[Illustration: _The Village Street, Ripley._] The motor-car has brought prosperity, even if it is a prosperity that can soil. But the tarnish washes off in night and rain. Ripley may look its best early on a Saturday morning, before the flood rushes down the road. When the little village lies clean and fresh in the sun, and the inns are busy with white tablecloths and cooking potatoes, and the children sit on the edge of the green before the dust comes, there is a sense of orderly bustle and of waiting for a day of hard work and good money that is pleasant enough. One building only has suffered from the business of the road. The little church stands behind arches and canopies of clipped yew, its walls almost touching the highway. It is an interesting little building, though much altered from its oldest form; the chancel has the remains of clustered pillars, and a beautiful string-course of Caen stone running round it. But those have not been the only attractions to visitors. When I was there I noticed that the oak collection-box by the door stood with its lid propped open. The caretaker happened to be in the church, and I showed it to her. "Oh yes," she said in a matter-of-fact tone, "we have to keep it like that. It has been robbed so often that we prop it open, so as to prevent people putting anything in." The church door still remains as wide open as the box. It would be a pious act for some passing motor-car--or a collection from many--to present the little church with a stronger box. Such continued hospitality, so vilely abused, deserves a return. [Illustration: _Trees on the Green, Ripley._] Two miles up the road lies the Hut Pond, opposite an inn that serves many tables. There is no quiet on the pond in the business of the day, but I was once on it on an October evening, and as the sun went down the sky filled suddenly with teal. Bunches of teal wheeled and circled in the cold twilight, whizzed down among the rushes, darted up again and round over the pines, then shot down again and settled, splashing quietly in the sedge. [Illustration: _Priest's door and Norman Chancel Ripley Church._]