Spring

by Melissa Harrison

  When we met together in the evening round the kitchen chimney-place, after the men had had their supper and their heavy boots were gone, my mother and Eliza would do their very utmost to learn what I was thinking of. Not that we kept any fire now, after the crock was emptied; but that we loved to see the ashes cooling, and to be together. At these times Annie would never ask me any crafty questions (as Eliza did), but would sit with her hair untwined, and one hand underneath her chin, sometimes looking softly at me, as much as to say that she knew it all and I was no worse off than she. But strange to say my mother dreamed not, even for an instant, that it was possible for Annie to be thinking of such a thing. She was so very good and quiet, and careful of the linen, and clever about the cookery and fowls and bacon-curing, that people used to laugh, and say she would never look at a bachelor until her mother ordered her. But I (perhaps from my own condition and the sense of what it was) felt no certainty about this, and even had another opinion, as was said before.

  Often I was much inclined to speak to her about it, and put her on her guard against the approaches of Tom Faggus; but I could not find how to begin, and feared to make a breach between us; knowing that if her mind was set, no words of mine would alter it; although they needs must grieve her deeply. Moreover, I felt that, in this case, a certain homely Devonshire proverb would come home to me; that one, I mean, which records that the crock was calling the kettle smutty. Not, of course, that I compared my innocent maid to a highwayman; but that Annie might think her worse, and would be too apt to do so, if indeed she loved Tom Faggus. And our Cousin Tom, by this time, was living a quiet and godly life; having retired almost from the trade (except when he needed excitement, or came across public officers), and having won the esteem of all whose purses were in his power.

  Perhaps it is needless for me to say that all this time while my month was running – or rather crawling, for never month went so slow as that with me – neither weed, nor seed, nor cattle, nor my own mother’s anxiety, nor any care for my sister, kept me from looking once every day, and even twice on a Sunday, for any sign of Lorna. For my heart was ever weary; in the budding valleys, and by the crystal waters, looking at the lambs in fold, or the heifers on the mill, labouring in trickled furrows, or among the beaded blades; halting fresh to see the sun lift over the golden-vapoured ridge; or doffing hat, from sweat of brow, to watch him sink in the low gray sea; be it as it would of day, of work, or night, or slumber, it was a weary heart I bore, and fear was on the brink of it.

  All the beauty of the spring went for happy men to think of; all the increase of the year was for other eyes to mark. Not a sign of any sunrise for me from my fount of life, not a breath to stir the dead leaves fallen on my heart’s Spring.

  R. D. Blackmore, Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor, 1869

  Purple-chequered snake’s head fritillaries on their delicate, curved stems are a sight to behold. Heralding the arrival of spring, a traditionally managed water meadow full of these lovely flowers brings joy to the heart, tinged with sadness at how much of our classic country landscape has been lost. Once commonplace, the snake’s head fritillary is now one of the rarest plants in the country. Although they thrive in places like Iffley Meadows in the centre of Oxford, they are barely clinging on elsewhere in the face of modern farming techniques.

  Iffley Meadows is managed by the Berkshire, Bucking-hamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust and is one of the best places in the country to see snake’s head fritillaries. A visit in April, either as part of a guided tour or by just wandering down the riverbank until you stumble across the reserve entrance, is a breathtaking experience. Purple-, pink-and even white-chequered flowers, heads down and necks arched, gently nod above their lush green surroundings. The spring sunshine glints on their silvery scales, making the blooms glow and sparkle. Birds busy themselves in the surrounding reeds, butterflies flit from flower to flower, drooping willow trees rustle in the gentle breeze and swans glide up and down the sparkling river. It is a small piece of heaven.

  A mere 500 flowers were recorded in the meadows before BBOWT took over the site in 1983, but careful management has seen this number steadily increase in recent years so that in the spring of 2015 just under 90,000 flowers were recorded in the annual count. The plants thrive because the site is maintained as a traditional water meadow, cutting for hay in July so the nutrient levels stay low, grazing cattle through the autumn and early winter to keep sedges and rushes at bay and allowing the fields to flood to retain the soil’s dampness.

  Fritillaria meleagris is the county flower of Oxfordshire, a member of the lily family and the UK’s only native fritillary species. It stands 15 to 40 centimetres tall and is one of the earliest floral spectacles each year, in bloom between April and May. The words ‘fritillary’ and ‘fritillaria’ come from the Latin fritillus, ‘dice box’, referring to its chequerboard pattern, and meleagris means speckled and likens it to a spotted guinea fowl. Other names for the plant include chequered lily, dead man’s bell, frog cup, fraucup and leper’s bell, as their bell-shaped flowers resemble the bells worn by lepers in the Middle Ages.

  Snake’s head fritillaries used to be found in water meadows right across southern and central England. Ford, a village in Buckinghamshire, was famous for its meadows full of fraucups, the local name for the flowers. People would visit the Ford meadows from all over the county on Fraucup Sunday, the second Sunday in May, to admire and pick the flowers by the armful. Many of these made their way to the markets of Oxford and London. The fritillaries were first recorded in Ford in 1736, but local legend has it that they were escapees from the Tudor gardens at Waldridge Manor. The seeds were washed downstream on Ford Brook to the Ford meadows, where they established themselves. They later moved downstream to Thame, and then on to the meadows of Magdalen College in Oxford, which is still renowned for its spring display of the flowers.

  Our ancient water meadows have been lost at a dramatic rate since the Second World War, with modern farming techniques leaving most of them dry and over-grazed. The fate of the snake’s head fritillary highlights the plight of our natural wonders when they are not properly cared for and cherished. As drainage systems were installed around fields the damp conditions required by the fritillaries were lost, and the use of fertiliser raised nutrient levels, making the soil too rich for them. Ploughing and intensive grazing leave any surviving plants with little chance to grow, flower and shed their ripened seeds. A recent hunt around the village of Ford resulted in a mere two flowers found growing by the side of a road. Fraucup Meadow was dry, had been grazed to the ground and was bare of any wildflowers at all. While today it would be a thrill to find two of these rare flowers on such an unprotected and unmanaged site, thousands thrived there as recently as fifty years ago.

  But thanks to the careful management and dedication of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust, we can at least continue to enjoy the spectacle of these lovely fritillaries flowering en masse in a traditional water meadow. They are one of our most precious floral treasures, and we should value and protect them for ever.

  Sue Croxford, 2016

  Tall Nettles

  Tall nettles cover up, as they have done

  These many springs, the rusty harrow, the plough

  Long worn out, and the roller made of stone:

  Only the elm butt tops the nettles now.

  This corner of the farmyard I like most:

  As well as any bloom upon a flower

  I like the dust on the nettles, never lost

  Except to prove the sweetness of a shower.

  Edward Thomas, c. 1915

  Soon the plum blossom came out on the knotted black tree which climbed all over the Irishmen’s Place, at the gable of one of the buildings, covering the long window slits with a network of close branches. A chaffinch built her nest in a crook in its boughs. Cream petals came thick among the pointed leaves of the pear trees, and a little brown bird lived right in the midst of the fragrance. Susan
could put her head out of her mother’s window and peep at the bright eyes among the leaves.

  The double white lilac at the garden gate and the purple and lavender bushes hanging over the pig-cotes budded, and the lovely soft apple-green leaves burst through the javelin points. Starlings built in the hole in the giant apple tree which overshadowed the lawn and horse-trough, the ancient tree taller than Windystone itself, perhaps older, hollow as a skull, yet soon to be covered with blossom and little green fruit.

  Doves cooed in the larch plantation, under the blue-speckled sky, jays screamed in the spinney and flashed their wings defiantly at the stealthy gamekeepers.

  Magnificent pheasants rang out their challenge as they flew boldly clattering over the garden to the Druid Wood. Squirrels ran up and down the mossy walls and chased each other up the nut trees by the cow-sheds. A yellow stoat crept warily over the wall by the yew trees and rats slunk in the shadows of the stack-yard towards a hen-coop. The cock crew with a shrill note and the hen clucked to her chicks and cried fiercely, with flapping wings. The shadow of a hawk went over the young chickens, death in the blue sky, and every chick ran obediently to its mother, except one tiny stray upon which the savage claws and beak swooped.

  Tom Garland ran out with his double-barrelled gun many a time a day, for it was Nature’s birth time, and the little creatures were in danger from their enemies. The men had been busy since early in the year with the sheep, and now the lambs were merry curly-haired little rogues, with twinkling eyes and black sturdy legs.

  They spent their baby days in Whitewell field, near the house, cropping a few morsels of short sweet grass, nuzzling and suckling from their mothers, and playing like school-children.

  A lamb ran calling plaintively after a sheep, but she walked on, eating steadily, heartless, as he tried to push under her. He stood, puzzled, his first disillusion, and then, bleating and crying, he found his own true mother. With tail wagging and little firmly planted legs, he drank until the impatient mother gave him a push and sent him off to play. He stared round and then galloped to the others who were in the midst of a game.

  Every year, for two hundred years at least, lambs ran the same race in Whitewell field. In other fields they had their odd games, but here it was always the same.

  By the side of one of the paths stood the oak tree, with the seat under it, and a short distance away stood the great spreading ash. The lambs formed up in a line at the oak, and at some signal they raced to the ash, as fast as their tiny legs would go; then they wheeled round and tore back again. They held a little talk, a consultation, nose-rubbing, friendly pushes, and then off they went again on their race-track.

  On the first of May the cows left their winter quarters in the cow-houses, and were turned out to graze in the fields. That was a day to remember. Becky put her hands on her hips and shouted with laughter at their antics as they came pushing, tumbling through the gate and galloped wildly up and down the hills, with outstretching tails and tossing horns. They flung their heads back and blorted, they stamped their feet on the cool soft earth, they leapt like young lambs and danced with their unwieldy bodies on their slender legs.

  Cows that had long been jealous attacked each other with curved horns, and the farmer and Dan stood ready with forks and sticks to prevent any harm. They raised their noses in the air and sniffed the smells of spring, and they ran to the streams and water-troughs, trampling the clear fresh water, drinking deeply with noisy gulps. They explored their old haunts, rubbed their flanks against their favourite stumps and railings, scratched their heads, polished their horns, and then settled down to eat the young short sweet grass.

  The bull in the byre stamped and roared to be free with them, but he was dangerous, his horns were short and deep, and his eyes red. No man turned his back on him, but Tom never let him think he was master. They had had some tussles and he obeyed the farmer, but old Joshua kept away from him.

  There were deaths as well as births on the farm, losses as well as gains. One day a man was seen waving and shouting as he came running across the Alder Lease. Tom stood at the back door, looking down the hill at the meadows below, straining to hear what he said. It was the servant from Oak Meadows and he pointed as he ran to a hollow by a wall out of sight. When he got near enough the words floated up the hill, ‘A cow has fallen in the ditch yonder.’

  ‘Get the ropes, quick,’ cried Tom, with fear in his voice, and he and Dan ran down the fields with the heavy ropes and Joshua followed with a spade. Becky went too, to give a hand in pulling the poor beast, and Margaret stood pale and anxious at the door.

  There it lay on its back where it had slipped in the wet treacherous grass, as it tried to get the bright patch across the little ditch. A child could have scrambled out, but the cow’s legs were twisted, and it moaned very softly.

  They put the ropes round it and hauled, but the sloping field and sudden drop made it difficult, the five of them could not move it. It lay with agonised eyes, imploring help. Its leg was broken, perhaps its back was injured, and above was the blue sky and larks singing.

  ‘Get the gun and cartridge,’ muttered Tom, and Becky hurried up the steep hills and across the fields. But it was too late, it was dead, and there it lay, a great white lump, smeared with mud and grass. They walked up the hill a sad procession, weary, disheartened. Margaret met them, troubled.

  The next day a knacker took it away, some silver for the skin, that was all. It went down the hill with its legs sticking out, tragic and unreal, and an empty stall had to be filled.

  Then someone, one of those folk who walk up and down the hills staring at nothing and asking foolish questions, left the gates open. Duchess’s foal, a chestnut with a star, glossy as the nut itself, got out and ran in his young innocence to the new horse who was a kicker. He let fly, and Prince was lamed, and spoilt.

  They had the vet, and his leg was rubbed and fomented, but he would always limp. Tom grew grave and worked harder than ever. Susan’s heart burst with sorrow, but between herself and the grown-ups existed a barrier she could never cross.

  Days grew longer and the mists of dawn were swept away by the sun growing stronger. Heavy scents of earth itself filled the air as the plough turned up the deep brown soil. Duchess and Diamond walked up and down the ploughland, and Dan guided them in the hollows and low hills as he drew the straight lines on the earth. Thrushes sang on the sycamore trees which stood round the walls of the ploughland, with long, pink, swelling buds.

  Primroses made pale pools of light under the hedges, and along the steep banks, where they grew in spite of winds which suddenly swept up the valleys and over the hills with a fierceness which tore the blossom from the pear trees. But the flowers of the banks were small, short-stalked little ones, whilst those under last year’s leaves in the hedgerows were large and fine.

  Margaret, Becky, and Susan went off to the fields to pick cowslips, for the time had come to make cowslip wine. It was a cowslip day, too, a day of scents and pale gold colours, of glittering budded trees and little winds which clasped their skirts and tickled their ankles. The sky was fair, soft, yellow as a cowslip ball, and clouds like butterflies flew across it.

  Alison Uttley, The Country Child, 1931

  Sonnet 98

  From you have I been absent in the spring,

  When proud-pied April dress’d in all his trim

  Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing,

  That heavy Saturn laugh’d and leap’d with him.

  Yet nor the lays of birds nor the sweet smell

  Of different flowers in odour and in hue

  Could make me any summer’s story tell,

  Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew;

  Nor did I wonder at the lily’s white,

  Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose;

  They were but sweet, but figures of delight,

  Drawn after you, you pattern of all those.

  Yet seem’d it winter still, and, you away,

&nbs
p; As with your shadow I with these did play.

  William Shakespeare, published 1609

  The bridge was bustling with traffic. Cars queued at the traffic lights as they made their way to the busy retail park. Underneath the bridge, a river cut through the concealed woodland, and the sound of rushing water drowned out the engine noises above. Hidden away from civilisation, the wooded area showed few signs of human interaction and this absence was clear in the abundance of birds fluttering about. Although quiet in the winter, with spring well on its way the woodland was thriving.

  Further down the river where the water was calmer, both a male and female dipper could be seen along the water’s edge. They worked hard to collect nest material for their first brood of the season. The adults searched for mosses and twigs, carrying them in their beaks up to the nest site in a concealed spot along the riverbank, a ledge in an old stone wall, of which they were just finishing the outer edges. Soon enough it was complete, and the female was perched inside incubating her eggs. Spreading her wings, she kept them warm, ensuring that the chicks inside would develop.

  Once hatched, the young dippers were helpless in their initial days of life. It was time for the adults to start the relentless feeding, to give them the strength to survive once out of the nest. They worked together – both were on feeding duty, the male doing the main foraging while the female stayed in the nest, keeping the juveniles warm and safe. He would be in and out for the majority of each day, constantly slipping into the water to catch food. Arriving back, the adult would be greeted by each bird noisily asking to be fed, their beaks wide open, all fighting for the tasty food.