OUR HISTORIC VILLAGES.
A particular request was broadcast by Mr. Keen asking for information on local vestiges of ancient agriculture and he obtained—perhaps to his surprise—a number of interesting details, photographs, and maps, giving incidentally ingenious explanations of place names. He makes special mention of reported relics of the three field system. Most of our English villages are fathoms deep in history, if we have enough knowledge to direct our eyes. I should like to see some little handbook, composed for the use of rural schools. It should contain accounts of all the classes of visible relics of the past. Banks, dykes, roads, mills, flints, and so on, with a blank page or so for the interpretation of local names and peculiari- ties. A sense of historical .continuity has been one of the marks of our rural population ; and it should be definitely encouraged, especially now that the motor car begins to destroy it. a
Previous page
