Bluebells

Thank you to everyone who took advantage of last week's offers on Most Beautiful Princess - I hope you enjoy the book!

The bluebells are out at Temple Newsam and the woods are awash with them, like a beautiful blue ocean! My Bichon, Bertie, had a lovely walk in the spring sunshine...and rolled in 'duck muck' by the lake...

November Can Be Beautiful, Too!

November always seemed to be a miserable month with the nights drawing in so quickly, the cold and rain and all the gloom of poppies and memorials. One of the many happy discoveries that comes from having a dog is the need to venture out to trudge through mud and rain every day...and some days just take you by surprise and fill you with awe, as happened on my walk with Bertie today. November can be very beautiful and happy after all!

A Different Kind of Hero

One of the most beautiful stories of WWII, and one that shows heroism in a different light, is that of Miriam Milbourne, about whom I know little except for her heroism, which wasn’t of the kind that requires an impulsive moment of great courage, but rather a far-seeing vision, and the fruits of her efforts can be enjoyed today.

During the Nazi occupation of the Channel Islands, food was in desperately short supply due to the British blockade, and the islanders were compelled to hand over any livestock to the occupying forces.

By the time of the occupation, Miss Millbourne (she is always described as Miss Miriam Milbourne, which I presume is meant as a mark of respect from that era) had been carefully ensuring the survival of the almost-extinct breed of beautiful Golden Guernsey goats by careful breeding programmes for about fifteen years. She was not going to willingly submit her beautiful animals to feed the Nazi invaders and so she somehow managed to conceal them in caves throughout the entire length of the occupation, knowing that if she had been caught, she would have been sentenced to death.

Happily, she and the goats survived. It was 1967 before the herd was successfully
introduced to England, and to my utter delight, there are beautiful Golden Guernsey goats in the farm of Temple Newsam. These gorgeous creatures are so noble in appearance, and so friendly and self-contained that it is impossible to imagine that they could have been wiped out were it not for the courage and love of this little-known heroine.

Animals have suffered a great deal in human conflicts. Over 8 million horses were killed in the First World War (8 million!! and what did they know of human wars?); during Idi Amin’s reign of terror in Uganda, elephants were horrifically slaughtered; the habitats of numerous animals have been destroyed on battlefields; sniffer dogs have been killed while searching for explosives....Thank heavens for someone like ‘Miss’ Miriam Milbourne whose courage enables me and so many thousands of other people to enjoy the beauty of the lovely Golden Guernseys today.

Fire at Temple Newsam

On Sunday evening a fire broke out in one of the barns of the farm, which is home to many rare breed animals, at Temple Newsam House. I did not hear about it until yesterday, when someone told me that the beautiful cattle, who are housed there and whom I see very often, had been in danger and had probably died in the flames. I was shocked beyond reason at such a thought but happily, it turned out that the animals were all – thanks to the heroic action of the fire brigade – rescued and quite safe. The thought of those pensive, beautiful creatures being caught in something so frightening was so horrific and what was more horrific was the suggestion (though the cause of the fire has not yet been confirmed and this was pure speculation) that the fire was an arson attack.

I spoke of this to someone whose immediate response was, “When they catch the culprits, they ought to lock them in a barn and light a fire outside until they experience the terror those poor animals must have felt!” And it struck me as rather odd that the same person then sat down to a beef dinner!

Apart from my personal views about the unnecessary and cruel slaughter of animals, it raises rather an interesting question. If a person abuses an animal, by law s/he can face a prison sentence. If, however, that person has a license to slaughter animals in abattoirs (where sentient creatures still feel terror) no one objects. The same is true of humanity. If someone takes it upon him/herself to terrorise or murder someone else, people rise up in indignant horror at such a crime. Crowds bang on the police vans taking the murderer to trial and people seem to gain a sense of their own self-righteousness in condemning the crime. If, however, killing is legalised and made respectable (in the case of a war, for example, or – in some countries – an execution) the victims surely feel the same terror, the same pain, the same loss, but it’s alright because the government said it was alright to commit this killing.

If someone had set out to deliberately harm those animals in the barn, I must confess, my initial thought, too, was that I would like that person to feel the fear that those creatures must have felt, but that was simply a reaction – and reactions, as opposed to responses, are always dangerous. Propaganda thrives on creating a reaction and too often legislation numbs human conscience and makes something ‘right’ simply because it has government authority behind it. If people had been able to think for themselves, instead of relying on legislation (someone else’s idea of what is alright and what is not alright) would so many millions have died for nothing on the Marne and the Somme? If people had thought for themselves, instead of relying on legislation, would there have been so many guards and commanders willing to carry out the atrocities of the concentration camps?

Well, I walked through the woods at Temple Newsam today and, seeing the shell of the burned barn still smouldering, and the firemen still pumping water from the lake (what a feat of engineering!), and three donkeys happily grazing in the field nearby, I have to say three cheers for the wonderful fire brigade and thank goodness those animals were saved.

The Little Temple of Temple Newsam

At the top of a slope in the woods at Temple Newsam there is a listed building folly called 'The Little Temple', which is sadly now fenced off due to years of decay and vandalism. Beyond the fences now surrounding it, are a couple of benches from which one can view the House, the trees as they change through the seasons, and the meadow where the Opera takes place each year. It is a most beautiful spot and a place where I often pass the time of day with people who happen to be sitting on those benches. Sometimes there are dog-walkers (for a while, a couple of years ago, I saw a beautiful black poodle named Claude but he and his people no longer seem to come by and I would love to hear where he is now) or families or couples or mothers with prams and push chairs or joggers taking a break or pensive people on their own...it's always so lovely and reminds me often of the beautiful "Bread & Fishes" song about meeting people by chance and meeting angels.

Alas, the Little Temple itself falls daily into a greater state of decay.
Not only does the unpleasant graffiti remain alongside the fences surrounding the folly, but there are signs of rotting timbers and the whole structure being abandoned. Sometimes I imagine all the people who sat there when it was first erected; the vision of the builder, the brilliance of the landscape gardener, Capability Brown, who created such beauty, and the thoughts they thought, the dreams they dreamed....and did they ever know how many people would come to enjoy such loveliness? There is a notice which says it is undergoing restoration, and that same notice has been there for so many years that I wonder how much it will cost to restore it to its original beauty and how to raise the money for that to take place.

The actual stone upon stone, pillar upon pillar is irrelevant really, I suppose. It's just that it's at the perfect spot amid those incredibly beautiful trees and has such an atmosphere of centuries of being attuned to Nature...It's just somewhere I happen to love and, when I reach my fortune, I would like to restore it to its original glory...

The photos here are not recent - I just found them on the net - the first from here (I trust it is alright to take this from your site - thank you!)

http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/Details/Default.aspx?id=465432

and will post my own next time I take my camera....

Crown Prince Wilhelm

Apologies again for my tardiness in updating this blog! Interesting how matter arise in our lives that lead us into a kind of temporary seclusion, which leaves a lot of time for sitting about in unwholesome atmospheres but brings thing to light. Family 'illness' necessitates time spent in such hospital atmospheres. Can anything be less conducive to health than being in that kind of atmosphere of a conglomeration of belief in illness? The more I see of illness, the more apparent it is that everything originates in our thoughts...but that's another story....)

For some bizarre reason, last night I dreamed of Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia, eldest son of the Kaiser, and wished so much this morning that I could remember that dream! The Crown Prince's memoirs were written in exile so short a time after World War I, during which he must have lived through horrendous experiences, including the daily reports of the loss of his friends and the gradual collapse of all he had been brought up to expect he would one day inherit. Like most adolescents, he seemed to go through a stage of rebelling against his father while his love for his mother casts a whole new light on a woman whom I considered rather shallow. He also is impressive in his balanced view of events - I stand in admiration of his considered appraisal of all that had happened, which sounds so balanced and thoughtful, even down to his fair descriptions of his father.

As I am presently working in a book in which he plays quite a minor role, it feels like opening a door to a whole new world of understanding. Rather than seeing Queen Victoria's family solely from the perspective of her children and grandchildren, it's interesting to see how they appeared as parents. In truth, nothing is ever as it seems, is it?

Please, kind people who drop by here, don't stop visiting because there is a delay in updating this blog...Meanwhile, here are a couple of photos, taken last week, of May time in the woods and gardens of Temple Newsam...

Swans

No matter what is happening in the world, it sometimes seems that there are moments of sheer beauty that return us to ourselves and stay with us forever. Today I had such a moment. Walking by the lake at Temple Newsam, I saw two swans gliding so beautifully over the water. Someone walked by with a child in a push-chair, and one swan came out of the lake as though to greet them. By the time I had crossed the little bridge, the people had passed and I thought the swan would have gone back into the lake but he stood there for a while and walked towards me and was so close and so tame that he actually seemed to pose for these photos. Alas! I am not a photographer but it was such an honour to be in his (or her??) company today, and to be in the presence of such amazing beauty.

Saints and Suffering - an oxymoron!

As a child, I loved reading the lives of the saints. They intrigued, inspired and utterly fascinated and absorbed me but something always bothered me: so many of them suffered from horrendous and grotesque illnesses. Those who weren't mauled by lions for the entertainment of the Roman mob, or hanged,drawn and quartered, or cannibalized or crucified upside down, or flayed alive or beheaded, often developed mysterious growths, tuberculosis and consumption and a large percentage of them died at a young age. Of course, the books and the images - young men pierced by arrows or saintly virgins holding their eyes (or even their breasts!) on a platter to show the means of martyrdom! - were quick to point out, that these saintly people were so holy because they participated in the suffering of Christ.

It's a heady concoction for a child. To go several times a week into a church and see the crucified Jesus with nails protruding from his hands, his body writhing in agony, and then to be told, "This is because you are a sinner and God loves you so much!" To hear that 'He gives His crown of thorns to his friends" creates the weirdest notions of Love and of who or what God is. This loving Father, whom we were to worship, somehow can only be appeased by suffering? This God who is omnipotent, somehow requires His children to endure all kinds of agony in order to be cleansed? When my mother wanted me to be cleansed, she put me in a bath and quoted poetry to me, then hugged me dry in a towel. But the Supreme Parent saw His (there was never any Her in it) children as needing cleansing by feeling such guilt that they could only assuage it by tremendous physical suffering.

Good grief! What an utterly nasty and unnecessary concoction that was! Look what it did: the child abuse scandals coming from various parts of the world, instigated by those in positions of religious authority! The burning and murder of many men and women as witches. The burning of heretics. The massacre of Jewish people not only by Hitler's holocaust, but by other so-called Christian nations - even here in the north of England (with a timely excuse for a scapegoat that 'the Jews killed Christ' while quite forgetting that Jesus was Jewish! The centuries of religious feuding and wars. And not one single word of it comes from the mouth of any of the truly spiritual founders of any of the most prominent religions. Had suffering been something required, would Jesus, for example, have cured so many people? Of course not, he would have patted them on the head and said, "Your suffering is good and holy!"

To this day, all the time, I hear 'religious' people saying, "Those who suffer are close to God.." and so many well-meaning people resign themselves to the will of a tyrannical God and think that is good, while others pander to the illness and think it is a sign of sanctity. Well, I utterly refute it! God is synonymous with Life. Does Life ever think it needs to destroy itself? It wouldn't make sense. The saints who suffered and died young, did so because they believed it was holy to do that. They brought their own illnesses on themselves by the belief that it was what God wanted. To my mind Life is Life. Life is the freedom to express our gifts fully, without any need to appease a stroppy Deity. That Life, the Life that lives through us, that expresses so purely and beautifully in Nature, in the love between people, in all that is healthy and pure and whole is what we call God. Surely, this whole notion of God was born of a series of minds that had so many issues of their own about guilt, and somehow they infiltrated the whole religious world and led people to suffer or inflict suffering on others through some totally bizarre notion that that is pleasing to this idol, who bears no resemblance whatsoever to the Buddha's vision or to Jesus' vision or Mohammed's vision, or to the vision of the great Sikh, Hindu or Judaic visionaries.

There is nothing holy or 'whole' in suffering. It is surely not the Divine view at all. Well...I watch the ducks on the lake at Temple Newsam and this is how it seems to me...

The Bluebell Wood At Temple Newsam

Alas! Dear Anne Bronte, like her sister Emily, was of a melancholy nature. Having grown up amid the freedom of the Moors, they found it so stifling to be torn from that childhood world and plunged into work that stifled their spirits. Anne's lovely poem, "The Bluebell" begins with such wonder but, sadly, as always, she slips into her sadness again.
Today I walked among bluebells (on the photo - at Temple Newsam) and had such a sense of being without the past, without the future, without anything but the glory of the woods. I think that the Brontes' yearning for freedom was so chained to that lost world of Angria and the Great Glass Town that they created as children - a fantasy world that was a reality to them. If only they had thought that perhaps it was possible to create and live their beautiful dream in this world, they might not have always been so melancholy and sad. It's a beautiful poem:

A fine and subtle spirit dwells
In every little flower,
Each one its own sweet feeling breathes
With more or less of power.
There is a silent eloquence
In every wild bluebell
That fills my softened heart with bliss
That words could never tell.

Yet I recall not long ago
A bright and sunny day,
'Twas when I led a toilsome life
So many leagues away;

That day along a sunny road
All carelessly I strayed,
Between two banks where smiling flowers
Their varied hues displayed.

Before me rose a lofty hill,
Behind me lay the sea,
My heart was not so heavy then
As it was wont to be.

Less harassed than at other times
I saw the scene was fair,
And spoke and laughed to those around,
As if I knew no care.

But when I looked upon the bank
My wandering glances fell
Upon a little trembling flower,
A single sweet bluebell.

Whence came that rising in my throat,
That dimness in my eye?
Why did those burning drops distil --
Those bitter feelings rise?

O, that lone flower recalled to me
My happy childhood's hours
When bluebells seemed like fairy gifts
A prize among the flowers,

Those sunny days of merriment
When heart and soul were free,
And when I dwelt with kindred hearts
That loved and cared for me.

I had not then mid heartless crowds
To spend a thankless life
In seeking after others' weal
With anxious toil and strife.

'Sad wanderer, weep those blissful times
That never may return!'
The lovely floweret seemed to say,
And thus it made me mourn.

The Ghosts of Temple Newsam

Temple Newsam House, a short walk from where I live, is renowned for its ghosts and it seems appropriate to speak of them at Halloween. Thousands of years ago, when I was a child, the famous 'Blue Lady' was the stuff of nightmares. Many times, since, I have been through the house half hoping to see her - alas to no avail! Children, today, though still speak of her and the various legends about how she was attacked and robbed while returning home and died soon afterwards. Legend has it, she returns in search of her stolen jewels. Then there is the story of the maid strangled in the cellars while resisting the advances of a footman...
I have never seen any ghosts at Temple Newsam but I have walked thousands of times in the woods there and I believe there is something so mystical and ancient about them. It would not surprise me to see fauns and satyrs skipping around those gnarled trees. The Templar legends resonate in that place and there is something so unique about the atmosphere of Temple Newsam that I have never experienced anywhere else. I would love to hear more of other people's stories of the ghosts they have encountered there, for I know there are many!

Temple Newsam

Temple Newsam House, birthplace of Lord Darnley, is a Tudor-Jacobean mansion set in the most glorious grounds. Long before the present house was built, the land - as the name suggests - was the property of the Knights Templar. Local street names: Knight's Hill, Baronsway etc. still bear witness to this. Being a law unto themselves, before they were banished from England, the properties they owned were marked with a Templar Cross and the inhabitants of houses with this mark were exempt from taxes, since they owed allegiance only to the pope not the king. It's interesting that several 18th century houses in the area of Temple Newsam still bear that cross and I wonder if - despite the banishment of the Templars - that right still holds (unbeknown to the residents) today.

"Beckford House" in "The Fields Laid Waste" and subsequent novels in the trilogy, is loosely based upon Temple Newsam House. The gardens, the rare breeds farm and the beautiful lakes and landscapes provide such a perfect background. The woods, even now, have a mystical feel about them...does this come, I wonder, from the ancient rites of the Templars...