8. When the farm had its own separate fields allotted to it, it became convenient for the farmer to live in the midst of his land. So we find the farmhouse and its buildings, with a few labourers' cottages, a long way out of the village, and away from the church. If you take notice you will find that from this outlying farmhouse there is usually a pretty straight field-path to the parish church. 9. Then, too, in parishes through which a big main road ran, as the traffic on the road increased, houses of entertainment for man and beast became necessary; =ale-houses= and =inns= sprang up, with little farmsteads round them. =Coaches= were put on many roads in the time of King Charles II, and had regular stopping-places, and these little inns often became important centres of business. Gradually hamlets sprang up round many of them. 10. The roads were so bad that horses frequently cast their shoes, tires came off wheels, and wheels came off carts and coaches; so under many "a spreading chestnut-tree" a little smithy and wheel-wright's shop arose. A smithy is always a centre of life and news, as everybody knows. You can see to-day, along many of our roads, sheds and shops being opened, where broken-down cycles and motor cars can be repaired and supplied with odds and ends which they may happen to need. 11. Thus =hamlets= have grown up away from the old village green, its church, and its manor-house. In scores of places the hamlet has become of more importance than the old village, and has grown into a little town, where new churches and chapels and public buildings have sprung up. 12. Then there are the =districts= where new industries and manufactures have been planted. That is too large a subject to deal with here, but think of the great changes these have wrought on the face of the country in the coal and mineral districts of England in the last two hundred years. 13. Again, there are the =railways=. Notice how little townships have grown up round the railway-stations, especially on the main lines in districts near a big town. Houses spring up for the hosts of people who, like streams of human ants, hurry to the station to catch the early morning trains, and, as the afternoon wears into evening, come again from the station to snatch a few hours' rest at home. 14. We have said nothing of "The beauty and mystery of the ships, And the magic of the sea", and the part they have had in the making of our towns and villages. This subject would require a book all to itself, and then we shall only just have begun to think about it, and to find out how little we know and understand of the things which go to make up our daily lives. 15. Yes, the life of our towns and villages is a very interesting subject. Nature and Man each works for and with the other; both are full of mystery, life, and beauty, if we could only use our eyes to see, our intelligence to understand, our hearts to sympathize, and our hands to work.