13 OCTOBER 1944, Page 14

Solitary Countrymen

It is not an easy matter to get to know countrymen. Their, labour in the fields and small workshops keeps them dispersed and solitary, and this work-habit colours their mental and emotional characters. But life in the Home Guard has forced than to come together, and to meet amongst themselves and also in company with men of other walks of life —such strange occupations, for instance, as mine. At first I was treated with that watchful silence which can be more disconcerting than open hostility. But as evening after evening went by—especially winter evenings—in enforced propinquity, the individuals gradually emerged.