OCTOBER - "With unwearying patience the farmer starts again..."
Still hanging in there (photo by Ginny) I've chosen two pieces from "The Country Child" by Allison Uttley to book-end my October offering. The first explains the farmer's relationship with Nature: "... with unwearying patience the farmer starts again; mending, doctoring, bringing life out of death, sowing and reaping, he struggles with Nature. . . . Tom Garland . . was as much a part of the hillside as the trees and grass. He knew when a storm was brewing and sent the men to shut up the young things which could not look after themselves. He could smell rain afar, and knew the movements of the winds. He could build a wall with the great blocks of rough sandstone so that it was firm to stand the buffets of the mighty gales..." Reflecting on Octobers Past, when harvest festivals continued to fill up the calendars of those Islonians who liked to go from church to chapel and onward to other villages in order to sing hymns and share in the harvest table, I find m
