144 A FARMER'S YEAR 



conclusion. At any rate, round and round the fold they tear in 

 terror, and when the lambs are born they come deformed and with 

 twisted heads. Twice in this neighbourhood have I heard of great 

 loss of lambs from this cause, once quite recently, where, as I was 

 told, nearly half of the total number perished. Little wonder, then, 

 that shepherds fear the visit of a lonely stag. 



To-day being Easter Monday, the annual Vestry Meeting was 

 held in the church at seven in the evening. It has now been my 

 lot, as people's churchwarden of this parish, to attend a great 

 number of these Easter-Monday Vestries. The similarity between 

 the proceedings in different years is really remarkable, although 

 once I remember, when there was some question of accounts 

 which excited popular interest, the place was crowded. The 

 average attendance, however, runs from six to nine, including the 

 clergyman, the churchwardens, the clerk, and the organ-blower, 

 which cannot be called excessive out of a population of about 

 eleven hundred. The fact is that, although they are far more 

 truly democratic than the Parish Council, since in them every 

 parishioner can say his say and exercise his rights of voting, such 

 as they may be, nobody takes the slightest interest in vestry 

 meetings, or the trouble to walk a yard to be present at them. 



The procedure is simple. When a quorum is present in the 

 exceedingly cold vestry, which is lit by one of the dazzling church 

 lamps, the Rector takes the chair and reads the minutes of the 

 last year's meeting. Then, the church accounts having been 

 produced, and the normal deficit sighed over, some gentleman 

 present, in earnest tones, proposes the re-election of the people's 

 churchwarden. Another gentleman seconds it, and the people's 

 churchwarden, duly re-elected, responds with an emotion befitting 

 the occasion, wondering in his heart how much he will be expected 

 to advance on account of the church coals during the coming 

 winter. Then the Rector nominates his churchwarden, who is 

 also re-elected, and after a long and rather desultory conversation, 

 generally about insurance or lightning conductors, that meeting is 

 gathered to its fathers. 



