THOMAS HARDY'S DORSET _Works by the same Author_ RUDYARD KIPLING: A CHARACTER STUDY GEORGE BORROW: LORD OF THE OPEN ROAD WAR AND THE WEIRD THE AMBER GIRL KIPLING'S SUSSEX FRIENDLY SUSSEX. (_In the Press_) [Illustration: Birthplace of Thomas Hardy, Upper Bockhampton] THOMAS HARDY'S DORSET BY R. THURSTON HOPKINS WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY E. HARRIES AND FROM PHOTOGRAPHS NEW YORK D APPLETON AND COMPANY 1922 FIRST EDITION 1922 COPYRIGHT PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY THE RIVERSIDE PRESS LIMITED EDINBURGH CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. DORSET FOLK AND DORSET WAYS 13 The Dorset Rustic a Genial Fellow--Unconscious Humour--The Jovial Blacksmith--Cider-making--The Poetic Tippler--Anglo-Saxon Tongue--Enigmatical Sayings and Proverbs--A Dorset Rector and his Ale--Whiplegs--Thatch and "Cob"--A Beautiful Tract between Seaton and West Bay--The Devil's Own Card--Thomas Hardy's Story of Witchcraft--Conjurer Trendle--The Piskies--The Bibulous Farmer and the Piskies--The Cider Mill--Happy Days at Hovey's Barn--Marc Bricks--A Game of "Hunting"--A Dorset Vicar on Miracles--Akermann's _Wiltshire Glossary_--William Barnes--"Dorset's good enough for me!"--Large Farm Kitchens II. BARFORD ST MARTIN TO TISBURY AND SHAFTESBURY 33 Tisbury--John Lockwood Kipling--The Green Dragon at Barford St Martin--The Man who laughed gloriously--Points of Perfection in a Greyhound--The Best Dog that ever breathed--Shaftesbury and its Traditions--A Curious Custom--A Story of Water-carrying Days at Shaston--Bimport and _Jude the Obscure_--Old Grove's Place--Marnhull--Pure Drop Inn III. THE VALE OF BLACKMOOR 45 Fortune scowls on me--The Song of the Nightingale--A Little Round-Faced Man--The Hauntings of Woolpit House--The Vale of Blackmoor--White-Hart Silver--King's Stag Inn--The Length of Life in Animals--Folk-Sayings of Blackmoor--The Maidens of Blackmoor--Barnes the Poet IV. BLANDFORD TO DORCHESTER 59 Blandford--Winterborne Whitchurch--Turberville the Poet--Milborne St Andrews--"Welland House"--Hardy's _Two on a Tower_--Puddletown--The Story of Farmer Dribblecombe and the Christmas Ale--The Ancient Family of Martins--The Ape of the Martins--The Last of the Martins--The Church of Puddletown--A Sad Love Story--"Weatherbury Upper Farm" V. DORCHESTER 69