Notes in a Wiltshire diary

Press, 11 December 1976, Page 15

Notes in a Wiltshire diary

Gallipot Eyes: A Wiltshire Diary. Bv Elspeth Huxley. and Nicolson. 184 pp. $12.90 (Reviewed by Lorna Buchanan) John Aubrey, the busy seventeenth century diarist, noted of the people in northern Wiltshire: “They feed chiefly on milke meates. which cools their braines too much, and hurts their inventions . . . their persons are generally plump and feggy, gallipot eyes, anil some black; but they are generally handsome enough.” Elspeth Huxley took Aubrey’s evocative phrase as the title for a diary she kept as site lived in the village of Oaksey from April, 1974, to March, 1975. The village had already been her home for more than 30 years. She happily confesses that it has no special claims to attention except that she had come to know it well and had a profound respect for the lives of its people Buried away on the edge of the Cotswolds near the source of the Thames, the district had a history which stretched back to the first recorded Lord of the Manor, the Thane Brihtric in Saxon times. Brihtric w'as something of a traveling diplomat who is said to have dallied with the Lady Matilda w’ho became the wife of William of Normandy. As a result, after the Conquest. Brihtric lost his lands and spent the rest of his life in prison. Such snatches of local history are sprinkled through an account of life in rural England today. Elspeth Huxley uncovered the tale of a vicar 100 years ago who went to jqil for not pay ing a debt and who embarrassed his Bishop on his return by preaching that the Old Testament was a pack of fairy tale-,. She learned that oak cut in summer

would rot within a few vears: she marvelled at fox cubs pla) > ' her window in the morning mist. She defends the daily exchange with neighbours of remarks about the weather with the wise observation that these establish contact without commitment or starting up an argu ment. She found an old local scandal involving a basket, a baby, and • inUn which probably supplied Oscar Wilde with the germ of the plot for “The Importance of Being Earnest.” From the diary, a New Zealand reader is surprised to discover how intensively the English countryside has been fanned for centuries — and how well it rewards careful husbandry Elspeth Huxley is deeply saddened by the intrusion of city people, their carand vandalism, into rural England Bu' at least something of England pa-’ is still preserved to give a sens* of the continuity of famihe and farming By contrast. New Zealand’s countn -ide has no past. It seems to have tun'll from untouched wilderness to mechanised rural factory with scarcely a win*, between. “Gallipot Eyes” reminds u of our loss. As for John Aubrey's curious phrase of the title: A gallipot was a small earthen glazed pot used for oiniments; later the word was extended to mean an apothecary, lhe dispenser of polmns staring with round, serious eyes as he recommended mysterious medicine- in the days when the association of niagu and medicine was still freely admitted Unfortunately. Elspeth Huxley does not say whether the people of Wiltsluro really look like that But her book makes the district sound so charming it would be worth a visit to find out