HAPPY VILLAGE 19 



perhaps a yard above the ground, and the old bases of 

 the corn-ricks can be traced. One house would be 

 distinct enough, if it were not swallowed up in thorns 

 and briars . The fate of the place is the fate of the Garden 

 of Eden. The hamlet is a much more pitiful sight than 

 some deserted mining-camp such as one may see in 

 Australia. When a vein of precious metal that gave men 

 work and wealth has petered out, we must accept the 

 fact and go elsewhere. But in Wiltshire, by Marlborough, 

 the vein has not been worked out. The soil is as good 

 as ever it was. It should produce more wealth, not less, 

 since tools and apparatus and transport have all been 

 improved. And such revival is perhaps coming. Other 

 villages in other parts, some of them still proper objects 

 of pilgrimage, have dwindled sadly, though they are in 

 no danger of extinction. Little Gidding in Huntingdon 

 shire is one : with Steeple Gidding and Great Gidding, 

 as its neighbours once rightly so called it. These are 

 some of the facts of its recent history. 



A delightful farm was bought for zz an acre in 1777 

 by a neighbouring landowner. The neighbourhood is 

 sufficiently well known in literature, for near by was the 

 home of Nicholas Ferrar and his community. By the 

 chapel on the hill is the grave of Mary Collett, whom 

 J. H, Shorthouse made famous in John Inglesant. Down 

 the southern slope of the farms, two fine avenues led to 

 the crossing of the little brook ; and rectilineal hollows 

 that were once fish ponds, indicate how populous the 

 district was before the Reformation ; and how various 

 the forms of food production* Let this older history of 

 a prosperous era look after itself; sufficient unto the day 

 is the evil thereof, and more recent annals suffice for the 

 contrast. 



After the purchase of the adjacent farms in 1777, a 



