From Shalford Common the road runs almost straight to Bramley. But it is
worth while to leave the main road as it crosses the single railway line
from Shalford to Bramley and Cranleigh, and to turn to the right down
the little road that leads to Unstead Farm, a delightful brick and
timber building, with exceptionally graceful chimney-stacks and latticed
casements, behind which, in summer, there should surely be the largest
bowls of roses. I saw the old house last in a frosty December sunset,
surrounded by floodwater, with farm horses splashing up the road, and
plovers crying round the edges of the stream. It looked desolate enough;
but three hundred years ago it was a fine house, at one time the
property of the Austens of Shalford, and later passing into the hands of
the trustees of Henry Smith, the "Dog Smith" who gave so much to Surrey
charities, and about whom Aubrey heard a quaint legend. "He had the
nickname of Dog-Smyth, because he kept no house, but dined at friends'
houses, and then desired a bit for his dog, which was to refect
himself." Was he merely a crochety old gentleman who always went about
with his dog, or did he keep the dog's dinner for himself? Another story
about him was that once, when he was a poor boy, he was whipped through
one of the Surrey parishes--accounts differ as to whether it was
Chilworth, Tatsfield, or Wanborough--and that he struck that particular
parish out of his will, but left large sums to all the others. He
certainly left a large fortune to Surrey parishes, and no bequests have
found their way to Chilworth, Tatsfield, or Wanborough, but that is the
only foundation for the old story.
A mile south-west of Unstead Farm lies Bramley, which has grown up round
the station of the single railway line running to Guildford. The
restored church holds some good glass, but the prettiest thing in
Bramley is an old mill which, with its medlar tree overhanging the
water, its ducks and pigeons, its octagonal brick dovecot and lichened
roofs, and its sweet-water grape vine clambering on the old walls, has
a rich grace of colour and age setting it, in modern Bramley, a thing
apart.
Bramley is almost joined by Wonersh to the east: Wonersh with its quaint
other names, Wogheners, which was perhaps the original form, Wonish,
Ignorsh, and Ognersh. Wonersh was once a very important village. It was
one of the centres of the wool trade in the county, and of Wonersh, as
of Guildford, Aubrey has the same sad story to tell of cheating
clothiers. But, as we have seen, the real cause of the decay of the
Surrey wool industry was something quite different. Perhaps one of
Wonersh's rival clothiers started the story of the stretched cloth;
perhaps it was never a libel.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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