Health in the village.

  • Acland, Henry W. (Henry Wentworth), 1815-1900.
Date:
1884
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Health in the village. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    i. Sketch cf Low Marsh, an English Village in the Pre-sanitation Period. On a sultry evening in the summer of 1858, I was sitting on a grassy knoll, looking over a flat and broad expanse in a midland county of England. A delicate outline of hills, not wholly unlike that of the Alban mount which bounds the Campagna of Rome, could just be seen some miles away through the heated haze that rose from the surface of the plain. Dividing the level lands were rare hedgerows and rarer trees. No sounds were to be heard save the nibbling of stunted grass by some ill-fed sheep, and the continuous hum of countless insect life so uncommon here, so common in some other lands. As I stayed gazing on this not extraordinary scene (for in country life there is always a rich field for reflection), suddenly there rose, from below a mile away, the pleasing murmur of village bells. Then distant, and yet more distant, peals took up the melody, in churchyards far beyond. Peering through the hot and wavy air I saw first one church tower half hidden among clustered trees and then another ; but though several vesper bells were heard I could see through the mist no other sacred edifices. As I slowly descended the green and slippery slope, the music of ever remembered words seemed to chant in unison within me :— Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease, Seats of my youth, where every sport would please; How often have I loitered o’er thy green, Where humble happiness endear’d each scene ! fn. i.l R