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025 - XXV Trespassers' Walk · Gentle Art of Tramping

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  Speaker 1: Chapter twenty five of the Gentle Art of Tramping by
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  Speaker 1: Stephen Graham. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings
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  Speaker 1: are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer,
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  Speaker 1: please visit LibriVox dot org. Read by Val Roth, The
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  Speaker 1: Gentle Art of Tramping, Chapter twenty five, Trespasser's Walk. You
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  Speaker 1: are going to be very ill mannered and stray on
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  Speaker 1: to other people's property. Granted that fundamental impertinence, you must
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  Speaker 1: be as nice as possible about it. Graciously lift your
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  Speaker 1: hat to the proprietor when you see him, mend the
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  Speaker 1: heads you have broken, put back the hurdle a virture face.
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  Speaker 1: If a lady is swimming in her private pool. In
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  Speaker 1: doing the trespasser's walk, it is as well to forego
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  Speaker 1: the happiness of a rigid rule. You take your compass,
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  Speaker 1: you decide. Let us say to go west southwest, and
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  Speaker 1: it will take you over the commons, over plowed land, village, greens, graveyards, gardens,
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  Speaker 1: over loosely held but large and idle estates, perhaps through
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  Speaker 1: the thickly propertied country. It is enough to do the
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  Speaker 1: walk roughly. You cannot follow a ruled straight line across
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  Speaker 1: sown fields and flower beds, and through the lord of
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  Speaker 1: the manor's kitchen. You must frame exceptions to the ruling
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  Speaker 1: of the compass, and be guided by the dictates of
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  Speaker 1: the heart and good sense. The main idea is to
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  Speaker 1: see just what the land of a given country is like,
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  Speaker 1: and to enjoy it. You have the added thrill of
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  Speaker 1: not knowing whom you will meet and on what terms.
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  Speaker 1: Of course, I do not guarantee that you may not
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  Speaker 1: come to grief. You may get into the grounds of
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  Speaker 1: a very peppery squire who, resenting greatly your trespass on
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  Speaker 1: his land, will assail you in person, or set his
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  Speaker 1: keepers on you, or even let Lucifer's dog or telephone
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  Speaker 1: the police. My experience is that you need not fear
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  Speaker 1: these chances, less you behave badly. Many landowners tacitly allow
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  Speaker 1: the neighboring villagers to walk in their grounds. If they
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  Speaker 1: do not do damage. The parvenu comes and tries to
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  Speaker 1: clear everyone out and keep his pleasure in s entirely
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  Speaker 1: for himself. But even he, unless he be a senior
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  Speaker 1: of a channel island, will not fire on a stranger
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  Speaker 1: at sight. The fact is that in England anyway, there
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  Speaker 1: is no absolute right to keep strangers off private property.
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  Speaker 1: Formerly possessed land was much more free to the use
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  Speaker 1: of the people in general than it is now. The
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  Speaker 1: tradition remains, no farmer objects to here walking alongside his
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  Speaker 1: corn fields or across his pastures. It is the people
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  Speaker 1: who enclose but do not farm, who have most prejudice
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  Speaker 1: against strangers. No doubt, bitterness over rights of way have
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  Speaker 1: hardened donor's hearts. No doubt the breakdown of feudal relationship
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  Speaker 1: between squire and villagers helped to make the farmer recluse.
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  Speaker 1: No doubt the increasing vulgarity and bad manners of people
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  Speaker 1: in general have made them less welcome in the eyes
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  Speaker 1: and on the estates of the refined and well to do.
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  Speaker 1: But unless you do damage, you are not committing a
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  Speaker 1: serious offense by trespassing. And the trespasser's walk is so
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  Speaker 1: arduous that it can only be recommended to the few.
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  Speaker 1: It is worth while, not merely as an adventure, but
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  Speaker 1: as a means of getting a true notion of your
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  Speaker 1: native land. You can get it hunting, but then not
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  Speaker 1: everyone hunts. One is inclined to think of England as
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  Speaker 1: a network of motor roads, interspersed with public houses, plotcarded
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  Speaker 1: by patrol advertisements, and broken by smoky industrial towns. That
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  Speaker 1: England is a fair country few will deny, because you
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  Speaker 1: see beautiful cross sections of her from trains. But when
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  Speaker 1: you get out at a railway station, the vision of
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  Speaker 1: the carriage window is seldom realized. You are guided away
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  Speaker 1: from nature by gullies at deep cutter hedged roads. England
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  Speaker 1: becomes to you a dusty road, a series of dusty roads.
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  Speaker 1: There are glorious commons here and there, and free woods,
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  Speaker 1: but you must travel to find them. You get tired
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  Speaker 1: of thoroughly tamed Sussex and Surrey and go to the
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  Speaker 1: Welsh Hills or the Cumberland Lakes. But England is more
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  Speaker 1: in Sussex and Surrey than it is in the mountains.
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  Speaker 1: Only it is enclosed, shut away and marked. Private rainwashed
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  Speaker 1: notices put up ages ago tell you that trespassers will
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  Speaker 1: be prosecuted. And as we pray daily in our old
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  Speaker 1: fashioned phrase, to have our trespass forgiven, we infest the
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  Speaker 1: idea of trespassing with some awe. So we keep to
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  Speaker 1: the road, even if we are out for a mere
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  Speaker 1: idle walk, and not bent on reaching any given house
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  Speaker 1: or place. Even if you take a style and leave
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  Speaker 1: road for footpath, your pleasure is enhanced. And if you
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  Speaker 1: leave footpath for the trackless woods, it is even further enhanced.
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  Speaker 1: For the trespasser's walk, you should be lightly clad and shod,
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  Speaker 1: for you have to jump often. You can start at
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  Speaker 1: any point you choose, and take the guidance of the compass,
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  Speaker 1: or the sun, or some dominant landmark in the view.
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  Speaker 1: You then take a bee line and see where it
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  Speaker 1: leads you. As you are neither a bee nor a bird,
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  Speaker 1: you cannot fly over hedges and walls, and you cannot
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  Speaker 1: go so fast. Every field presents its problem, but every
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  Speaker 1: field presents also its pleasure. You will observe the different
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  Speaker 1: way the wildflowers look on the other side of the
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  Speaker 1: hedge that skirts the road. They are sheltered and fresh,
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  Speaker 1: and more numerous, and altogether more happy. Even that first
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  Speaker 1: field is a more pleasant place in the Great Highway.
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  Speaker 1: The second hedge is likely to be lighter and more
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  Speaker 1: easy to get through than thet You come into a
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  Speaker 1: broad meadow and see beyond it the darkness of a
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  Speaker 1: woodland you have never entered on the fringe of it.
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  Speaker 1: The rabbits are playing in the bushes, or more nests,
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  Speaker 1: more fluttering of birds. You enter the wood. It is
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  Speaker 1: still and dreaming, apparently utterly unpopulated. It belongs to some
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  Speaker 1: quiet family living in a big secluded country house a
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  Speaker 1: mile away. There is room for a tribe where but
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  Speaker 1: five people and their servants are living naturally enough. F
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  Speaker 1: you meet no one. You are in woodland, which is
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  Speaker 1: after all but little visited, through the midst of crowded England.
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  Speaker 1: The berries on BlackBerry bushes wrought unpicked. No one comes
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  Speaker 1: seeking the many mushrooms. Even the rabbits are only shot
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  Speaker 1: at once a year to keep their numbers down. You
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  Speaker 1: are treading on last year's leaves, or the leaves of
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  Speaker 1: the year before last, on the leaf mold of ages past.
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  Speaker 1: England is carpeted under your feet. You delight in your steps,
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  Speaker 1: in the rise and fall of the land, in the
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  Speaker 1: sunny clearing of the vetch covered bank, where you sit,
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  Speaker 1: watching little blue and brown butterflies fluttering about you. No
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  Speaker 1: one comes to chase you off. At least, you are
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  Speaker 1: not a trespasser until some one has seen you. You
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  Speaker 1: hear no one moving anywhere. You do not even hear
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  Speaker 1: the motor cars on the road you left. You have
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  Speaker 1: disenchanted the England of those roads. This is the real England,
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  Speaker 1: the england into which you ought to have been born,
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  Speaker 1: rather than that of curbed ways and tarred roads. From
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  Speaker 1: the woods, you emerge onto a fair pleasure wance, an
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  Speaker 1: upward reaching green's ward, flanked afar by a white house,
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  Speaker 1: the owners probably Your eyes turn wistfully toward the house
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  Speaker 1: and its windows, but there seems to be no one there.
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  Speaker 1: It might be empty. There is not even a smoke
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  Speaker 1: from a chimney. You climb the green slope to another would, and,
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  Speaker 1: passing through it, come unexpectedly to a gap. No, a ditch, no,
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  Speaker 1: a country road, a lane leading from You do not
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  Speaker 1: know where to, You do not know what. You go
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  Speaker 1: down into it, you climb up on the other side.
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  Speaker 1: You have entered a different type of property. You are
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  Speaker 1: in a turnip field, which you skirt. In your next field,
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  Speaker 1: you see a fiersome animal, all by himself, grazing at leisure.
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  Speaker 1: And it depends on your courage whether you will face
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  Speaker 1: the bull or make an exception to your rule of
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  Speaker 1: the game of the walk. It is well to have
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  Speaker 1: a notebook and record the rules, by laws, and exceptions
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  Speaker 1: of your walk as you frame them. In this notebook.
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  Speaker 1: Also you keep a personal record of the england you
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  Speaker 1: found the other side of the hedge. Upon seeing a bull,
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  Speaker 1: you decide to pass him and the spirit of escaping torrero,
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  Speaker 1: or you make a rule to beat the danger. You
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  Speaker 1: take a bearing by your pocket compass and ascertain what
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  Speaker 1: tree or landmark you are naturally making for on the
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  Speaker 1: other side of the bulls field, and having assured yourself
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  Speaker 1: of that, you reach it by making a detour. Then
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  Speaker 1: proceeding with your tramp, you go right through a farmhouse yard.
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  Speaker 1: If the compass directs that you should go right through
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  Speaker 1: the farmhouse, you may go in and get some refreshment.
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  Speaker 1: You do not avoid the farmer and his spouse or
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  Speaker 1: farm hands. They are part of your novel adventure, and
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  Speaker 1: are nearly always quite pleased to see you, even if
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  Speaker 1: a bit puzzled at your line of route. It is
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  Speaker 1: just as well not to explain what you are up to.
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  Speaker 1: They will not take to it. They do not mind
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  Speaker 1: your walking across the farm with a given object, but
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  Speaker 1: will fail to understand your notion of following the compass assuredly.
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  Speaker 1: They will think you rogue or mad. It is best
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  Speaker 1: to talk politics to them. Talk of that terrible fellow
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  Speaker 1: Ramsay MacDonald and the dreadful doings of labor. They love
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  Speaker 1: that your interest in the stock will not come amiss.
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  Speaker 1: You may ask also of land for sale, of estates
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  Speaker 1: falling vacant, and changes of ownership. They will tell you
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  Speaker 1: much about the owners of the land you travel over.
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  Speaker 1: The difficulty is in getting away from a farm and
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  Speaker 1: making the crazy exit that your compass dictates. There Again,
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  Speaker 1: a rule may be framed. You may select a point
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  Speaker 1: of view ahead and get to it conventionally, resuming your
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  Speaker 1: bee line across country. There you are in for a
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  Speaker 1: delightful day, or for delightful days of tramping. If you
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  Speaker 1: have a cottage in the country, as I had when
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  Speaker 1: doing this, you can do a few hours of this
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  Speaker 1: and then return by road or rail home, resuming another
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  Speaker 1: day at the point where you left off. On the
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  Speaker 1: other hand, if the weather is fine, there is no
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  Speaker 1: reason why you should not sleep out and tramp all
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  Speaker 1: the way to the sea. Only it will take longer
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  Speaker 1: than could be expected, as getting over hedges and walls
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  Speaker 1: and ditches and streams takes time, and it is more
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  Speaker 1: tiring than an ordinary walk on a moor or a
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  Speaker 1: common On a long tour of the kind, you learn
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  Speaker 1: something about English life which is not easily obtained in
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  Speaker 1: a conventional way, and the experience should be filled out
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  Speaker 1: by learning the names and histories of estates and owners.
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  Speaker 1: If you have friends on the way, you can have
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  Speaker 1: delightful accidental meetings and enriching conversations. If you are seriously
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  Speaker 1: studying English life, there is no reason why you should
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  Speaker 1: not frankly call it the houses you see on the
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  Speaker 1: way and get what information you can. Some people may
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  Speaker 1: meet you coldly, a few poorishly, but most will be
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  Speaker 1: polite and friendly enough. Occasionally you will be people who
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  Speaker 1: will be extremely kind and helpful. It is neither so
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  Speaker 1: wicked nor so dangerous to be a trespasser as might
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  Speaker 1: at first appear. End of chapter two twenty five