Country Life
BY IAN NIALL THIS is the day of labels and tags, but what a way we have come to talk about the 'over- spill' from cities and use the term, 'dormitory town,' to impersonalise human existence! Only Thurber could draw an 'overspill' of people. One shouldn't, of course, be light- hearted about anything so acutely pressing as the problem of living-space, and there are two approaches to the problem at present. One is the creation of satellite towns and the other is the expansion of more rural villages, neither of which is a solution that could have any social value if people only moved into a place to sleep there. For- tunately men and women cannot be spilled nor can they he put in convenient compart- ments. Even when they are subjected to the most almighty planning that the bureaucrat can produce, they will dig their gardens, grow marrows and order their own affairs, to finally confound the tabulators. by being consistently human and unrobotlike.
A GAME TERRIER
R. had a very old terrier with him, and his progress was slow when I came upon him. He had to stop frequently to let the dog come toddling on; he was going all out and doing his .best. He was game and always had been. Did I remember the time when he had caused such a stir in the lane by getting himself stuck up a drain? The old terrier stopped and recovered his breath, but he didn't even look up. Yes, I remembered the scene. Someone had gone for a pick and had started digging up the road, while others poked sticks up the drain. The baker, unable to get through with his van, got down and gave a hand. In the end the dog came through to the other side of the road, shook himself and ran in delighted circles to the sound of great applause. While we talked of this, the old one remained like a statue, but at length he gave me a look and feebly wagged his tail. The old warrior knew we had it all wrong, of course. We had for- gotten the rat.,Everyone had forgotten the rat that day, but he bad gone up the drain to kill a rat, and be bad killed it.
THE HERON
We passed the place where the stream breaks through the hedge and goes under the road. It used to be a watering hole for the horses drawing carts on the road. When we passed I looked at the water casually, but a few minutes later, on our way back, I was surprised to see a heron step out on to the road, ruffle his feathers and then sail gracefully up. For a moment it looked as though the bird intended to fly right at us, but then he swung away, re- crossed the road and went over the field to some ash trees on the course of the sante stream. He had, no doubt, been fishing down- water, walking -a few paces and then waiting for an unwary eel or fingerling trout. It was almost dusk and I wondered if he would perch in the trees; but no, he went down to the water again. Either he was hungry or he preferred the gathering mist and the lading light to catch something in low water.
HERBACEOUS CLTITINGS
Herbaceous plants of a number of sorts can he propagated by root cuttings. The roots of the plant are exposed in winter and fragments an inch or two in length are used. One end of the cutting (the top) is cut squarely across and the other end parted from the rest of the
root at an angle. The pieces are planted ver- tically in compost, which is then given a light scattering of sand and covered with glass.
Previous page
