? No raids?

Not even an attempt to carry me off, said Amicia. Life indeed has been dull. Notwithstanding she had so much to tell that her guardian could say no word about his adventures in London.

Their approach to the gate-house was heralded by the baying of a savage mastiff and the cackling of geese in the farmyard. A peacock in the garden added to the din with its shrill cry. The bailiff himself was at the entrance to welcome the Squire, and, while they talked, Amicia ran across the drawbridge and up the flagged path of the garden, touched by roses as she went, to announce their arrival to her mother, Mistress Ann, and the cook.

It was on the point of six, the hour for supper, and in the hall a round table with carved legs was already spread with dishes. Time was allowed for Amicia to change the simple gown she was wearing for a dress more in keeping with the low-cut, tight-waisted costume in which her mother was already arrayed; and for the traveller first to refresh himself in the outhouse which provided something approaching a Roman bath, and then to put on a high ruff collar, a purple velvet coat, and silk stockings that set off the length of his shapely legs. So adorned, he descended to the hall, announcing himself uncommonly hungry.

We begin with two of your favourite dishes, said Amicia, who now looked so lovely that her guardian found himself wondering why no young squire in the neighbourhood had attempted to carry her off in his absence.

The favourite dish of which Amicia had spoken, was lettuce. It had been recommended to Mascall by his friend, John Gerard, a student of medicine and herbs, who some years later was to become the historian of plants, and to set down in print the fact that "lettuce is served in these daies, and in these countries in the beginning of supper, and eaten first before any other meat; which also Martiall testifieth to be done in his time, marvelling why some did use it for a service at the end of supper, in these verses—

Tell me why Lettuce, which our Grandsires last did eate,

Is now of late become, to be the first of meate?

Notwithstanding it may now and then be eaten at both those times to the health of the body; for being taken before meat it doth many times stir up the appetite; and eaten after supper it keepeth away drunkennesse which commeth by the wine; and that is by reason that it staieth the vapours from rising up into the head.

The next delicacy (at which Amicia herself shuddered) was a dish of frogs’ legs.

Why shudder? said the Squire. Taste them, and if you shiver it will be with delight.

Will you recommend them in your book on ‘Fishing’? Amicia asked.

The Squire nodded.

Of frogs, he said, I shall say: ‘In many places frogs, being well dressed, they eat like fish, and do taste as well as a young poulet, for I tasted my part of many.’

Amicia, however, preferred a plover’s pretty egg.

There followed a leg of lamb—which the Squire declared to be of a finer taste than venison —with dishes of asparagus and early peas. The simple meal—eaten without forks—ended with a pastry in which were strawberries covered in cream. No wine was served, though the manor-house cellar was well-stocked; the full enjoyment of wine-bibbing would follow at the after-supper, before going to bed. But the Squire fully agreed with Andrew Boorde, the Sussex physician and traveller, who fifty years before had been suffragan Bishop of Chichester, that water is not wholesome, sole by itself, for an Englysshe man, and, while Mistress Ann and Amicia drank cider, he enjoyed more than one tankard of strong home-brewed ale.

He was well pleased to be home again. The floor of the hall had been freshly strewn with lavender, rosemary and thyme, and, to welcome him, Amicia had made a little carpet of rose-petals round the table. There was a nosegay of fragrant flowers beside his place. The walls of the room were hung with carpets and tapestry; against them were one or two tables, a carved cupboard and chest, and a few high-backed chairs. Vast must have been the toil involved in bringing whatever furniture was not made on the estate from London. It would have come by pack-horse, or in a wagon hauled with difficulty through the miry by-ways of the forest. In the Squire’s sitting-room was a fine writing-desk, and in the sleeping chambers upstairs were magnificent four-posted beds, framed mirrors and ornamental clocks, besides such necessary articles as cupboards and tables for basin and ewer and things of the toilet; little furniture, but worthy of a man of taste.

So it was with a sense of complete contentment that the Squire sat at the table, relating the adventures of his travels through the forest, and of days spent in London; he had passed some hours with a bookseller, dwelling at the little north door of Paul’s, at the Sign of the Gun. He was a man who would gladly have for sale a book on fishing.

After supper, Amicia played for a time on the virginal, perhaps partly the better to show off a new ring which her guardian had brought her from London; but soon refused to compete against the singing of a nightingale in the garden. They moved to the garden. The night was warm, and the little barge moored to the landing-stage of Sussex marble, tempted them to descend the terrace steps, to cross the moat and enjoy the evening lights from one of the arbours in the pleasure garden, on the far side of the water. There they could not only hear one but many nightingales, singing to the accompaniment of the music of the water, falling over the mill-race. The ladies had carried with them their embroidery, on which they worked while the Squire related the latest news of Sir Francis Drake’s voyages, and of the Catholic plots against the Queen.

At nine o’clock they returned to the house for the after-supper; and as his home-coming was a special occasion, to be celebrated, the Squire brought up from the cellar a bottle of choice French wine. This was emptied into a silver bowl in which Mistress Ann drowned some spices, floated a slice of lemon, and scattered sugar. Amicia brought from the cupboard some fine Venetian glasses, well suited to show off the colour of the wine, and, from the kitchen, pasties, some containing meat and others preserves.

Long after the ladies had retired to the sleeping chambers—there was no corridor upstairs and Amicia’s apartment opened out of her Mother’s —the Squire sat at his writing-desk, turning over his papers by the light of candles, set in two handsome glass candlesticks. He had brought from London both rolls of parchment and paper for his writing, superior to anything that he had yet succeeded in making on the farm, and he fingered the paper with pleasure. For the hundredth time, he thought over the title for his translation of the book on trees and orchards, a book he was now anxious to finish before starting work on the fishing treatise, for which he had already collected a deal of material. Finally, inspiration came, and taking up a quill, which one of his own swans had provided, he wrote:

A Booke of the Arte and Manner how to Graff and Plante all sortes of Trees, how to set Stones and sow Pepins to make wilde trees to Graffe on; as also Remedies and medicines, with other new practices, by one of the Abbey of St. Vincent in France; with the addition of certain Dutch practices; set forth and Englished by L.M.

He read the title over twice, with satisfaction. And now, with Amicia’s help, he would soon come to his last page. . . . Another project came to his mind. A certain Katherine Woodford, a beauty, and an heiress, had made his stay in London delightful. In idle conversation, he had promised to write for her a book on poultry, had even won her promise to accept its dedication. He was too far committed to neglect a promise so gallantly made.

He snuffed the candles and went for a moment to the door of the hall to look out on the night. The chief fault he found with life was that it was too full of interest. The Husbandlye Ordering and Governmente of Poultrie! He could see in his mind’s eye this title and it suggested an amusing task. He hoped his chickens were safely in the new hen-house he had built. The guardian mastiff was silent, but sleeping, he knew, with one eye open. It was not only foxes and buzzards that were the peril on that lonely farm of his, nor only the poultry that might be attacked. Bands of armed robbers roamed the forest, cattle-thieves and poachers, besides the vagabonds to whom robbing a hen-roost was the very spice of life. Reckless young squires, with armed followers, had been known to break into a house to carry off by force some pretty girl, rather than waste further words with a disapproving father or the guardian of some wealthy ward. But all the farm-hands were trained in the use of the bow and other weapons, ready to be fighting-men at any time if the Queen had need of soldiers, and more than ready for a fray with marauders from the forest or the crews of foreign privateers, who sometimes came across the Downs on a daring raid on some lonely hamlet. The carter slept in a loft above his horses, and the ox-herd among the straw near to his cattle; the shepherd watched over his sheep. They would not be easily surprised, for like the mastiff they seemed to sleep with one eye open, and they passed the night without discarding their day-time clothes, in contrast to the highest in the land, who slept naked under their warm coverings.

Except for the singing of the nightingales, and the occasional croak of a frog, all was silent. Before retiring to bed, the Squire took a last look at the Downs, clear-cut against the night sky. They brooded over his home and he delighted to be back under their shadow.

On the day following we discover the Squire in his study, at work on his translation of Maison Rustique, his ward writing to his dictation. The chapter they thus prepare here follows:

THE DUTIE OF A FATHER OF A

FAMILIE, OR HOUSHOLDER

The father of a family must have skill in matters of husbandrie.

I WISH and desire that The Lord of the Farme may be a man of great knowledge, well acquainted, and given to matters of husbandrie. For who so is ignorant of them, having had but small practise in the, as also he which doth take his chiefest delight in other things & spendeth his time other wise, must of necessitie commit himselfe to the mercie and discretion of a farmer, which will mocke him to his face, and will impaire his groundes and house also, heaping thereto a world of quarrels and suites which he will raise. Or else he must trust to some other accomplisher of the business either in governing or waiting and attending, & he asking counsell of other the farmers thereabout, they will make him beleeve things to be not so good by the halfe as they are.

And indeede wee reade for a certaintie in the Romaine histories, that the earth was never so fruitfull, as then when it was allured and wonne by the industrie of the famous Romaine citizens, and delivered out of the tyrannous handling of grosse-headed peasants, whom we see before our eies, notwithstanding that they are altogether ignorant, to growe rich at our costes and charges, and to the great spoile of the ground which they husband and till.

There is nothing comparable to the over-looking eie of a prudent and discreete Lord, and one that is accustomed to husbandry, and which looketh after and contenteth himselfe with such estate as may stand with his profit, and keepeth to himselfe the principall charge, which is a watchfulnesse and earnest desire to preserve his goodes, and hath alwaies care of his companie, and farmeth not, nor yet renteth out any thing but that which he will have nothing at all to doe withall, except a little oversight.

What things are most fit to bee farmed out.

Neither yet would I have him in so doing, that hee should passe any bargaine by the way of Notaries or by writing: for by this meanes he rob-beth himselfe of his libertie.

Let him learne well to know and understand the natures and choise of men, cattell and groundes, and let not that worke possibly fall out, which he himselfe knoweth not to doe.

At the least let him understand the times and seasons when, as also the manners how things were accustomed to be done.

For as a man which seeth not any place, whereby he may give light to another, can never lighten him so well: even so that Lord of a farme which understandeth not, neither knoweth the seasons and proper times for to do any thing belonging to his government & jurisdiction, neither yet the ordering of things, to execute every thing accordingly, shall never know so well what to command, and doth nothing to the workman but trouble and greeve him. It is the manner of men to mocke at such as commaund and will things to be done which are nothing to the purpose, but must afterward be undone againe, or else abide without any profit. This is it which the great husbandman Cato hath written, that the ground is very ill intreated and greevously punished, whose Lord and owner knoweth not to teach and commaund that which is to be done: but must depend and relie wholy upon his farmer.

The cheefe key of all the rest.

A privie doore. To order his suites. What time the housholder should keepe at his farme, and when he may best goe abroad to the towne or elsewhere.

I meane all this while, that the abode of the owner of the farme is upon his inheritance, and that he have the royaltie and chieftie of the whole, and that he doth withdraw himselfe from home, and secretly returne thither againe, when it shall seeme good unto him, to keepe his people continually in doing of their office and charge. This is the cause why among the rest of his buildings, we have counselled him to provide a backe gate in the end of his inclosure. Let him not go to see the towne, except it be upon his earnest affaires, and let him commit his suites to be followed (which without great losse he cannot let passe and neglect) by some faithful atturney, to whom he shal give nothing but the onely counterpaine of his evidence. And being in the towne let him not goe to see any man therein, except it be in winter, or at such time as when his harvest is in, and his seede time and first arder be dispatcht, to the end, that by one and the same meanes he may attend upon his causes in controversie, and goe about the getting in of his debts.

Men cannot abide to bee roughly intreated.

I wish further that he carie himselfe pleasant and courteous unto his folke, not commanding them any thing in his choler. Boisterous and rough handling wil prevaile as little with men, as with stiffenecked jades. Let him speake familiarly unto them, let him laugh and jest with them sometimes, and also either give them occasion, or else suffer them to laugh and be merrie. For their uncessant paines are somewhat mitigated, when they are vouchsafed some gentle and courteous intreatance of their maister towards them.

Notwithstanding I wish him not to be too familiar with them for the avoiding of contempt. Neither would I have him to acquainte them with his purposes, except it be sometimes to aske their counsell in a matter, and let him not spare sometimes to seeme to doe after their advise, though he had determined the same course before: for they will worke with more cheerfulness, when they thinke that the matter is caried according to their invention. Let him maintaine the cause of his neighbours, and not to arrogate unto himselfe or take any thing upon him as commaunding them, let him also relieve them in their necessities.

And yet let him not lend them except it be some small thing, and such as he had rather loose then aske twise, except it be in their extreme neede and necessitie. Let him patiently and quietly beare their tedious and troublesome natures, whom he knoweth to envie and repine at him, never falling out with them, or giving them ever any just occasion of displeasure: but winking at that which he knoweth of their nature and naturall inclination, let him pleasure them to the uttermost that he can, and seeme to be at one with them, as if he had never understood any thing to move him to the contrarie.

And thus he may purchase peace and rest.

THE OFFICE OF THE FARMER

Husbandmens apparell.

TAKE unto you for your farmer a man of indifferent yeeres, not sickly, but lustie and strong, and of the same countrie and soile that your farme lieth in, if it be possible, and him such a one, as whom you have knowne of long time, or else by the report of honest men have heard of, to be a good man, and his wife also to be a thriftie huswife, and his children well nurtured. Such a one as hath no farme or inheritance neere unto your house, who from his youth hath beene hardly brought up, and well experienced in matters and businesses belonging to husbandrie, or otherwise by meanes of great diligence and good will toward the same, hath attained the mysterie of husbandrie. One who is a sparing and sober minded man, not poore and very needie, a gadder to townes, quareller or haunter of alehouses or tavernes, not suffering any thing to goe backward, or by little and little to come to nothing. One that will use to rise first and goe to bed last, not haunting markets or faires at townes if it be not upon verie urgent necessitie; not admitting of new waies or pathes, and breaches into his groundes, or suffering any incroachment to be made upon the least part of the inheritance belonging to the Farme. For an inch of ground lost in one yeere is worth a foote within two yeeres after. Which will not undertake to lodge any guest if hee bee not the very friend and familiar of the Lord of the soile; which is given to have himselfe & all his family cloathed rather for profite then for pleasure, as namely, to save them onely from the winde, colde, and raine, for which purpose shall serve garments and sleeves made of skins, caps, clokes with hoods or cassockes of canvasse.

For by this meanes there shall be no day so boysterous and cruell, wherein they may not worke abrode; one which will not have any other to his servant, but such as is fit for the busines belonging to the farme, and for the worke and profit of his maister. Not given to play the marchant for himselfe, nor to lay out his maisters money in cattell and other merchandise. For such businesses doe turne away and hinder farmers from