DIGITS BUSY

Evening Star, Issue 21640, 8 February 1934, Page 11

DIGITS BUSY

WORKED WITH FINGERS AND TOES Thera are acrobats who arc paid £SO a night for a fe'at that Mr William Flewitt performs daily in the course of his w’eekly work for a few shillings. He is 70 years old. Ho makes cattle-feeding sleeps, which are stout wicker baskets, and when ho dies In's craft will die with him. Mr Flewitt at work is one of the curiosities of Castle Doninglon, Derbyshire. Ho builds his baskets round himself. It is doubtful if the whole of England can offer a more unusual spectacle. Most men when they arrive at work take off their coats; Mr Flewitt takes off his shoes. His feet serve him as extra hands. They are beautiful feet, strong and muscular, with the healthy look of well-prosei-yed hands. The big too of the right foot is as serviceable as an ordinary man's thumb. To make a skep Mr Flewitt selects six pliable pieces of thin wood as ribs for the liasket. Laying them one over the other in the form of spokes of a wheel, he stands on the top of the bunch. ThO ! space occupied by his feet is the size of the bottom of the basket. The craftsman then selects a stout willow half an inch thick and begins to weave. To do this he has to bend double, so that his hands touch his toes. He does this easily, and what is more ho maintains this difficult position for a full hour, turning round and round as the basket grows. As Mr Plcwitt’s strong, capable hands weave the stout willows in place his prehensile right foot laps over the edge and holds the prow in position, the toe pressing it down firmly with the strength of a muscular thumb. During this work he supports himself entirely on the left foot. The acrobatic pose necessary is unique. There is no other man in the country who can do it. anti there have been no young men apprenticed to the trade for fifty years. Mr Flewitt, in fact, is the last of his race. In his youth lie made six baskets a day. That means ho stood for six hours in a space a little over a foot in diameter with his head bent down to the level of his knees. It takes an hour to build up

a skep to the point where it can be completed in a more comfortable position. This remarkable man never has a headache, He never suffers from dizziness. And although lie works summer and winter in his bare feet he never suffers- from cold. Ho is spare, athletic even. His cheeks are rosy. And although he has spent so much of his life in a hairpin position he is, when walking, as erect as a sergeant in the Guards. When Mr Flowitt goes—and jic appears good for twenty years yet—farmers will have to use shops of zinc. And another pict in usque figure will ha ve disappeared from the English countryside^