DOI Artikel:
Powell, Alfred: Country building and handicraft in ancient cottages and farmhouses
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.41870#0039
COUNTRY BUILDING AND HANDI-
CRAFT IN ANCIENT COTTAGES AND
FARMHOUSES. BY ALFRED H. POWELL
“ Canst thou say in thine Heart
Thou hast seen with thine Eyes
With what cunning of Art
Thou wast wrought, in what wise,
By what force of what stuff thou wast shapen
and shown on my breast to the Skies ? ”
IT has been often said that we live in a period of record and research.
The war has been a rough wakening and we have now got to a work
period. Standing as we do between the past and the future, the link
between the two, we cannot but look to both for what help they can
give us, to the past for guidance, to the future for service. The present
has come so gently, step by step out of an endless past, that we cannot
point to any real hiatus separating the two. All our present activity is so
obviously founded upon past activity—work upon work, thought upon
thought, wisdom upon wisdom, pleasure upon pleasure—that past evi-
dences may safely take rank alongside of that now in the making. There
is no need to drive our vision forward as if it were a forlorn hope ; it can-
not but go forward, and upon precedent. It is manifestly impossible to
forget the past while the world endures and the green turf is underfoot.
There is a tale of an old Irish woman who was introduced to a famous
general as “ one like yerself, fra’ Tipperary.” After a talk she said as she
left him,“ Speak well o’ the bridge that carried ye ! ” So, without follow-
ing out here the long tale of English handicraft, let us speak well of those
(and their work) who carried us through the centuries, and gave us, on the
whole, the best country in the world and the most beautiful.
There is much real patriotism to be learned from ancient building and
craftsmanship. Even in the specious propaganda that was administered
through the war we see a dim belief in patriotism as an original instinct,
to cultivate which we must identify our present life with that of our pre-
decessors, our country with honourable names, great deeds, and famous
places. It is in the hope of seeing England so identified that I have put
together these few notes about old work, feeling that if I have found a
little, others may easily find much more in a field still open for explora-
tion, and so help towards a more common understanding of what ancient
building and its kindred works have meant, and still mean, for us inhabi-
tants of England.
And first for the “ look ” of England. We need not dwell upon the dark
patches where we have made her unsightly, though we may well bear
them in mind in view of the ever-present danger of yet more sightly
patches being filchedfrom an already too scantystore. There is no reason
27
CRAFT IN ANCIENT COTTAGES AND
FARMHOUSES. BY ALFRED H. POWELL
“ Canst thou say in thine Heart
Thou hast seen with thine Eyes
With what cunning of Art
Thou wast wrought, in what wise,
By what force of what stuff thou wast shapen
and shown on my breast to the Skies ? ”
IT has been often said that we live in a period of record and research.
The war has been a rough wakening and we have now got to a work
period. Standing as we do between the past and the future, the link
between the two, we cannot but look to both for what help they can
give us, to the past for guidance, to the future for service. The present
has come so gently, step by step out of an endless past, that we cannot
point to any real hiatus separating the two. All our present activity is so
obviously founded upon past activity—work upon work, thought upon
thought, wisdom upon wisdom, pleasure upon pleasure—that past evi-
dences may safely take rank alongside of that now in the making. There
is no need to drive our vision forward as if it were a forlorn hope ; it can-
not but go forward, and upon precedent. It is manifestly impossible to
forget the past while the world endures and the green turf is underfoot.
There is a tale of an old Irish woman who was introduced to a famous
general as “ one like yerself, fra’ Tipperary.” After a talk she said as she
left him,“ Speak well o’ the bridge that carried ye ! ” So, without follow-
ing out here the long tale of English handicraft, let us speak well of those
(and their work) who carried us through the centuries, and gave us, on the
whole, the best country in the world and the most beautiful.
There is much real patriotism to be learned from ancient building and
craftsmanship. Even in the specious propaganda that was administered
through the war we see a dim belief in patriotism as an original instinct,
to cultivate which we must identify our present life with that of our pre-
decessors, our country with honourable names, great deeds, and famous
places. It is in the hope of seeing England so identified that I have put
together these few notes about old work, feeling that if I have found a
little, others may easily find much more in a field still open for explora-
tion, and so help towards a more common understanding of what ancient
building and its kindred works have meant, and still mean, for us inhabi-
tants of England.
And first for the “ look ” of England. We need not dwell upon the dark
patches where we have made her unsightly, though we may well bear
them in mind in view of the ever-present danger of yet more sightly
patches being filchedfrom an already too scantystore. There is no reason
27