MEMORIES 73 



sparrows used to drill this roof with holes, flying 

 away with long straw streamers to their nests. 

 "Thatcher Dick" was always patching and casing it, 

 and it never had a whole new suit of thatch. 



But after a time the place changed tenants. The 

 new man had been a smith in Woolwich Arsenal. 

 " Arsenic " was as near as the carters could get to it ; 

 and none of us knew where it was, and few of us 

 what it meant. It was enough that he had made 

 cannons for the soldiers. For on still days you 

 might hear a heavy booming over the hills, which 

 some said were " cannon-guns, they reckoned." 

 Anyhow, we stood in awe of him as a very Vulcan, 

 and were not surprised when the thatch was replaced 

 by a beautiful roof of new red tiles, and a second fire 

 and bellows placed inside. 



There was a good trade going in those days before 

 the dawn of cheap machinery. Old turn-rice ploughs ^ 

 lay about round the door waiting for their newly 

 pointed shares. Big horses would stand with heads 

 down, in a brown study, lifting at intervals a heavy 

 foot for the trying-on of shoes ; and everything told 

 of regular and ready custom. 



At the top of the hill beyond the forge rises the 

 church spire — a beautiful, tapering shingle spire, as 



tAJte^t^^ 



