The sheep were sold by auction, and when I had bought a pen of 100, generally from Lord Ashburton's flock, paid the auctioneer's clerk as soon as possible and received a ticket permitting the release of the sheep, as the roads in all directions are soon crowded, I induced the shepherd to help in driving them to the railway-station. He was always a dear old fellow, and full of interesting information. On reaching the station we packed the sheep into three open trucks, so close that they could not jump out, and despatched them to Worcestershire, whither they would arrive about noon the following day. We never had a mishap with them on the journey, but they were terribly thirsty on reaching Aldington, and made straight for water immediately.
Old Tricker came to Worcestershire originally with a farmer who migrated from Suffolk, which proves him to have been a valuable man. But he was worn out even when he first came to work for me, though as willing and industrious as ever. My bailiff often praised him—for his work was excellent, if somewhat slow on account of his age—and used to tell him that "All as be the matter with you, Tricker, is that you was born too soon," which was only too true, for he must have been the oldest man on the farm by at least twenty years. He was a steady worker, and was often so absorbed in his job, such as hoeing, that, being, moreover, somewhat deaf, he was not aware of my approach until I was quite close. On such occasions, with a violent start, he always said: "My word, how you did frighten I, to be sure! Shows I don't look about me much, however, don't it?"
He was fond of fairs, wakes, and "mops"—no doubt they were reminiscent of old days, for he lived in the past—and he would often beg a day off for such outings; he was a subject for the chaff of the other men for his gaiety when these jaunts took place. They pretended that, as a widower for many years, it was time for him to think of another courtship. On a festive occasion, when we were giving a dinner to all the men and their wives, great amusement was caused by crackers, which the guests, I think, had never seen before, containing paper caps and imitation jewellery; and it was a merry scene when all around the tables were decorated in the most incongruous fashion. Old Tricker happened to become possessed of a plain gilt wedding-ring, and of course chaff was levelled at him from all sides: "Ah, Tricker; sly dog, sly dog!" and so on. He was greatly pleased, accepting good-naturedly the part of pantaloon of the piece; and I am sure, from his beaming smiles, he felt, for a time at least, dozens of years younger.
Years before, when still able to do a good day's work, he walked to Ipswich to revisit his old home, a distance of about 160 miles, which he accomplished in four days, and returned in the same time. He had been specially struck by the building of a new post-office there—this must have been at least thirty years before the time of which I am writing. One of my brothers who lived near Ipswich was visiting me, and I introduced him to the old man, knowing that they would have common interests. No sooner did Tricker hear that my brother had just come from Ipswich than he inquired anxiously if the new post-office was finished. "Oh yes, and pulled down some years ago, and a new one built!" Tricker was astonished; the years had evidently slipped by him unnoticed, and no record of dates remained in his memory.
Tricker often got a little mixed in the names of novelties or in unusual words. I chanced to pass him one day along the road, on my omnicycle, and next time I saw him he referred to it, adding: "I didn't know as you'd got a phlorsopher (velocipede and philosopher)"! Some of my land had been occupied by the Romans in very distant days, and coins and pottery were frequently found. Tricker, having heard of the Romans, also of Roman Catholics, jumbled them together, and "reckoned" that the former inhabitants of these fields were "some of those old Romans or Cartholics."
This mixture of words, generally bearing some relation to each other, was not infrequently carried still further by making one word of two. With some of the villagers "conservatory" stood for conservative and tory, and "containment" for concert and entertainment. A messenger who was asked to bring Daniel Deronda from the Evesham library returned with the announcement that "Dannel Deronomy" was not available; this appeared to be a confusion between the books of Daniel and Deuteronomy. A cook (not a Worcestershire person) was asked if the papers had come. "Yes; the Standard has arrived, but not the Condy's fluid (Connoisseur) "! The regatta at Evesham was always "the regretta." An old sexton working in a churchyard, from whom I inquired if there was a bridge over the river, replied: "Only a temperance bridge (temporary bridge)."
Tricker, as a very typical representative of the agricultural labourer in old age, was engaged as model for a figure in a picture by Mr. Chevalier Taylor, then staying in Badsey. He sat in this capacity when work was not very pressing, and day by day used to repair to the artist's lodgings with his tools on his shoulder. His remuneration was half a crown a day—ordinary day wages for an able-bodied man—but he told me that the inaction was very trying, and that a day as model was much more exacting than a day's work on the farm.
When the old man could no longer complete even a short day's work, and suffered from the cold in winter, he decided to go to the workhouse for a time, but he was out again before the cuckoo was singing, and we found him light jobs "by the piece," so that he could work for as long or as short a time as suited him. He was most grateful for any assistance, and told me that "A little help is worth a deal of sympathy." Eventually he became a permanent inmate of the workhouse, much to my grief; but it is, of course, impossible to run a farm on which heavy poor-rate has to be paid, as a philanthropic institution. The difficulty with aged and infirm persons is not so much food and maintenance as the necessity for nursing and supervision, which are expensive and difficult to arrange. Tricker told me that he could live on sixpence a day, and if it had been a question of food only, and our village could have cut itself adrift from the Union and the rates it entailed, we could easily have more than kept the poor old man to the end of his days in comfort. For years he was the only parishioner receiving any help from the immense sum the parish annually paid in rates. I have heard it said that out of every shilling of the ratepayer's contributions the poor people only get twopence or its equivalent, the officials and administration expenses absorbing the remaining tenpence.
My first gardener had been employed at the Manor, when I came, for very many years, and at the end of ten more he was obliged to resign through old age. He had planted the poplars round the mill-pond in his earliest days, and, among other trees, the beautiful weeping wych-elm on the lawn behind the house. The weeping effect he produced by beheading the tree when quite small and grafting it with a slip of the weeping variety, and the junction was still plainly visible. It was a symmetrical and, especially when in bloom, a lovely tree, but as the blossoms died and scattered themselves all over the grass, they worried the methodical old man, and every spring he wished it had never been planted. It had flourished amazingly, and we could comfortably find sitting room at tea for sixty or seventy people at a garden-party in its shade.
He was an excellent gardener, but did not care about novelties in flowers, though at one time he made a hobby of raising new kinds of potatoes. His greatest success was the original Ashleaf variety, the stock of which he sold to Mr. Myatt for a guinea, and which was afterwards introduced to the public as "Myatt's Early Ashleaf." It was one of the best potatoes ever grown, very early, and splendid in quality, and it was unfortunate that he parted with it so cheaply, though, of course, the purchaser of the first few tubers had no idea of its immense potential value, and possibly, like so many novelties, it might have proved a failure. It is still in cultivation, though its constitution is impaired, like that of all potatoes of long standing. Later on I shall have more to say about this unfortunate tendency to deterioration.