Learn something about Dorset cointest

[+Dorsetgal & GeoDog]

Ok this cointest is going to be pretty simple, anyone who has not been to an event this weekend may enter

 

What to do: I'd like you to tell me something about the English county of Dorset, one fact per post please. You may include pictures.

 

How often can you enter? You may post every half an hour.

 

When will it finish? Midnight tonight, UK time, that's like just under 8 hours from now.

 

What's the prize? One Dorsetgal trackable Poker Chip coin. (from the TNT project)

 

Who will win? I will determine the winner by random draw before I go to bed tonight.

 

Good luck and I hope you enjoy learning something about our little corner of the world

 

Please keep it to one fact per post so that others have the chance to add something unique to the thread, thanks!

[lorca.nl]

Dorset is a county of great beauty, a land of contrast and breathtaking scenery. It is one of the maritime counties of southern England, fronting the English Channel which separates the United Kingdom from mainland Europe. Its coastline extends some 140 kilometers from Lyme Regis in the west to Christchurch in the east, and offers a selection of the finest sandy beaches to be found in the British Isles.

 

[+gardengorilla]

<h2 align="center">Charmouth </h2> One of the most studied and scientifically rewarding areas in England, and indeed the rest of the world, for studying Jurassic paleontology, stratigraphy and geology, and for collecting Jurassic and Cretaceous fossils, is along the continually collapsing cliff faces of the west Dorset coastline in and around the Charmouth area, (the Latitude is approx 50 degrees 44 minutes North and the Longitude is approx 2 degrees 54 minutes West).

 

The Dorset cliffs form part of the Lower Jurassic (or Lias) which comprise predominantly of clays, thin limestone's and siltstones.

[+KrazyTrollz]

Wow...... you live in a beautiful and interesting area!!!!!! Here ya go........

 

The Chase was formerly a royal hunting forest and has a fascinating history of smuggling and deer poaching, the latter being punishable by death. The deer remain and can often be seen grazing at the edge of the stands of hazel coppice which are a feature of this area. The wildlife of the downs is a fascinating study in itself - there are still areas of unimproved downland on which native flowers and butterflies flourish and the rare Stone Curlew still visits the Chase every spring. The views from the rim of this great ridge of chalk are superb - it is said that on a fine day seven counties may be seen from the top of Bulbarrow, with the green vale stretching from the foot of the downs until it is lost in the blue mist of the Somerset hills in the distance.

[SCYoli]

There are 8 beautiful Castles in Dorset, England

Corfe Castle

 

Sherborne Castle & Lakeside Gardens

 

Durlston Castle

 

Portland Castle

 

Christchurch Castle

 

Lulworth Castle

 

Highcliffe Castle

 

Maiden Castle

[+Geo.Error]

West Dorset's coast is known as 'Jurassic Coast' - it has been awarded World Heritage Site status, and consists of rocks formed during the Jurassic Period. This 25 mile stretch is fossil hunting country, with the beaches around Charmouth and Lyme Regis being the best places to hunt for fossils.

 

[+zoesbrother]

Dorset is largely rural with many small villages, few large towns, and no cities.

[lorca.nl]

Dorset has been visit by aliens in 1525

 

[+Jan and the Percey Boys]

the best thing Dorset ever did was to relieve us Hampshire Hogs of Bournemouth!!!!

 

The best thing about Dorset is the Road to Hampshire

 

Mind you I found this funny!!!

 

<image that is not family friendly removed by moderator>

 

Do you still sell wives down there?

 

Bob

 

You can take the boy out of Hampshire but you cannot take hampshire out of the Boy!!

 

edited for picture

Edited May 30, 2008 by Eartha

[paganfrog]

the first thing that always comes to mind when i think of dorset, is POOLE POTTERY. the history of poole pottery started over 200 years ago. all the pottery creations are only hand crafted, which in my opinion gives that unique rough homely feel that you will never get with machinery.

i have owned a couple of beautiful poole pottery mugs that are now 28 years old.

if i ever visited dorset again i would love to visit poole pottery to buy some more nice items.

[+Geo.Error]

Meet Poll Dorset Ram winner Melplash Show 2006

 

[+GATOULIS]

Oh!! dorset has fossils!!! I want an amonite!!!

 

The first known settlement of Dorset was by Mesolithic hunters, from around 8000 BC. Their populations were small and concentrated along the coast in the Isle of Purbeck, Weymouth and Chesil Beach and along the Stour valley. These populations used tools and fire to clear these areas of some of the native Oak forest!

[+The-Wolf-Pack]

Dorset is famous for its beautiful coastline, the Jurassic Coast, which features landforms such as Lulworth Cove, the Isle of Portland, Chesil Beach and Durdle Door, as well as the holiday resorts of Poole, Bournemouth, Weymouth, Swanage, West Bay and Lyme Regis. Dorset is the setting of the novels of Thomas Hardy, who was born near the county town of Dorchester. The county has a long history of human settlement and some notable archaeology, including the hill forts of Maiden Castle and Hod Hill.

[+KarelKraak]

In Poole is the finish (or start) of the most beautiful national trail of the UK: the South West Coast Path. 630 miles along the coast and it never gets boring

[lorca.nl]

Dorset was the home of auteres Jane Austen she wrights sense en sensibility.

this was her home

[+Tschakko]

Thx for the cointest

Just one fact:

Throughout the Jurassic period of geological time, Dorset lay under a tropical sea in which a thick accumulation of clays, sandstones and limestones formed. However, near the end of the Jurassic, sea levels dropped and the recently deposited Portland Limestone became exposed to form low-lying land.

[+BrierPatch]

It is in England right [Dumb American]

[+GATOULIS]

The earliest recorded use of the name was in AD 940 as Dorseteschire, meaning the dwellers (saete) of 'Dornuuarana' (Dorchester)

[+MountainRacer]

Dorset is a place of significant literary heritage. It's the native county of Thomas Hardy, who also set many of his works in that area of England. 'Jekyll and Hyde' was written there as well, though the action of the book largely took place in a more urban environment. Contemporary writers who have called Dorset home include Douglas Adams, who wrote 'The Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy' series, and spy novelists John le Carre and Ian Fleming.

[lorca.nl]

the man who may have been JACK THE RIPPER lived in DORSET .

his name is MONTAQUE JOHN DRUITT.

it`s because his likeness from many witness accounts.

[+Jan and the Percey Boys]

Dorset was the home of auteres Jane Austen she wrights sense en sensibility.

this was her home

 

What!!!!!!!

 

Chawton is in HAMPSHIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!

[+Jan and the Percey Boys]

DORSET IS BEAUTIFUL

 

...Oh! Dorset is a'beautiful wherever you go

And the rain in the summer-time makes the wurzle tree grow

When you're sitting in the spring-time in the thunder and the hail,

With your true love, on a turnip plant, to hear the sweet nightingale...

 

As I was a'walking one morning with a lass,

Mary Two Dorsetshire farmers I chanced for to pass.

And one said to the other as we went strolling by;

"There be more birds in the long grass than there be in the sky"

 

Oh! Nellie is my girlfriend and I loves her so.

Her's as big as an haystack and 40 years old.

Farmer says hers ginormous and loud do he scoff

For you has to leave a chalk mark to show where you left off.

 

Farmer looks at young Gwendoline and he looks at young Ned

"What a handsome young couple, they ought to be wed".

Farmer says sadly "It's impossible of course

For Gwendoline is my daughter and Ned he is my horse".

 

One day as her went milking with Nellie the cow,

Her pulled and her tugged but her didn't know how.

So after a short while, Nellie turned with a frown,

Saying "You hang on tight love and I'll jump up and down".

[+Tschakko]

The harbour of Poole is the second largest Natureharbour in the world, right after Sydney.

 

You are very generous for holding two cointest at the same time, thank you for the weekendfun

[+Frank n Beck]

Dorset has outstanding levels of biodiversity. 90% of all of the UK's bird species, 85% of mammals, 80% of butterflies, 75% of dragonflies and all of its reptiles and amphibians are found in the county.

 

Very beautiful place you live!!!!!!!!!!

[+Us 4 and Jess]

I am sorry this is a copy and paste, but it should be quite interesting to our American friends.

 

Broadstone is a village in Dorset, I think it might be quite near to where Wendy lives

 

Broadstone scarcely existed two hundred years ago. Heath Landers living in scattered cottages cut turf for fuel here, but there are relics of those who had lived or passed this way before. An arrowhead, dated to 1500 BC was discovered on the slopes of Springdale Road, and a 17th century stirrup from the restless days of the Civil Wars was found in Clarendon Road area, but historians give no clue as to how it may have got lost there.

 

Today Broadstone is an elegant suburb of Bournemouth and Poole. The slopes overlooking Poole Harbor and the Purbeck Hills encouraged the wealthy to build lovely properties there long before the last war, and the vast building estates which have grown up since 1946 have maintained Broadstone as a quality area. A large shopping center lines the main road and like many London suburbs built around villages, the older part of the village lives in harmony with the new. Where amongst the trees a few Victorian brick cottages survive, along with the white brick church built in 1888.

 

So named because of the broad stones laid as a means of fording the Blackwater stream, close to Brookdale Farm, Broadstone was first recorded as a village in 1765. The Roman road from Hamworthy was close to the present village and was the boundary of Canford Magna parish, but now it is the border between Broadstone and Corfe Mullen.

 

In its short history, Broadstone has witnessed the arrival and departure of the railway. Although the line came through in 1847, the station there was not opened until 1872. This facility lasted about one hundred years until Beeching axed the line and where the railway passed under a bridge at the village center, a complex road roundabout has been constructed. The last train out of Broadstone will be remembered by train spotting enthusiasts who gathered on that historic Sunday morning to see the train depart, loaded with other rail buffs. As cameras clicked, the guard posed on the platform, trying to obey all the instructions of the photographers when, waving his flag at their command, the engine driver thought it was time to leave, and the train pulled out. The memory those photographers will retain was of the portly guard chasing along the sleepers to regain his charge.

 

The Golf Club has attracted many famous personalities over the years, including a former Bishop of London who was not popular with some of the caddies. In addition to carrying the clubs, Dr. Winnington Ingram required his caddie to walk behind him and help push him up the steeper slopes of the course.

 

Broadstone has known a host of famous and unusual residents. Most famous was Alfred Russell Wallace, the biologist, who with Charles Darwin, was co-discoverer of the theory of evolution. He did not come to Broadstone until he was seventy eight years of age and in his lifetime, had explored the Amazon and Malay Peninsula. He liked unusual homes, and his house at Old Orchard has been described as dark and inconvenient. This man who was known for his scientific thinking and his views on spiritualism, socialism and vegetarianism is buried at Broadstone and his grave marked by a fossilized tree from South America.

 

As a boy, the actor Richard Todd resided in the village and the Dutch playwright, Jan Fabricus, lived at Caesar’s Camp, a house on Broadstone Heights. Although little known in this country, he was one of Holland's most famous authors. A pet bird always sat on his writing desk.

 

Broadstone was also the family home of the Hibberds. Stuart Hibberd was the B.B.C’s first Chief Announcer in the days when radio was the dominating media. His was the cultured voice of Britain and he will be remembered for his announcement when King George V was dying. the King's life is moving swiftly to a close.

 

A quick note to say that I reckon they must breed the nicest and kindest of people in Dorset, I have never actually ever met Wendy but I have spoken to her over the computer, MSN and the telephone, she has helped me many times with geocoins, doggie problems and many many other things, she has sent me presents gifts ect and I personally know she does many many good things for Dogs for the Disabled the charity Caesar came from and helps out with many other charities, she is always jetting off around the world but along with her geocaching activities their is also work involved, for being a wheelchair user she is truly an amazing person and she makes me feel very humbled she is an amazing and very generous person, and I feel privelaged to call her my "friend"

Caesar is just amazing too, its is fantastic what these two do for each other,they just make the perfect partnership. I cant wait to meet you both in August at the Mega Event.

Edited May 25, 2008 by Us 4 and Jess

[+LadyBee4T]

Dorset is the birthplace of Thomas Hardy, who wrote of Dorchester as 'Casterbridge' and renamed Dorset as 'Barsetshire' in his literary classic, "The Mayor of Casterbridge".

 

Thanks for another cointest!!!! Sure hope that Caesar continues to improve

[lorca.nl]

Dorset was the home of auteres Jane Austen she wrights sense en sensibility.

this was her home

 

What!!!!!!!

 

Chawton is in HAMPSHIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

what you mean whit chawton is this wrong?????

 

It's this county which was home to authors such as Jane Austen, William Barnes, and Thomas Hardy. The latter, probably Dorset's most famous son, immortalized the County town of Dorchester as 'Casterbridge'. His novels still attract thousands of visitors each year keen to see the real life settings for 'Far from the Madding Crowd', 'Jude the Obscure', the 'Return of the Native', and of course 'The Mayor of Casterbridge'.

[+GATOULIS]

In the 12th-century civil war, Dorset was fortified with the construction of the defensive castles at Corfe Castle, Powerstock, Wareham and Shaftesbury, and the strengthening of the monasteries such as at Abbotsbury. In the 17th-century English Civil War, Dorset had a number of royalist strongholds, such as Sherborne Castle and Corfe Castle, which were ruined by Parliamentarian forces in the war. In the intervening years, the county was used by the monarchy and nobility for hunting and the county still has a number of Deer Parks. Throughout the late Mediaeval times, the remaining hilltop settlements shrank further and disappeared. From the Tudor to Georgian periods, farms specialised and the monastic estates were broken up, leading to an increase in population and settlement size. During the Industrial Revolution, Dorset remained largely rural, and retains its agricultural economy today. The Tolpuddle Martyrs lived in Dorset, and the farming economy of Dorset was central in the formation of the trade union movement.

[+Us 4 and Jess]

Virginia Wade was born in Dorset in 1945

 

She won three Grand Slam singles titles and four Grand Slam doubles titles.. Best remembered for winning the women's singles title at Wimbledon in 1977. Since retirement has moved into television commentary.

[+Us 4 and Jess]

Virginia Wade was born in Dorset in 1945

 

She won three Grand Slam singles titles and four Grand Slam doubles titles.. Best remembered for winning the women's singles title at Wimbledon in 1977. Since retirement has moved into television commentary.

[+Anthus]

Dorset will host an Olympic event at the 2012 Summer Olympics – sailing – at the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy in Portland Harbour. Weymouth and Portland's waters have been credited by the Royal Yachting Association as the best in Northern Europe.

 

 

Thanks for the cointest.

 

....Anthus

[+Us 4 and Jess]

This is different............the largest hail stones ever recorded in the UK were in Dorset

 

Heavy Hail

In July 1808, a damaging hailstorm hit the South West of England, primarily affecting Dorset, Somerset & Gloucestershire.

 

The storm first hit areas in the Sherborne/Templecombe area in late afternoon then moved (or developed) to reach Bristol mid-evening.

 

From reports at the time, the diameter of much of the hail was around 11cm, with much damage being recorded - including injury & death to people in the open.

 

If these reports are correct, then this 1808 hailstorm produced the largest hail diameters for Britain known.

[lorca.nl]

the king of smugglers is Isaac Gulliver.

his men wore a uniform, the traditional smock of the Dorset farm hand.

[acadiahiker]

Dorset County has a population of approx. 410,100.

[+Tschakko]

Dorset has 8 Districts

 

1. Weymouth and Portland

2. West Dorset

3. North Dorset

4. Purbeck

5. East Dorset

6. Christchurch

7. Bournemouth (Unitary)

8. Poole (Unitary)

 

[+kdv]

The site of one of the largest hoards of Bronze Age axes ever found in Britain has been investigated by Wessex Archaeology. At a site on the Isle of Purbeck in south Dorset, metal detector users found hundreds of Bronze Age axes in late October and early November 2007.

[+PengoFamily]

Did you know that in Bournemouth on 12th July 1910 Rolls Royce co founder Charles Rolls became the first British man to be killed in an aircraft crash

[+Jan and the Percey Boys]

Whilst Dorset can lay claim to many British Authors such as Henry Fielding, Robert Louis Stevenson, Thomas Hardy, William Barnes either through Birth or residence Jane Austen was not one of them.

 

Jane Austen (1775-1817) lived most of her life in Hampshire. She was born and raised in eastern Hampshire, her father being rector at Steventon near Basingstoke. This was followed by sojourns in Bath (her father retired there), Southampton, Chawton in East Hampshire, and finally Winchester, where she died and is buried. She was known to have holidayed in Lyme Regis but this hardly makes her a dorsetwoman

 

Anyway back to the county - here is William Barnes opinion

 

In Praise of Dorset

We Do'set, though we mid be hwomely,

Be'nt asheamed to own our pleace;

An' we've zome women not uncomely;

Nor asheamed to show their feace;

We've a mead or two wo'th mowen,

We've a ox or two wo'th showen,

In the village,

At the tillage.

Come along an' you shall vind

That Do'set men don't sheame their kind.

Friend an' wife,

Fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers,

Happy, happy, be their life!

Vor Do'set dear,

Then gi'e woone cheer;

D'ye hear? woone cheer!

 

If you in Do'set be a roamen,

An' ha' business on a farm,

Then woont ye zee your eale a foamen!

Or your cider down to warm?

Woont yo have brown bread a-put ye,

An' some vinney cheese a-cut ye?

Butter> - Rolls o't!

Cream? - why bowls o't!

Woont ye have, in short, your vill,

A-gi'ed wi' a right good will? Friend an' wife,

Fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers,

Happy, happy, be their life!

Vor Do'set dear,

Then gi'e woone cheer;

D'ye hear? woone cheer!

 

An woon't yo have vor ev'ry shillen,

Shillen's wo'th at any shop.

Though Do'set chaps be up to zellen

An' can meake a tidy swop?

Use 'em well, they'll use you better;

In good turns they woont be debtor,

An' so comely,

An' so hwomely,

Be the maidens, if your son

Took woone o'm, then you'd cry 'Well done!'

Friend an' wife,

Fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers,

Happy, happy, be their life!

Vor Do'set dear,

Then gi'e woone cheer;

D'ye hear? woone cheer!

[+LadyBee4T]

Sherborne School, a traditional Anglican public school, has been used as a film location many times. The Browning Version (1951, 1994), Goodbye Mr Chips (1969), and The Guinea Pig (1948) were all made here. Although it is a working school, it is possible to see around the grounds.

 

Off to a picnic now. Thanks for the cointest!!!

[lorca.nl]

After the battle of Worcester on September 3rd 1651, the future King Charles II fled from the field attempting to reach the continent of Europe. Heading south he arrived in West Dorset. Even though he was only in the county for about three days, (Trent was at the time in Somerset), almost every town and village has a story relating to this episode in English history.

 

After the restoration, the Prince, as King Charles II, paid many visits to his friends in Dorset and tradition has it that during one of these visits the King stopped at a blacksmith’s forge in the small village of Godmanstone and requested of the smithy a glass of porter. Quoth the blacksmith, ‘I cannot oblige you Sire, as I have no license.’ Then said the King, ‘From now on you have a license to sell beer and porter.’ So was born the Old Smith's Arms in the forge at Godmanstone. Built of mud and flint, at 20ft by 10ft it was for many years claimed to be the smallest public house in England.

[+Geo-Gophers]

Hope Caesar is well on the road to recovery........

 

Dorset blue vinney (frequently spelled "vinny") is a traditional blue cheese made in Dorset, England, from skimmed cows' milk. It is a hard, crumbly cheese. "Vinney" is a local Dorset term related to the obsolete word "vinew", which means to become mouldy. Another explanation has it that "vinny" is a corruption of "veiny", referring to the blue veins running throughout the cheese.

 

While the cheese was a common farmhouse cheese in Dorset for hundreds of years, production dried up around 1960 and the cheese became extinct. However, in the 1980s Woodbridge Farm in Dorset revived the old recipe, and it is now producing the cheese again.

 

Thanks for another great cointest!!

Edited May 25, 2008 by Geo-Gophers

[acadiahiker]

Dorset has a thriving population of Sika deer, a species from Asia, introduced to Britian in the 1800's.

[lorca.nl]

well Jan and the Percy Boys,

 

i`m sorry if i am wrong about Jane but i read it on the Dorset Page....

so i`m glad that you make me learn where Jane come from

 

maybe the dorset page must correct it but i will never forgot it.

 

http://www.thedorsetpage.com/Dorset_Home.htm

[+zoesbrother]

Dorset is famed in literature for being the native county of author and poet Thomas Hardy, and many of the places he describes in his novels in the fictional Wessex are in Dorset

[+Tschakko]

The population of Dorset is about 645.000 with 25,9% over 65 years of age, the oldest population of Great Britain

[lorca.nl]

Public executions were for centuries one of the most popular forms of entertainment in England and Dorchester as an assize town certainly witnessed its fair share. Lurid descriptions of these spectacles abound in the literature, with immense crowds of rich and poor alike jostling to obtain the best view-point, their mood varying according to their sympathies with the criminal.

 

the last public hanging was in 1858.

[+Geo-Gophers]

Dorset was the home of T.E. Lawrence, aka Lawrence of Arabia. His home, "Clouds Hill" (now owned by the National Trust) is situated near Wareham. At the age of 46 he was killed in a motorbike accident, very near to his cottage. He is buried in the churchyard at Moreton.

 

The "Church of St Nicholas and St Magnus" at Moreton is famous not only for being the burial place of T.E.Lawrence. After being bombed in WW2 it was rebuilt, but the stained glass window panels were never replaced. In their place a beautiful set of engraved glass windows were created by Sir Laurence Whistler. Not only are the windows themselves world famous and a sight to see in their own right but the transformation of the inside into a place of light and space is magical.

Edited May 25, 2008 by Geo-Gophers

[acadiahiker]

Sherborne Castle was built by Sir Walter Raleigh in 1594.

 

Thanks for the cointest! Off to a birthday party now on this most beautiful day on coastal Maine.

[+Jan and the Percey Boys]

well Jan and the Percy Boys,

 

i`m sorry if i am wrong about Jane but i read it on the Dorset Page....

so i`m glad that you make me learn where Jane come from

 

maybe the dorset page must correct it but i will never forgot it.

 

http://www.thedorsetpage.com/Dorset_Home.htm

 

Thnks for tht I am hampshire born and bred and we look after our own!!!!! I am sure you have small rivalries with neighbouring areas in the Netherlands. The issue between Hampshire and Dorset is fairly friendly unlike with the Moonrakers (people from Wiltshire!!). the bigger rivalry is between cities within hampshire. The Southampton folk hate the skates from Portsmouth. So here is a dorset fact

 

Sandbanks is the home of the biggest Traitor

 

sorry got carried away

 

my favourite dorset quote is from Thomas Hardy and tells the story of the demise of the village Quire (Church band) it goes as follows

 

Absent-mindedness in a Parish Church

 

It happened on Sunday after Christmas - the last Sunday they played in Longpuddle church gallery, as it turned out, thought they didn't know it then. As you may know, sir, the players formed a very good band - almost as good as the Mellstock parish players that were led by the Dewys, and that's saying a great deal. There was Nicholas Puddingcome, the leader, with the first fiddle; there was Timothy Thomas, the bass-viol man; John Biles, the tenor fiddler; Dan'l Hornhead, with the serpent; Robert Dowdle, with the clarionet; and Mr Nicks, with the oboe - all sound and powerful musicians, and strong-winded men - they that blowed. For that reason they were very much in demand Christmas week for little reels and dancing parties; for they could turn a jig or a hornpipe out of hand as well as ever they could turn out a psalm, and perhaps better, not to speak irreverent. In short, one half-hour they could be playing a Christmas carol in the squire's hall to the ladies and gentlemen, and drinking tay and coffee with 'em as modest as saints; and the next, at the Tinker's Arms, blazing away like wild horses with the 'Dashing White Sergeant' to nine couple of dancers or more, and swallowing rum-and-cider hot as flame.

 

Well, this Christmas they'd been out to one rattling randy after another every night, and had got next to no sleep at all. Then came the Sunday after Christmas, their fatal day. 'Twas so mortal cold that year that they could hardly sit in the gallery; for though the congregation down in the body of the church had a stove to keep off the frost, the players in the gallery had nothing at all. So Nicholas said at morning service, when 'twas freezing an inch an hour, "Please the Lord I won't stand this numbing weather no longer; this afternoon we'll have something in our insides to make us warm, if it costs a king's ransom."

 

So he brought a gallon of hot brandy and beer, ready mixed, to church with him in the afternoon, and by keeping the jar well wrapped up in Timothy Thomas's bass-viol bag it kept drinkably warm till they wanted it, which was just a thimbleful in the Absolution, and another after the Creed, and the remainder at the beginning o' the sermon. When they'd had the last pull they felt quite comfortable and warm, and as the sermon went on - most unfortunately for 'em it was a long one that afternoon - they fell asleep, every man jack of 'em; and there they slept on as sound as rocks.

 

'Twas a very dark afternoon, and by the end of the sermon all you could see on the inside of the church were the parson's two candles alongside of him in the pulpit, and his spaking face behind 'em. The sermon being ended at last, the pa'son gie'd out the Evening Hymn. But no quire set about sounding up the tune, and the people began to turn their heads to learn the reason why, and then Levi Limpet, a boy who sat in the gallery, nudged Timothy and Nicholas, and said, "Begin! begin!"

 

"Hey? What?" says Nicholas, starting up; and the church being so dark and his head so muddled he thought he was at the party they had played at all the night before, and away he went, bow and fiddle, at 'The Devil among the Tailors', the favourite jig of our neighbourhood at the time. The rest of the band, being in the same state of mind and nothing doubting, followed their leader with all their strength, according to custom. They poured out that there tune till the lower bass notes of 'The Devil Among the Tailors' made the cobwebs in the roof shiver like ghosts; then Nicholas, seeing nobody moved, shouted out as he scraped (in his usual commanding way at dances when the folk didn't know the figures), "Top couples cross hands! And when I make the fiddle squeak at the end, every man kiss his pardner under the mistletoe!"

 

The boy Levi was so frightened that he bolted down the gallery stairs and out homeward like lightning. The pa'son's hair fairly stood on end when he heard the evil tune raging through the church, and thinking the quire had gone crazy he held up his hand and said: "Stop, stop, stop! Stop, stop! What's this?" But they didn't hear'n for the noise of their own playing, and the more he called the louder they played.

 

Then the folks came out of their pews, wondering down to the ground, and saying: "What do they mean by such wickedness! We shall be consumed like Sodom and Gomorrah!"

 

And the squire, too, came out of his pew lined wi' green baize, where lots of lords and ladies visiting at the house were worshipping along with him, and went and stood in front of the gallery, and shook his fist in the musicians' faces, saying: "What! In this reverent edifice! What!"

 

And at last they heard'n through their playing, and stopped.

 

"Never such an insulting, disgraceful thing - never!" says the squire, who couldn't rule his passion.

 

"Never," said the pa'son, who had come down and stood beside him.

 

"Not if the Angels of Heaven", says the squire (he was a wickedish man, the squire was, though now for once he happened to be on the Lord's side) - "not if the Angels of Heaven come down", he says, "shall one of you villainous players ever sound a note in this church again; for the insult to me, and my family, and my visitors, and the parson, and God Almighty, that you've a-perpetrated this afternoon!"

 

Then the unfortunate church band came to their senses, and remembered where they were; and 'twas a sight to see Nicholas Puddingcome and Timothy Thomas and John Biles creep down the gallery stairs with their fiddles under their arms, and poor Dan'l Hornhead with his serpent, and Robert Dowdle with his clarionet, all looking as little as ninepins, and out they went. The pa'son might have forgi'ed 'em when he learned the truth o't, but the squire would not. That very week he sent for a barrel-organ that would play two-and-twenty psalm tunes, so exact and particular that, however sinful inclined you was, you could play nothing but psalm-tunes whatsomever. He had a really respectable man to turn the winch, as I said, and the old players played no more.

[lorca.nl]

Dorset is connected to London by two main railway lines. The West of England Main Line runs through the north of the county at Gillingham and Sherborne. The South Western Main Line runs through the south at Bournemouth, Poole, Dorchester and the terminus at Weymouth. Additionally, the Heart of Wessex Line runs from Weymouth to Bristol. Dorset is one of only four non metropolitan counties in England not to have a single motorway. The A303, A31 and A35 trunk roads run through the county. The only passenger airport in the county is Bournemouth International Airport, and there are two passenger sea ports, at Poole and Weymouth.