132 



MY LIFE 



[Chap. 



parish is rather large. It is only three miles from Leighton, 

 and we obtained accommodation in the school-house, a rather 

 large red-brick house, situated at the further end of the 

 village, where three roads met. It was occupied only by the 

 schoolmaster and his sister, who kept house for him, so we 

 had the advantage of a little society in a rather lonely 

 place. They were both young people and fairly educated, 

 but, as I thought even then, rather commonplace. The chief 

 business of the village girls hereabouts was straw-plaiting, 

 which they did sitting at their cottage doors, or walking 

 about in the garden or in the lanes near, which therefore did 

 not interfere with their getting fresh air and healthy exercise, 

 as do all forms of factory work. Now, owing to cheap im- 

 ported plait, the only work is in hat and bonnet-sewing, 

 which involves indoor work, and is therefore less healthy as 

 a constant occupation. 



The district was rather an interesting one. The parish 

 was crossed about its centre by the small river Ouzel, a 

 tributary of the Ouse, bordered by flat verdant meadows, 

 beyond which the ground rose on both sides into low hills, 

 which to the north-east reached five hundred feet above the 

 sea, and being of a sand formation, were covered with heaths 

 and woods of fir trees. Parallel with the river was the Grand 

 Junction Canal, which at that time carried all the heavy 

 goods from the manufacturing districts of the Midlands to 

 London. Following the same general direction, but about 

 half a mile west on higher ground, the London and Bir- 

 mingham Railway was in course of construction, a good deal 

 of the earthwork being completed, most of the bridges built 

 or building, and the whole country enlivened by the work 

 going on. 



At the same time the canal had been improved at great 

 cost to enable it to carry the increased trade that had been 

 caused by the rapid growth of London and the prosperity 

 of agriculture during the early portion of the nineteenth 

 century. About thirty miles further on the watershed 

 between the river-basins of the Ouse and Severn had to be 

 crossed, a district of small rainfall and scanty streams, from 



