by Ashly Graham
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Somewhere in England, at the foot of the South Downs in the county of Sussex, is a village where the Aristotles live. The Wind says that the Aristotles have occupied this place since before even Father Time was born. They are ageless, therefore, and for all anyone knows the Aristotles shall live for ever.
Now, no one has ever met or spoken to an Aristotle; so the stories that follow are those told by the Wind, who is the only one who knows where this Aristotle village is. Ever since Time was old enough to count the hours, he’s been trying to find it, and he has been in every village in the county each day of his life. As often as Father Time has asked the Wind, and as much as he has heard about the Aristotles from him, the Wind has always refused to divulge the location, to the point where Time often thought that it doesn’t exist.
He tried again as recently as today, and met with the same response: very courteously the Wind said that it’s none of his business.
Timeless place, or place out of time, that village may be; but it has never been a place that Time forgot, and he shall be talking about it until the end of the world.
Aristotles look like sheep...or clouds. They are no ordinary sheep or clouds, however, for they can do many things that neither sheep nor clouds can, such as sailing in the sky in the opposite direction to the Wind. However much they eat—and that’s a subject unto itself which you’ll hear a lot more about—they remain lighter than air, and can float in the firmament just as real clouds do.
It’s not that the Aristotles delight in contrarian behaviour, the Wind says, and he is not in the least offended. Although Aristotles do things in their own way as the mood takes them, they are the most civil, gentle, and obliging of beings.
When you look up into the sky in summer and see the biggest clouds resembling powder puffs: those are Aristotles drifting along in one direction, or another, or a number of directions, just as they used to aeons ago when there was nothing more important to keep them busy, other than living their lives as they are accustomed to doing. The Wind is happy to blow them along, or not, because it doesn’t require any greater effort on his part than usual as he spreads the seeds and pollen of the trees and flowers about, and lowers the temperature when it gets too hot, and ushers in the rain to swell the grain in the fields so that it can ripen in the sun.
The Aristotles, as much as they love the land and the village where they live, often spend the whole day in the air, except for when they come down for their very frequent meals, and for the night. They are very content up there basking in the sunlight, as you might expect, for who wouldn’t be?
Unlike the sheep you saw as a child doing nothing but nibble grass and chew the cud, the Aristotles are unruminative creatures who have a great sense of fun, and like to enjoy themselves. They keep their wool immaculately trimmed, and take any special occasion as an excuse to dye it a variety of colours, and put on the rainbow scarves they make at knitting parties, and at their firesides in the evenings. Although Aristotles don’t have to wash, they take frequent bubble baths in tubs set outside, which the Rain fills with water; and the Wind dries them off afterwards.
Aristotles are passionate about shopping and collecting things, and they love all sorts of utensils, as well as those odds and ends generally referred to as bibelots, bric-à-brac, curios, and knick-knacks. Tea caddies and tea strainers, and toast racks and brass toasting forks, for example, they can never have too many of those. They like fountain pens, and dip and drawing pens with different-shaped nibs, and propelling pencils, whether in working condition or not; inkpots of silver and brass and painted clay; leather bookmarks and paperweights; seals and sticks of sealing wax, letter openers and holders, and ornamental paper scissors—all of which are surprising, because Aristotles have no need to write letters: they see each other every day; and there are no books to read, because everything there is to know already surrounds them.
Cowrie and conch shells, dried sea horses, and brooches made of duck feathers carved out of wood; signet rings; enamel and marquetry inlaid boxes for putting odds and ends in; glass hand-coolers and hatpins; trout and salmon flies, and quill and cork fishing floats…though they do not fish; briar and meerschaum pipes, and tobacco jars and snuffboxes...though they do not smoke or take snuff; walking-sticks with carved heads made from horn and ivory; candlesticks, picture-frames, needlepoint tapestries and samplers, semi-precious stones, beach pebbles, and pressed flowers...
…these are only a few examples of the items to be found amongst the furnishings of an Aristotle home.
At the General Store, which is the only shop in the Aristotles’ village other than the Bakehouse and the Tea Shoppe, they trade their surplus wool for thistle toothbrushes for their long teeth, which have a tendency to yellow unless they are cleaned with chalk powder four times a day; mouthwash, bubble-bath liquid, and wool dye; combs and curlers to untangle their wool and set it; files and varnish for their hooves; and ribbons, and floppy-brimmed sun hats.
Also available from the store are boxes of high quality large-leaf tea, for the Aristotles are very particular and discriminating in selecting their infusions, and cocoa for their bedtime drink.
Because they are so domestic in their habits, and grind the flour and churn the butter themselves for their bread and cakes, the shop also stocks kitchen equipment: earthenware mixing bowls, baking sheets, measuring cups, jelly moulds, ladles, whisks, spatulas, and spoons.
Of clothes there are none, for the Aristotles’ fleeces and the natural lanolin that they contain keep them warm and waterproof, so that they have no need of the pullovers, overcoats, raincoats, jackets, and mufflers, that clutter up most people’s wardrobes and cupboards. All that the Aristotles need to maintain their dress are topiary shears, for a cool and lighter look in the long summer months.
The Aristotle language is primaeval, as many times removed from the Anglo-Saxon tongue as Old English is to yours. It changes from day to day, depending on how the Aristotles feel when they get up in the morning, and what the weather is doing. Because it is formed from the sounds of their environment, the Aristotles speak the same way that the grass and flowers and trees do; and the waters that issue from the hillside spring, which never dries up but bubbles out of the rock at one end of the village, and runs in a stream alongside the Street to keep it and those who walk along it company with its purling.
Although the Aristotles’ language might therefore be said to be simple and natural enough...it’s not, and only the Wind and the Rain understand it.
To illustrate how difficult the Aristotles’ speech is, consider the words that they taught the shepherd, for him to use when counting, or “telling”, his own, ordinary, sheep to make sure none of them has strayed. These are the only words that the shepherd needs to know.
Up to ten, the numbers go: Yan, tan, tethera, pethera, pimp, sethera, lethera, hovera, covera, dik. Instead of fifteen the shepherd says “bumfit”; and at twenty, “figgit”, often followed by “Bother!”, because he can’t remember what comes next. And since ‘bother’ isn’t a number, he has to start again at the beginning.
On the North Downs, the shepherd has a brother who uses another version, because the dialect there is different. He still starts with ‘yan’ and ‘tan’; but then goes: “Tether, mether, pip, azer, sezer, akker, conter, dick, yanadick, tanadick, tetheradick, metheradick, bumfit”—fifteen, there it is again—“Yanabum, tanabum, tetherabum, metherabum”, and “jiggit” instead of “figgit”.
Having got to twenty, the shepherd picks up a pebble and repeats the same words; at thirty he bends over for another pebble, and at forty another; and so on until every sheep has been counted, and his pockets as well as his hands are full, because in days of yore flocks were much larger than in more recent times.
Occasionally the farmer passes by, and as a joke calls out, “Mathawoot!” and “Yahawoot!”. ‘Mathawoot’ and ‘Yahawoot’ are old words that are spoken to oxen when they are ploughing, meaning “Come hithe
r” and “Go thither”, and they are the only two words an ox needs to know. Unfortunately the sheep don’t understand either of them, but take them as an instruction to disperse all over the downs and coombs, or “bottoms” as the hills and dales and hollows on the downs are called.
This means that the shepherd has to round them up again; which if it weren’t for his dog he wouldn’t be able to do. Though none of the sheep has ever gone missing, the farmer’s little joke at the shepherd’s expense is always lost upon him.
Down south, some of the shepherds tell their sheep in twos, as follows: “One-erum, two-erum, cockerum, shu-erum, shitherum, shatherum, wine-berry, wagtail, tarrydiddle, den.” “Den”, if you’ve been counting correctly, therefore equals twenty sheep.
It was from this system that people got the idea of “telling” sheep when they’re having difficulty falling asleep.
But Retournons à nos moutons, or “Let’s get back to our sheep”, as the French say when, in Pierre Pathelin’s words, they want to return to the subject.
The Aristotles built their village under the downs, because it was the nicest place in the world—so they say, though I don’t think they looked very far, if at all—and they gave it a name that even to the Wind’s ears, and he is tone deaf, sounded strange. So I just call it the Village. Everyone the Aristotles know gets lost on the way there, because the drovers’ track that leads to it goes round in circles, as if it is in no hurry to arrive; which, since the Aristotles never have cause to travel anywhere and come back, it isn’t.
The reason for the circumferential character of the road, though it barely deserves the title of thoroughfare, is that the Aristotles constructed it themselves, and very slowly. Rome wasn’t built in a day, as the expression is, admittedly; but if the Aristotles had been in charge of the project the emperors would have lived in tents instead of palaces.
The Aristotles didn’t make so many loops and bends in the road because they wish to discourage visitors, for they are a sociable and welcome company. But it is natural for them to move in circles, like the road…or as they call it, “in a peripheral manner”, when they are on the ground. Except, that is, when they are making a beeline to their breakfast-, lunch-, tea- or dinner-tables, of which each family has a separate one for each meal. All are round, and each person moves one place to the right each day, on the Aristotelian theory that this ensures even wear and tear—even though each seat is always filled.
When the road arrives at the Village, after coyly going around several bends, it becomes The Street. It is called the Street because there’s no other paved means of ingress and egress to confuse it with.
Along the bottom of the downs on either side of the Aristotles’ village are dense beech woods. Above these woods is a steep escarpment, covered in springy turf, which rises to the top of a line of high but soft and rolling hills. The short grass is emerald green in colour, like baize, interspersed with dashes of colour from violets, cowslips, and harebells; field poppy, red clover, wind eyebright, and sapphire-blue round-headed rampion—known as “the Pride of Sussex”; knapweed, yellow rattle, campion, and vetch; scabious, wild thyme, and bird’s foot trefoil; and Spotted, Pyramid, Fragrant, and Early Purple orchids.
Because common or field sheep aren’t as nimble as Aristotles over rough ground, and as fleet of foot, there’s a track called a bostal cut in the escarpment, for the shepherd to drive his flock up to the grazing during the day, and down in the evenings to the folds.
“Downs” is the meaning of the Aristotle word for hills. It might seem like an inappropriate name for a geological formation that goes upwards. But the Aristotles think of the Downs as downs because their word for Up, when it entails moving in that direction on foot as opposed to floating like a cloud, is the same as that for Exercise...which is a word signifying anything that is to be avoided, owing to the importance of not missing the next meal at home.
When a young Aristotle is told to tidy up his room, he may stamp his foot and say, “I won’t! That’s exercise, and it’s nearly time for lunch!” But his parents tell him to do it anyway, or there will be no lunch; which there always is.
The Aristotles find that single syllable, Up, fatiguing to utter in its connotation of effort; as tiring as its opposite, Down, is pleasant and refreshing. So, because they are as drawn to the sky as a cloud is, when the Aristotles want to go up the downs they think “Up!” as hard as possible, whilst reminding themselves that Up is followed by Down: down to where their cottages are, and their cheerful kitchens, and well-stocked larders; and breakfast, lunch, tea, and supper.
At least when they get to the top, there’s the reward of a breeze to cool them off, and a view of the Village, and the great flat plain of the Weald beyond; and a sight to the south of the blue sea against the whitest of sheer chalk cliffs, where the downs come to an abrupt end as if they’d stopped in the middle of a sentence; and to the north of the North Downs on the other side of the Weald.
Then, when they’re ready, the Aristotles shout “Down!” and hurry down the hill, happy that they’re soon going to be home for tea, and hot buttered crumpets, and scones, and jam.
The other Aristotles, those who’d “exercised”, or perhaps it should be called “unexercised”, their option to stay home and take a nap after lunch, would by now be looking out of the lattice windows in their living rooms, and wondering where the others are. For though there are no clocks in the Village, because Time has never visited it, no Aristotle is ever late for tea.
At last the stay-at-homers would see them tumbling down the hill, yelling “Bags I cream cake!”, and “Toffee banana for me!”, to let those below know that they are on their way...as if there could have been any doubt of it.
The Aristotles, therefore, do have a body clock of sorts, which, instead of telling them the time, registers, rather than reminds them—for how could they forget?—when it is time to eat.
The day is divided into twelve sections to accommodate the various meals that an Aristotle needs to keep body and soul together. There are even a few sticklers who observe the minutes, too, when one progresses from course to course during a meal; and who regulate their mouthfuls to ensure that everything can be “fitted in” before commencement of the interval that separates one meal from another, during which one fasts.
The gustatory day is as follows:
One: Early Breakfast. Early Breakfast is a scaled-down version of what is to follow, as Main Breakfast. It is taken as soon as one gets up, for no purpose other than to prepare the mind and body for Main Breakfast. The only difference between Early Breakfast and Main Breakfast, other than that Early Breakfast is a bit smaller in quantity, and shorter in duration, than Main Breakfast—or as the Aristotles would say “less large and not as long”, is that tea is drunk instead of coffee.
Two: Main Breakfast. Fruit juice, followed by orange or grapefruit segments, or prunes; cereal or porridge, or both, with cream; bacon, grilled tomatoes, sausages, mushrooms, kidneys, eggs à la however you fancy them—meaning boiled or coddled or fried or poached or scrambled; fried bread and black pudding; toast and butter, and a dollop of marmalade or jelly or jam or honey…or half as much each of two of them, or a third as much each of three, or a quarter as much each of four, or as much of all of them as one can eat or has time for, whichever is the greater.
And a great deal of freshly ground coffee.
Three: Late Breakfast, which is an expurgated, meaning slightly less large, version of the aforementioned. The only difference, therefore between Late Breakfast and Early Breakfast is that it comes later. Or “less early” as the Aristotles prefer to say, the word “later” to them being a little depressing—or rather, less happy, because Aristotles don’t get depressed—in that it means there are fewer meals ahead of them to look forward to that day.
Four: Mid-Morning Snack, usually consisting of a Cornish pasty, Scotch egg, and a large Melton Mowbray pork, or veal and ham, pie.
Five: Brunch. A cold collation of what was not
left over from breakfast, because it was eaten earlier, which means going to the larder again to assemble it. Brunch is an introductory lunch.
Six: First Luncheon. The lunch part of Brunch, only more of it.
Seven: Second Luncheon. The same as First Lunch, only larger still.
Eight: Third Luncheon. A somewhat pared-down, or rather, less sizeable, Second Lunch.
Nine: Teatime. Sandwiches, cakes, and more cakes…a subject that shall be gone into in greater detail, considerably greater detail, presently.
Ten: High Tea. An edited breakfast, with the eggs done a different way to how one had them at breakfast.
Eleven: Supper. An unrestricted menu, except as may be dictated by personal preference and seasonal availability. The only thing missing from Supper, or rather, not included in it, are Savouries. Savouries are, or would be if there were such things, dishes that are served at the beginning or end of a meal as a stimulant or digestive. The Aristotles’ appetites do not need stimulating, and their digestions are just fine, thank you.
Twelve: Snack. Milk and cookies, most of them chocolate.
Now, lest you should think that the Aristotles’ meal schedule—or “itinerary” as they call it in their language, because each category of meal is eaten at a different table, requiring movement—is, though evenly distributed throughout the day, more heavily “weighted” towards the beginning, Attend! The next chapter shall describe in more detail what the Aristotles mean by Tea.
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On certain afternoons the Aristotles, instead of having tea at their homes, meet at the Tea Shoppe in the Village.
The Tea Shoppe is run by Mrs Crampton-Bunne, in the gabled cottage where she lives with her two daughters. It has an uneven stone floor and a low-beamed ceiling, and the windows have lace curtains drawn in a sweep to either side. It is dark in a cosy way, lit by firelight and reflections from five great copper kettles on iron stands on the hearth.