. . . . a little western flower . . . . .

After all the raving and ranting I’ve done recently, not forgetting moaning and whining, perhaps it’s time I turned my attention to gentler topics. How about the humble pansy? Anyone interested? Thought not. See what I can do.

Let’s start with the common European wild pansy, viola tricolour, also known as Johnny-Jump-Up, heart's ease, heart's delight, tickle-my-fancy, Jack-jump-up-and-kiss-me, come-and-cuddle-me, three faces in a hood, or love-in-idleness. And that’s just a few of them in English.

 wild pansy

In German the wild pansy is called, inter alia, Ackerveilchen (viola of the field), Muttergottesschuh (Mother of God’s shoe), Maedchenaugen (maiden's eyes), Schöngesicht (beauteous face) or Liebesgesichtli (Lover’s face).

The English illustrator, Cicely Mary Barker (28 June 1895 – 16 February 1973) was best known for a series of fantasy illustrations depicting fairies and flowers. The wild pansy is one of the flowers used by her in her rather whimsical drawings.
Shakespeare mentions the wild pansy in two of his plays:   In Hamlet, Ophelia, who is mad with grief at the death of her father, rambles on about strewing herbs:  “And there is pansies, that’s for thoughts…” (Act IV, Scene 5.)
And in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Oberon commands Puck to bring him “…a little western flower / Before milk-white, now purple with love’s wound / And maidens call it love-in-idleness.” (Act II, Scene 1.)   It is the effect of this natural aphrodisiac that causes the mayhem and entertainment of the entire play!  You could say that A Midsummer Night’s Dream is woven around the magical properties of heartsease.

Georgia O’Keefe produced a very beautiful painting of a black pansy and followed it up with a depiction of a white one.

Wild pansies were used as herbals, to cure venereal disease for instance, acc. to Culpepper; ditto headaches and dizzy spells. The ancient Greeks used it as a love potion and a symbol of fertility.

The violet has ever been the emblem of constancy. There is a French proverb which goes something like this: “Violet is for faithfulness, which shall in me abide, hoping that in your heart too, it shall not hide”.

The German name for the garden pansy is 'little stepmother’ Stiefmutterchen. There is a very sad tale attached to it:

Stepmother, symbolised by the large lower leaf, only allows her own children
to adorn themselves in colourful array.
Her stepchildren, the upper two leaves of the flower, have to remain in the background, clad in modest colours, or plain white.

Sorrow at the poor treatment his own children receive has turned the pistil, representing the father’s hair, white.

Lastly an explanation for the name in English, which is, as so often, a mispronunciation of a foreign name.

A small bouquet of pansies, given by a lover to his love, was called a pensée, - hence pansy - a thought, symbolising devotion and faithfulness, remembrance, honour, even humility.

But mainly it means: "I am always thinking of you".

In other words, the pansy is an all-round excellent fellow; humble though it is. we should plant many more of them, in spite of their dowdy image with some gardeners. The pansy will brighten any spot and is at home equally in the ground as in any kind of container.

Still reading? Well done. I’ll stop now.

March,

the month of new life, is named after Mars, the Roman God of War. It’s only the fourth day today and already March has lived up to its name and nature, roaring in like a lion. To a gardener like me it seems to be the most provocative and exciting month of the year, full of promise, albeit broken at a moment’s notice. March flirts with the sun, calling you out to admire the many signs of new growth, only to fling pellets of hail at you the moment you put your trust in the brave light. Blizzards, showers of grey, cold rain, followed by the treacherous breath of a soft south westerly breeze which quickly turns into an icy gale bringing renewed snow flurries as soon as you discard your woolly hat.  My longing for an hour in the garden lures me out to prowl among the beds and borders, secateurs at the ready; twenty minutes later I scuttle back to my warm hearth, fingers frozen. Even the most battle-hardened gardener’s enthusiasm is forced to retreat before the eccentricities of the March barometer.

And yet...

the crocuses are out in their early glory. They may be small and unremarkable, but look closely and their simple beauty will astound you. Then there’s the pigeon taking a long, slow look at the huge conifer in the hedge which year after year provides a home for it and its family.
It’s the early bird which takes up residence in good time, ensuring a favourable position on the housing ladder.

And then

there are the glossy leaved periwinkles, evergreen and growing anywhere, in sun and shade, in woodlands or as here, with  roots in the foundations of a brick wall. In a mild winter the periwinkle will give you a few blossoms as early as January.

In France the periwinkle, which is sometimes called ‘the Magician’s Violet’, is considered the emblem of sincere friendship, and as such is much used in their language of flowers. The English have adopted this evergreen plant as the representative of ‘Tender Recollection’. In Italy the country people make garlands of this plant, to place upon the biers of their deceased children, for which reason they name it the ‘Flower of Death’. But in Germany it is the symbol of immortality, and, because its fine glossy myrtle-green leaves flourish all through the winter, they term it ‘Wintergreen’.

From The Language of Flowers 19th Century

Request for some Sporting Advice from my US Blogging Friends ....

please.

I understand you just had one of those annual events which change the history of your nation and put every citizen into a great excitement. I also understand that the following is something like:

“When they meet there is neither comparing of numbers, or matching of men; but a silver ball is cast up and that company which can catch, and carry it by force or sleight to the place assigned, gaineth the ball and victory. The Hurtlers take their next way over hills, dales, hedges, ditches, yea, and through bushes, briars, mires, plashes and river whatsoever: so as you shall sometimes see 20 or 30 lie tugging together in the water, scrambling and scratching for the ball. A play both rude and rough. The ball in this play may be compared to an infernal spirit, for whosoever catcheth it, fareth straighways like  a mad man, struggling and fighting with those that go about to hold him. You shall see them retiring home as from a pitched battle, with bloody pates, bones broken and out of joint, and such bruises as serve to shorten their days; yet all is good play, and never Attorney or Coroner troubled.”


They did that sort of thing in Cornwall at the beginning of the 17th century. There’s nothing new under the sun.

The Last Hurrah

Valley’s End

is showing a last burst of colour before the dark days of winter.

Keep up your spirits with healthy exercise:

Leaping is an exercise very commendable and healthful to the body,

especially if you use it in the morning.

Upon a full stomach and to bedward it is very dangerous, and in no wise to be used.

For the young:

Wrestling is a very good exercise in the beginning of youth, so that it be

with someone who is equal in strength or somewhat under,

and that the place be soft,

that in falling their bodies be not bruised.

But

in football is nothing but beastly fury and extreme violence,

whereof proceedeth hurt,

and consequently

rancour and malice do remain with them that be wounded.

Wherefore it is to be put to perpetual silence!

Treat throat complaints betimes:

Take the old nest of a swallow, with all the substance

(as clay, gravel, sticks and feathers),

do nothing but beat it and sift it through a coarse sieve,

and put thereto grease and honey and make a plaster thereof.

Then stroke it upon a cloth and lay it about his neck:

of this wise have I holpen one in three hours.

The advice comes from the Compleat Gentleman of 1634, The Book Named The Governor of 1531 and The Homish Apothecary of 1561. I cannot guarantee its efficacy. But the pictures are Valley’s End's and the garden’s last (probably) hurrah and make be taken to be truthful and up to date.

Beechnuts

That crackle and crunch underfoot is beech mast.
The big beech is aiming missiles at me from a great height,
and when her aim is true, I feel it.
Ouch!

Once in every five to ten years, they say, can we expect such bounty.
Last year was a good one too, so either they are wrong,
or nature is changing her rhythm.
A hot, dry summer helps.

I have need of a pig.
Could you lend me a pig?
Free of charge to both of us?
I have no acorns but plenty of beechnuts.
But do remember to ring the pig’s nose, I don’t want it rooting up my garden.

There was a time, a long-ago time,
when they gave you a voucher for a litre of oil,
in exchange for six kilos of beechnuts.

Diligence can do it,
they said.
All it takes is three days of back breaking work in the forest.
If you have little ones,
and maybe sing a happy song,
collecting six kilos of beechnuts
is child’s play.

Collect more and keep them to enhance your diet.
You want bread?
Cracked and ground into flour,
beechnuts are very tasty, make excellent bread.
But remember,
oxalic acid is harmful,
so roast these pretty little delicacies first
to avoid bad pain in the gut.
And warn the little ones.

A pig, on the other hand,
enjoys a forest meal, no ill-effects at all.
No need for roasting.
Yet.

Women in Medicine

Mediaeval Illustration

They say you can tell you are getting old when you see policemen getting younger. You know you must be old when your doctor, who is younger than you, retires.  In our time here the head of our country practice has always been a woman, although we also have a much appreciated and very popular male doctor. My lovely female doctor has retired, another female practitioner has taken her place. Even the most old-fashioned and hidebound countryman now accepts these providers of medical care without turning a hair.

From earliest times, women have nursed the sick and cared for newborns and the elderly in their homes. Childbirth was entirely in the hands of trained midwives; but it was not until the 1900s, and after much struggle, that women won the right to study and practice medicine in the same way as men. Even so, this right is still not granted in all parts of the world.

Women have always been central in providing medical care, whether in the home, nursing or acting as herbalists. However, the medical profession has been male dominated for most of its history. In Europe this came about from the 1400s, when many cities and governments decided that only those trained in universities were allowed to formally practise medicine. As women were not allowed into the universities they could not gain a licence.


In my copy of 'The Portable Medieval Reader' I found “The Case Of A Woman Doctor In Paris”. (1322)  A certain Jacoba Felicie was prosecuted by the medical faculty of the University of Paris for practicing without their degree of the Chancellor's license. :

“ . . . . in the inquisition made at the instance of the masters in medicine at  Paris against Jacoba Felicie  and others practising the art of medicine and surgery in Paris and the suburbs without the knowledge and authority of the said masters, to the end that they be punished, and that this practice be forbidden them . . . . . “

The Court produced a whole range of indictments, i.a. that Jacoba visited many sick persons, afflicted with grave illnesses, touching, feeling, holding their pulses,  examining body and limbs, and inspecting their urine.  Not only that but she also said to these sick persons:  "I shall make you well, God willing, if you will have faith in me”, making an agreement concerning the cure with them and receiving money for it."

Many witnesses came forward to testify that Jacoba had indeed healed them whereas, although enduring the care of very many expert masters in the art of medicine, they had not been able at all to recover from the illnesses, although the masters applied as much care and diligence to these as they were able. And the said Jacoba, called afterwards, had cured these sick persons in a short time, by an art which is suitable for accomplishing this.

In their wisdom the medical faculty accepted defeat and Jacoba was allowed to continue to cure the sick. It is a pity that it took the medical profession another 600 years to come to the conclusion that women could do more than wipe a fevered brow.

Rites of Spring

 We knew it had to happen

eventually.

Being a careful sort of gardener,

I won’t risk calling these days ‘spring days’,

but the lenten roses tell me that winter must be over.

Cutting back to the ground the previous year’s leaves reveals the flowers.

They come in many varieties;

my favourites are the pure white and deep purple ones.

I’m debating whether I should be good and lay off the chocolates for lent. Today is Ash Wednesday, the day when every child at school went to the morning’s service to receive a smudge across her forehead - yes, it was a Catholic girls’ school - and promised to be good for lent.

Is this a Fast, to keep the Larder lean and clean
from fat of veals and sheep?

Is it to quit the dish of flesh, yet still to fill
the platter high with fish?

No, ’tis a Fast to dole thy sheaf of wheat and meat
unto the hungry soul

It is to fast from strife, from old debate and hate
to circumcise thy life.

So said Herrick’s Noble Numbers in 1647

I suppose it is a lot easier to be good in spring

when all nature reawakens.

It’s the lack of light which forces me to eat lots of chocolate in winter.

 When I bent down 

I could see and hear a whole swarm of bees in the crocuses.

Where did they all come from so suddenly?

Millie is getting impatient, she’d already

run ahead down the drive but came back

to see what had happened to me.

“Come on, mum.

Are you going to waste this whole gorgeous morning on taking silly flower pictures

or are you taking me for a walk?

And as for taking pictures of laundry blowing in the wind,

you must be as mad as a

Mad March Hare."

“No, Millie, just happy.”

(It’s the first time this year I’ve hung laundry out to dry.

There’s nothing like it.)

Blogallimaufrey

A respite from the rain for most of the day, there was even enough sun to bathe the castle in a warm afternoon glow. Millie and I went out twice, morning and afternoon.  We met Robin up on the castle bailey throwing a ball for Horace, the shaggy whippet who looks as if he’s wearing an Afghan coat. Millie was not amused. She likes Robin well enough and makes a fuss of him, but every time Horace raced past her she growled. Old dog ladies are like that, they feel the need to put these whippersnappers in their place. Robin and I just stood there, mesmerised by the unnatural feeling of sun on our necks. Two adults standing on top of a flat, low hill, watching a pair of mad dogs and stretching out their arm to their full extent, grinning like idiots.

Magnus Manske - Wikimedia Commons

Back home I took a closer look at the garden. There are signs of life everywhere, buds and tiny shoots are appearing and the Daphne Odora Aurea-Marginata - the gold-edged fragrant Daphne - is about to burst into life. It was getting too dusky for a photo, so I filched this one from Wikimedia Commons, but mine is exactly the same. I shall take the camera round the garden at the very next opportunity and see what there is.

With all this rain I’ve spent many hours reading. Good stuff and not so good stuff. One book I can recommend whole-heartedly is Barbara Kingsolver’s ‘Flight Behaviour’.  I could barely put it down.  The main character, Dellarobia Turnbow is beautifully observed, and her development from drudge to a woman with renewed hope is described with sympathy and understanding. Even her rather dreadful family on the rundown farm in the Appalachians is ultimately accorded compassion. But the main theme of the book is climate change. If there is anyone who still doesn’t get it - and I know, there are many - you might do worse than read this novel. But if this should prove too arduous a task, look at the myriad of blogposts from all corners of our planet telling us about the weird weather patterns we are all experiencing.

Flight Behaviour was published in 2012 and is Kingsolver’s seventh novel; it is a New York Times Bestseller, and was declared "Best book of the year" by the Washington Post and USA Today.

Finally, a bit of advice. Yesterday was Saint Apollonia’s day.This aged Christian matron having had her teeth pulled out before her martyrdom, is invoked against toothache. If she can’t help, “take a nail and make the gum bleed with it, then drive it into an oak." The very stout William Neal, who was mad with toothache and ready to shoot himself, was thereby cured.

So says John Aubrey in his Miscellanies of 1695. At least he doesn’t advise us to drive the nail into the gum.

Advent Diary, day 17 - Seasonal Symbols

My crabapple, Red Sentinel,  keeps on giving;

it’s a medium sized deciduous tree with showy pinkish flowers in spring 

and edible fruit in autumn; 

Red Sentinel also has gloriously coloured autumn leaves.

Blackbirds will be glad of the fruits as soon as the weather turns cold

when there’s little else on offer for them.

Mince Pie season officially - traditionally - began yesterday.

Originally rectangular in shape, mince pies were abominated as ‘Popish and superstitious’

by Puritans, and were described thus in 1656:

'Idolatry in Crust! Babylon’s Whore

Defiled with superstition, like the Gentiles

Of Old, that worshipped onions, roots and lentils.'

Later, however, the ‘solid, substantial, Protestant mince pie’

became the champion of the English Christmas against

‘imported foreign kickshaws’.

Ah well, from Evil to Virtue and back was ever just a short distance,

if it suited the prevailing fashion.

Personally, I dislike mince pies; 

they’re too sweet, too sticky, too unimaginative for my palate.

Mistletoe

is sold in outdoor markets everywhere.

Folklore says that it is on no account to be brought indoors until Christmas Eve.

Clearly, nobody told the owners of this barn restaurant.

Most powerful of all against evil is the rare oak-mistletoe, which should be gathered at New Moon without the use of iron, and never allowed to touch the ground; but mistletoe grown on apple trees or the sacred hawthorn is also especially worth having.

Mistletoe is likewise an aphrodisiac and a plant of fertility, hence perhaps the originally Welsh Border custom of kissing beneath mistletoe boughs decked with ribbons, nuts and apples. After each kiss, the lady concerned should pluck a berry and throw it over her left shoulder; and when the berries come to an end, so should the kissing.

There are an awful lot of berries on a bough!

Advent Diary, day 6 - The Feast of St Nicholas

Jan Jiri Heinsch

1647-1712

St. Nicholas giving alms to the poor and needy of his diocese.

All good children in mid-European countries had a lovely surprise today: St Nicholas brought them presents. Children who had been well behaved and never told fibs and never irritated grown-ups and were most unchildlike during the previous year were finally rewarded for their creepiness.

They might have saved themselves the trouble, the naughty ones had presents too, of course. They just promised to be good in future.

Jane Collier in her The Art of Ingeniously Tormenting (1753) had a splendid use for real pests:

‘There is no better use of having your children noisy and troublesome, than this of plaguing all your acquaintance. For you may suffer them, when you have visitors, to make such a racket that you cannot hear one another speak. Let them also, with their greasy fingers, soil and besmear your visitors’ clothes; put their fingers and dirty noses into the cream pot, and dribble over the sugar............... in short, be more troublesome and offensive than squirrels, parrots or monkeys.

Fair enough; but wouldn’t it have been easier not to invite visitors in the first place?

Whoooooo

that was scary!

Just at the mirk and midnight hour

The Fair Folk will ride

They that would their true love win

At Miles Cross they must bide.

The Ballad of Tam Lin

Last night was the best night of the year to divine the identity of your future husband or wife. If you missed it this year, here’s what you do next Halloween:

Take a candle and go alone to a mirror in a darkened room; eat an apple while looking into it, combing your hair all the while, and the face of your lover - or of the Devil - will appear over your shoulder.

Do try and remember, I won’t remind you again.

Millie’s First Birthday

 A year of life with 'smelly Millie with the Ears' already?

 Twelve months gone? Never! 

Throughout the year I said things like: 

”Millie’s first spring with us”,  

"Millie’s first summer in the garden with free-anytime-access-to-the-river”, 

Millie’s first time of this or that,

as any fond parent with a new baby would do.

She has taken over house and garden and much of the castle grounds,

like any self-respecting dog does, who knows what a personage of her importance is owed.

She’s still overweight,

still has those ridiculous ears,

and still thinks that anyone she meets is in need of a thorough Millie cuddle.

She has calmed down somewhat; 

although she enjoys her walks,

she is just as keen on fossicking around in the tall grass of the castle meadow,

spending hours with her nose deep in 

 the soft underbelly of tussocks and damp hollows.

She is a darling,

and we’ve never, not once, not for a second,

regretted giving her a home when she became surplus to requirements

in her previous life.

And right at this moment she is a very useful dog to have around, because:-

I believe all over England a Spayed Bitch is accounted wholesome in a House; that is to say, they have a strong belief that it keeps away evil from haunting of a House.....at Cranborn in Dorset about 1686, a Home was haunted and two Tenants successively went away for that reason; a third came and brought his Spayed Bitch, and was never troubled.

So said John Aubrey in his  Remains of Gentilism of 1688, and he should know. Besides, what with Halloween coming  . . . . . .

St Luke’s Summer

Now is the tolling time

Between the falling and the buried leaf;

A solitary bell

Saddens the soft air with the last knell of summer.

Gone is the swallow’s flight, the curving sheaf;

The plums are bruised that hung from a bent bough,

Wasp-plundered apples in the dew-drenched grass

Lie rotting now.

Doomed with the rest, the daggered hawthorn bleeds

Bright crimson beads

For the birds’ feast.

Gone are the clusters of ripe cherries,

Tart crabs and damsons where a bullfinch tarried,

Only the camp-fire coloured rowan berries

Blaze on.

Now is the time of slow, mist-hindered dawns,

Of sun that stains

Weeds tarnished early in the chilling rains,

Of coarse-cut stubble fields

Where starlings gather, busy with the scant grain,

And with hoarse chattering proclaim

The spent season.

Now are the last days of warm sun

That fires rusted bracken on the hill;

And mellows the deserted trees

Where the last leaves cling, sapless, shrunk, and yellow.

A robin finds some warm October bough

Recapturing his song

Of Aprils gone,

And tardy blackbirds in the late-green larch

Remember March.

Phoebe Hesketh 

St Luke’s-tide lovers exchange tokens and set the wedding date.

It was anciently very customary  . . . .to break a piece of Gold or Silver in token of a verbal contract of marriage and promises of love; one half whereof was kept by the woman, while the other part remained with the man.

Brand Popular Antiquities 1813

(Not) Coming Clean and Making Jelly

Having two gardeners is not necessarily a good thing. Although No. 2, Paul, knows that he is employed to take the weight off No.1 Gardener’s shoulders, No.1 has no official idea. He came last week for his usual day and noticed that various jobs had been done. When he said, all innocently: "somebody has cleared the overhang on the path to the lane and filled a compost bin”, I agreed with a throwaway remark, implying that I had done it myself. “Yes, we had some good days for work last week.”

“Yeeeees,” he said. Feeling uncomfortable I asked No. 1 to tackle the same path and dig out grass and weeds from between the stones.  He made an excellent job of it. “Right,” he said, “ now it looks like somebody lives here.”

Apart from a permanent guilt feeling, having two gardeners, albeit temporarily, also means that I have to work twice as hard myself. Not for me the detached supervisory role; it’s “would you please . . . . “ and “if you don’t mind, could you help me with . . . . . .” round here. I come from a family who did for themselves, so when either gardener works, so do I. The same hours, although maybe not quite as hard, leaving me exhausted twice as often.  I have a small garden, no more than 1/3 of an acre, there won’t be enough work for three of us soon. However, in winter most outdoor work stops and No. 1 won’t want to come anyway.

I’ve picked the Japanese quinces for jelly-making; they’re totally inedible raw but a lot of work, time and trouble turns them into a delectable golden jelly to accompany winter roast meats. I am sure you could buy quince jelly, but where’s the fun in that?


Markham, in the English Husbandman of 1635 says:

Now for quinces, they are a fruit which by no means you may place near any other kind of fruit, because their scent is so strong and piercing, that it will enter into any fruit and clean take away his natural relish. The time of their gathering is ever in October; and the meetest place to lie them in is where they may have most air and lie dry (for wet they can by no means endure); also they must not lie close, because the smell of them is both strong and unwholesome.”

Strong? yes. Unwholesome? No.

Epic Journeys

The time has come for swallows, martins and swifts to leave the UK and embark on their epic migration to South Africa, so make the most of the last few in the skies. 

A final preen . . .

Swallows indicate the end of the summer when they depart for warmer climes and that is where our swallows are currently headed.  They undertake an impressive 6000 mile migration between the UK and South Africa twice a year in search of food. They nest in the UK in the summer, but as they only feed on aerial insects (the majority of which are large flies, such as horseflies and bluebottles), their food source starts to run out in the autumn.

Faced with the prospect of little or no food, they start to head south during September and October. 

It’s no walk in the park for these tiny birds as their extreme migration takes them south through Europe and across the Sahara desert.

They cover approximately 200 miles a day, generally at about 20mph – the maximum flight speed recorded was a whopping 35mph. 

During their epic journey, swallows easily fall prey to starvation, exhaustion and extreme weather conditions, not to mention being trapped and killed in Southern Europe, the Middle East and North Africa in their hundreds of thousands during the migratory period.  (The July issue of National Geographic covers the slaughter of birds in detail - don’t go there if you are at all squeamish)

 . . .  are we ready . . . 

. . . let’s go.

See you on the other side of the world.

The disappearance of swallows and other migrants in the autumn was for long a great mystery. Some firmly believed that they hibernated at the bottom of lakes or ponds, and others that they hid and remained torpid until spring.

“In the Northern waters, fishermen often draw up in their nets an abundance of swallows, hanging together like a conglomerated mass. In the beginning of Autumn, they assemble themselves together in the reeds by ponds, where, allowing themselves to sink into the water, they join bill to bill, wing to wing and foot to foot.”

Olaus Magnus, History of the Northern Nations, 1550

But in 1776, in the Naturalist’s Journal, Gilbert White asked:

“But if hirundines (swallows) hide in rocks and caverns, how do they, while torpid, avoid being eaten by weasels and other vermin?"

“How much blood is there?"

Beloved had another BCC*  removed this week.

Gardener, Beloved and I are having a tea break, not one of us is feeling very active and a tea break is a good excuse to down tools.

"Bleeding a bit.”

"You take thinners do you?”  Gardener thinks that’s funny and cackles. So, they got the scalper out, did they? Yeah, it’s bleeding alright. They ought to have cauterized it".

"They did. Nasty smell, burning me.”

“I don’t hold with doctors much.” That’s rich, coming from a man who had a heart attack a couple of years ago, was taken to hospital by air ambulance and was given a stent within hours of arriving there.“You see some bloody doctor and he don’t know what he’s talking about. That’s all I see nowadays; all them locums, waiting, waiting. It’s a bloody pain, going there.”

We suggest that he changes surgeries, goes to one a bit nearer home.

“The missis keeps saying her might be putting the house on the market; I don’t know if it’s worth it. They’re gonna build new houses round us, two-three bedroom houses all down to the road. we’ll be shut in the middle then. And who’re they building them for? Bloody layabouts from bloody Telford. And we’ll be paying the poll tax for them.” 

“Layabouts from Telford can’t afford to buy two-three bedroom houses?” My remark makes Gardener snort in disgust.

“They won’t be buying them, they'll be renting them and we’ll be paying the rent. And the poll tax. That’s what it’ll be for. Bloody overflow from Telford.”

Common sense won’t get us anywhere with Gardener. It’s decades since the poll tax was abandoned. And the new estates are for sale, not rent. Beloved goes into generalities about building houses and we change conversational tack.

“What on earth have you got your left hand in the sling for?” It’s his right arm which had the operation.

“Just to put it somewhere."

"He’ll have his foot in there next”, says Gardener.

A dog is yapping in the distance.

"Ours does that. Her’s in the window and every time her sees a dog in the field her shoots through the conservatory and rushes out to the fence for when they come back. Her never misses anybody. Her’s got her bloody eye on whoever's gonna come down there and her’s out.  Her sits by my side like on the settee, and off her goes. Her wants to join them. But you cannot trust her.” You can hear the regret in  Gardener’s voice. His dog is a maniac, a tiny little mongrel with the heart of a lion and totally untrained.

That’s the end of that topic. Gardener looks round for something else to comment on.

“I see we got some nuts on the walnut. They won’t come to anything, you need a proper walnut for that.” 

I don’t know what’s improper about our walnut tree, it looks  quite respectable to me.

“They come from some other country.” Beloved seems to agree with gardener about our tree being incapable of producing edible nuts.

“Mind, we always had hazelnuts. Hazelnuts, they’re alright. Gardener starts a story about his childhood, I’ve been waiting for him to do that.

"Dad used to come out with us,  on a Sunday morning. He had a big hook he did, and he used to shake the bloody thing like and we’d be picking them all up. He  used to shake the tree really hard and we’d get hit on the bloody head with the nuts. It’s something dad always did with us. He always seemed to know when they was ready. Big nuts they were.

Then he’d put them in the big milk tins like, from the NHS like you used to get milk powder in. Dad put them all in the tins and put some salt on top and dig holes in the garden and put the tins in. We had them for Christmas. Dad always knew where he put them but we never did.” Gardener chuckles affectionately.

It’s time we went back to work.



*BCC: basal cell carcinoma, an operable skin cancer.

Golden Potatoes

photo Agustin Berocal

Tess Kincaid’s Magpie 177

In the days when people undertook long journeys overland on foot a goldsmith and a tailor were travelling together.  One evening they had reached the edge of a wood when they heard music and laughter. They decided that such jolly sounds meant jolly company, so they entered the wood and soon came upon a group of little people, dancing and singing in a clearing, by the light of the harvests moon.

The two travellers stood full of astonishment, watching the dance. The tallest of the little people, an old man, who whirled and stomped the hardest, beckoned them to join in. The goldsmith, brave as only a hunchback can be, jumped at the chance whereas the tailor held back at first, but when he saw how merrily all was going he plucked up the courage to step into the circle.

The travellers sang and danced and leaped about, all fear having vanished. Then the old man drew a large knife from his belt, whetted it and jumped upon them. Instantly terrified the pair crouched and cringed but from within the circle of little people there was no escape. The old man seized the goldsmith and with the greatest speed shaved the hair off his head and then did the same to the tailor. The little people laughed and slapped the travellers on the back, as if to say how brave they had been and what good sports. The old man laughed the hardest and then pointed to a heap of potatoes to one side and urged the travellers to stuff their pockets with them.

Not knowing what to make of it the travellers did and then continued on their journey. They found a poor inn where they spent the night on straw pallets, covering themselves with their coats. Waking up hungry in the morning a baked potato seemed a good idea. They went to the fireplace and were just about to put a potato each into the ashes when they noticed a golden glow: the potatoes had turned to nuggets of pure gold!  They had become rich beyond their wildest dreams. Happily, too, the hair on their heads was there again, thick as ever.

The tailor wept tears of joy but the goldsmith, being a greedy man, instantly wanted more. He belaboured the tailor to go back with him when night fell and bring back still greater treasure from the old man with the knife. The tailor refused. He stayed at the inn and promised to wait for the goldsmith to return from the wood.

In the evening the goldsmith hung a couple of bags over his shoulders so that he could stow away a great deal and took to the road they had travelled the day before. He found the little folks at their singing and dancing, and the old man again shaved him clean and signed to him to take some potatoes away with him. He was not slow about stuffing as much into his bags as would go, came back to the inn quite delighted and covered himself with his coat. He fell asleep with the sweet anticipation of waking an enormously rich man.

O the folly of greed! The potatoes in his bags remained potatoes and what’s more, the previous night’s gold had turned back into nothing more than wholesome, earthy tubers. The goldsmith wept bitter tears, and his wailing became even louder when he rubbed his head and found himself as bald as a coot. 

The good tailor felt sorry for him. He comforted the goldsmith who was as contrite as any poor sinner facing up to the error of his ways and promised to share his own wealth with him. He kept his word and the two of them continued on their journey, steering well clear of singing and dancing and all such temptation they might later come to regret.

(With a nod and a wink in the direction of the Brothers Grimm, two old men who might well have told a morality tale along similar lines)

The Extraordinary Dandelion

"Has there ever been a year for dandelions like this year?”
Standing in the kitchen, after his walk with the dog, he looks wistful, undecided.

Gathering and preparing dandelions for wine-making is labour-intensive;
dandelion heads must be plucked when in full bloom,
preferably late in the morning or early in the afternoon,
and always on a dry and sunny day.
Leave it too late and the flowers will be half-closed and difficult to handle.
Make sure that every trace of stem is removed,
and also remove as many as possible of the green sepals that enclose the yellow petals.
If you don’t, your wine will be bitter.
Kitchen scissors are the tool of choice.

He has decided, he will make dandelion wine,
the first in many years.

Be warned, however.
A strong bladder and digestive system are essential if you want to come away unscathed.
The dandelion’s other names are:

Jack-piss-the-bed,
Pissy beds,
Pittley beds,
Tiddle-beds,
Wet-the-bed,
Dog’s posy,
Old man’s clock,
Peasant’s clock,
Swine’s snout,

the seeds are known as:

Fairies,
Parachutes,
Sugar eaters.

 

Dandelions mean carpets of golden-yellow flowers, jagged green leaves (the dent de lion - lion’s tooth) and clouds of featherweight seeds blowing in the wind. Albrecht Duerer saw the appeal even of the closed and withering flower-heads and included them in his extraordinary close-up portrait, painted in 1503, of a square foot of meadowland, "Das Grosse Rasenstueck". Shakespeare included the plant in the elegy in Cymbeline : “Golden girls and lads all must / As chimney sweepers come to dust.” Keats imagined “The soft rustle of a maiden’s gown/ Fanning away the dandelion’s down.”

Children still blow dandelion down from the round dandelion clocks - the ‘chimney sweepers’ - to ‘tell the time’. The number of blows needed to remove all the seeds gives the hour. if you can catch one on the wing. you can make a wish.

Lastly, dandelions appear more and more on menus; the traditional French dish Pissenlit au Lard has fried bacon scraps (lardons) and croutons served on a bed of dandelion salad; dandelion leaves can be found in ordinary pub salads. There’s dandelion pasta,  pickled dandelions, and stir-fried dandelion.

In spite of all the above I have spent a good part of today’s gardening gouging out dandelions in my flower beds. Lesser celandine and dandelions are this gardener’s greatest enemies, no matter how highly tradition values them.



Tess Kincaid used Jamie Wyeth’s image
`’Lighthouse Dandelions” for her prompt
MAG 169.

This post is loosely connected.

Candlemas

Giovanni Bellini, 1460-1464, Galleria Querini Stampalia, Venice

February has been the month of purification since Roman times;  Februalia was the Roman festival of ritual purification . The festival, which is basically one of Spring washing or cleaning (associated also with the raininess of this time of year) is old, and possibly of Sabine origin. According to Ovid, Februare as a Latin word which refers to means of purification derives from an earlier Etruscan word referring to purging.

The Roman month Februarius ("of Februa," whence the English February) is named for the Februa/Februatio festival.  (Excerpts from Wikipedia)

February was also the month when the housewife traditionally started her ‘spring cleaning’ of home and hearth;  the days lengthened and showed up dust and grime which remained invisible during the dark months. German folk wisdom  claims that: come New Year the day has grown by a rooster’s step, at Three Kings (Epiphany) by the leap of a deer and a whole hour by Candlemas. 

On the 2nd of February the Catholic church celebrates ‘St Mary’s Feast of the Candles’, officially the Feast of the Purification and the Presentation of Christ in the Temple.  The aged Simeon prophesied that Jesus would be ‘a light to lighten the Gentiles’; on this day, therefore, lights and candles are blessed at a candle lit service. There are records which show that the custom of blessing the year’s supply of candles was already in existence in the tenth century in the area of the Lower Rhine. A normally dark church was transformed into a sea of light, surely an awe inspiring sight for the peasants of the time. After the service the candles were carried around the church in procession; great care was taken that the flames remained alight, because that meant the year would be a good one for bees.

Sacred and household candles were blessed alike; the beekeeper took his burning candle to his hives to thank the bees for providing him with the necessary wax and ask them for a good harvest of honey for the coming year;  the husband, as head of the household, took his candle and dribbled three drops, in the shape of a triangle, into the clothes of each member of the household, making the sign of the cross. This was to protect them from all evil, particularly witchcraft and magic. Another custom was for the father to dribble three drops on to a piece of bread, which he would give his children to eat and show to the animals in the stables.

The candlemas candle continued to be of great importance throughout the year; it was lit whenever danger to life and limb, the home, animals and property threatened. It was lit at the birth of new life and at the end of a life, both of which were natural events happening within the family home in those days.

Candlemas, like many saints' days, also provided the countryman with weather adages; farmers and shepherds preferred the day to be cold and rough:

If Candlemas Day bring snow and rain

Winter is gone, and won’t come again.

If Candlemas Day be clear and bright

Winter will have another flight.

Around 1700 a shepherd on the Lower Rhine was said to watch the weather on Candlemas morning with particular attention;  a proverb said that he’d rather see the wolf than the sun in the sheep pen. 

At least as early as the 1840s, German immigrants in Pennsylvania had introduced the tradition of weather prediction that was associated with the hedgehog (der Igel) in their homeland. Since there were no hedgehogs in the region, the Pennsylvania Germans adopted the indigenous woodchuck (a name derived from an Indian word), aka the groundhog. The town of Punxsutawney, some 80 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, has played up the custom over the years and managed to turn itself into the center of the annual Groundhog Day, particularly after the 1993 movie starring Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell. Each year, people gather to see if a groundhog dubbed "Punxsutawney Phil" will see his shadow after he emerges from his burrow. If he does, the tradition says there will be six more weeks of winter. (Phil has a rather dismal 39% rate of accuracy for his predictions.)