230 OLD WEST SURREY 



An old custom that I remember in my young days, 

 as a strong expression of public opinion, was the perform- 

 ance of ' Rough music' 



If a man was known to beat his wife, he was first 

 warned. The warning was a quiet one enough — not a 

 word was spoken ; but some one went at night with a 

 bag of chaff, and laid a train of it from the roadway up 

 to the cottage door. It meant, ' We know that thrashing 

 is going on here.' If the man took the hint and treated 

 his wife better, nothing more happened. But if the ill- 

 treatment went on, a number of men and boys came some 

 other night with kettles and pans and fire-irons, and any- 

 thing they could lay their hands on to make a noise with, 

 and gave him ' Rough music' The din was something 

 dreadful, but the effect was said to be salutary. My home 

 was half a mile from the village, but every now and then 

 on summer nights we used to hear the discordant strains 

 of this orchestra of public protest and indignation. 



The daily life of the cottager varied so little in one 

 cottage or another, or in one village or the next, that 

 the usual restriction of ideas and interests was only to 

 be expected ; but every now and then it was a pleasure 

 to find some cottage housewife with a distinct taste for 

 some occupation, or a general aptitude for wider interests. 

 Sometimes it was patchwork, or beautiful plain needle- 

 work ; a thing that by long practice became almost an 

 extra sense. The skill often remained, even when sight 

 was much impaired ; and I am told by some one, whose 

 word I absolutely trust, of an old woman who lived on the 

 outskirts of Godalming who could still stitch shirt-fronts 

 when totally blind. 



My old friend, ninety years of age, whose portrait 



