The Heart of the Dales (51 page)

‘Thank you, Dr Gore' said the Chief Inspector, moving forward. ‘I should just like to echo your comments. None of us, with the exception of your self, had any idea Connie was leaving us. She will be greatly missed. To repeat one of my colleagues, the place won't be the same without her. I speak for everyone here, Connie, when I say thank you for all you have done and may I wish you a very happy, restful and well-deserved retirement.'

‘Hear, hear!' said Sidney, not very
sotto voce
.

‘And I should also like to put on record my own appreciation for all the hard work everyone has put in this year, and for the welcome you have given me as Head of Department. I came to this great county of rolling fells and trickling becks, austere moorland and soft green dales, twisting roads and endless limestone walls, and felt immediately at home. It is a vast and beautiful landscape, God's own country, but it is the people in Yorkshire who make it so special – their warmth, hospitality, blunt honesty and cheerful good humour. So thank you, thank you so much for making me feel so very welcome. Now,' she said, turning to Connie who was standing in front of her, clutching the large silver box, ‘perhaps you would like to open your present.'

Connie took the box to the table and loosened the paper from around it. She lifted the lid off the box, and peered inside. ‘Oh, goodness me, how l… lovely!' she said, and drew out a large ugly shiny gold clock.

During the final few weeks of term, teachers and pupils everywhere had been preparing for Christmas. Highly-decorated fir trees in large tubs stood in entrance halls, wreaths of holly and laurel hung on doors, cribs with brightly-coloured figures had been taken from storeroom shelves, dusted down and arranged in classrooms, walls had been decorated with Christmas scenes, and nativity plays had been rehearsed and then staged throughout the county. I have always loved the weeks leading up to the year's most celebrated festival, both now and when I had been a child myself.

I was not aware of it at the time but, looking back, I realised I had had a charmed childhood and the very best life could offer – the combination of loving parents and dedicated teachers. I had assumed that all children, like myself, had parents who were, like the weather, always there – parents who never missed the opportunity of celebrating anything good that I did, however small; parents who told me stories and read to me every night; and parents who expected a great deal of me yet convinced me that I was as good as any of the other children. I think my parents believed that their first duty was to make me happy.

Of the many children I have met in the course of teaching and inspecting schools, some had been lucky and, like me, had had the very best; the world, to use one of Connie's expressions, was ‘their lobster'. Some like Michael, with disabilities, had mountains to climb, but they often possessed the determination and strength of character to get to the top. Others like Miranda would feel the pressure of excessively self-assertive and overly ambitious parents who won't allow them to have a carefree and happy childhood. And then there
were children like Terry – angry, lonely, mixed up, troublesome – who have a hard time of it growing up. Before he was taken into care, there was nothing in Terry's home except anger and unhappiness; there were no kind words of encouragement, no saving moments of fun; there was nothing to look forward to, nothing to strive for. He, of all children, deserved to have the very best teachers, teachers like Miss Bailey and Mr Hornchurch, who were enthusiastic, respectful, good-humoured, and who brought compassion, respect and laughter into the lives of the children they taught.

Wandering round Fettlesham on a cold, damp Saturday afternoon, a couple of weeks into my job as a school inspector, I had come on a second-hand bookshop down a narrow alleyway. I already had quite a collection of old books that I used to use in class when I was teaching – traditional fairy stories and fables, poetry anthologies, old-fashioned picture books, even defunct reading schemes. I had decided to go into the shop to see if there was anything of interest on the shelves.

The interior of the shop was as cold and damp as the world outside, and was deserted save for an elderly man who sat behind the counter, his nose in a small book. He looked up briefly at the sound of the tinkling bell but then returned to his reading and left me alone to browse. Some time later, I returned to the counter with the two books I had decided to buy.

The first book was a tattered specimen with a faded red leather binding but with what must have once been finely-tooled lettering; its pages were creased and discoloured. The book, written over a century before, by one Thomas Cobden-Sanderson, was about childhood. In it, I read later, he wrote of the qualities he hoped to inculcate in Richard, his five year-old son. Of course, I never thought at the time that one day I would have a son of that name, too. The qualities that Thomas Cobden-Sanderson listed seemed to me to sum up what the good parent should endeavour to instil in the young: politeness, kindness, obedience, patience, unselfishness, fortitude, courage, truthfulness, self-control, application, modesty
and reverence. I remember wondering at the time just what young Richard Cobden-Sanderson had made of himself in the world with such a start in life.

The proprietor handled the second tome with great reverence, stroking the covers with long fingers. It was clear he was reluctant to sell it. The book had a sturdy rust-coloured cover and was called
Dale Folk, Character Sketches in Prose and Verse
and had been written by Dorothy Una Ratcliffe over fifty years earlier. It was a treasure chest of anecdotes and stories, verses and memories and illustrated with detailed line drawings and delicate sketches.

‘I shall be very sorry to see this one go,' he had told me sadly. ‘I often used to take it off the shelf and read from it. And it's still in very good condition.' He had looked at me for a moment before adding, ‘But I feel certain you will give it a good home.'

‘How do you know that?' I'd asked, intrigued.

‘Young man,' he'd said, ‘you have spent the best part of an hour browsing the shelves, handling the books, turning the pages. You lost track of time. I can tell you are a lover of books.' Despite my protestations he would only take two pounds.

That night, in my cramped flat above The Rumbling Tum café, I had read
Dale Folk
from cover to cover, learning much about the people of the Dales who would soon become so special to me. It was a work of considerable poignancy and beauty, shrewdly observant, with a genuine flavour of the humour, plain-speaking, generosity and occasional dourness of this unspoilt rural people.

I had recently picked the book off the shelf at Peewit Cottage and re-read some of the chapters. Before shutting it, I had turned to the note printed near the front as a sort of dedication. ‘The people in this book you will find anywhere so long as you really wish to meet them.' Having now spent over four years as a school inspector in the magnificent county of Yorkshire, I had indeed met a veritable cast of them: Harry Cotton, George Hemmings, Thomas Umpleby, Hezekiah Longton,
Maurice Hinderwell, Lord Marrick, Andy – gamekeepers and gardeners, shepherds and lords of the manor, pest control officers and lollipop ladies, not to mention the many teachers and the wonderful children of the Dales.

It was a cold, overcast afternoon when I arrived at the final school I would visit that term. Backwatersthwaite Primary had been the very first school I had visited on becoming a school inspector. I was now looking forward to renewing my acquaintance with the remarkable headteacher, Mr Lapping. Our paths had crossed on various occasions during the intervening years, and he had never failed to impress me.

I had got hopelessly lost on the way to that first visit and had, in fact, passed the school without realising it. There had been no traffic triangle warning of a school, no school board, no playground, nothing that would identify the austere building as an educational establishment. I formed the idea at the time that the window boxes, tubs of bright flowers, curtained windows and small carefully-tended garden in the front of the building were intended to disguise the fact that it was a school. Perhaps the headteacher had cleverly altered the appearance of the building to resemble a private dwelling to evade a visit from unwanted visitors, in particular anyone from the Education Department at County Hall.

I smiled now as I made my way up the narrow path towards the gaunt stone edifice with its shiny slate roof and high leaded windows. I recalled that first occasion when I had lifted the great iron knocker in the shape of a ram's head and let it fall with a resounding thump. The heavy blackdoor had opened and I had been confronted by a thin, stooping man with frizzy greying hair like a tangle of wire wool and the complexion of a corpse. The figure appeared as though he had clambered up an embankment after a rail crash. He had had no policy documents, planning materials, schemes of work, lesson plans or curriculum guidelines. When I had asked to see his School Development Plan, he had run a hand through his hair and wrinkled his forehead into a frown. Then he had given a
hollow laugh and had informed me frankly that he wouldn't recognise such a thing if it were to fly through the window. He had gone on to inform me that, in his book, education was not about paper and processes, procedures and documentation, it was about teaching. Then he had tapped his brow.

‘It's all up here, Mr Phinn,' he had said.

He had told me, on that first meeting, that he reckoned it was the teacher who made the real difference in children's lives and that the teacher has an awesome power and a great responsibility. ‘A teacher can inspire or deaden, challenge or bore, hurt or heal, develop a love of learning or kill it stone dead,' he had told me. ‘Teaching is a vocation, Mr Phinn, not a job.'

Because of my late arrival, the children had in fact already gone home and so I had returned a month later for a proper visit. Despite the fact that there was still nothing written down or recorded, I had been highly impressed by everything I had seen and heard. Before I had left, a small nine-year-old with wide eyes and thick bracken-coloured hair had approached to inform me seriously that ‘Mester Lapping's a reight good teacher, tha knaws.' He had then suggested that I ought to write it down in my little black book in case I should forget.

Mr Lapping was now retiring after forty years in a profession he described as the most influential of all. I was there that afternoon to wish him the very best in his new life. He was moving south to Canterbury to live nearer to his daughter and grandchildren. I knew he would miss Yorkshire desperately and wondered if he would ever settle so far away from his beloved county. I had been invited to his farewell party, which was to take place later in the village hall, but sadly I had had to decline since it clashed with the nativity play at Hawksrill School. I had promised Christine I would be home in time to go to it with her.

Mr Lapping and I were sitting in his office, during the afternoon break. Through the window, I could see that snow had started to fall softly, and the deep valley, where a wide unhurried river flowed gently beneath the arches of a slender bridge, was speckled in white.

‘This is for you, George,' I said, passing him a brightly wrapped present. ‘As you browse through the pages, it's to help you remember your days in Yorkshire. It will perhaps remind you of the people of the Dales who have been so much a part of your life.'

‘How very kind,' he replied. ‘May I open it?'

‘Of course.'

He stared at the book, then read from the binding: ‘
Dale Folk, Character Sketches in Prose and Verse
by Dorothy Una Ratcliffe. How wonderful. Thank you so much.'

‘The final poem is a particular favourite of mine,' I told him. ‘Perhaps I might read it to you and wish you all the very best in your retirement. It's called ‘The Yorkshire Blessing' – I expect you know it.' I turned to the very last page and read:

To thi mind – Peace,

To thi 'eart – Joy,

To thi soul – Strength

And Courage.

In thine outgoings

Nowt amiss,

To thi 'ome comings

'Appiness.

‘Thank you, Gervase,' he said quietly. ‘I shall treasure it.' There were tears in his eyes.

He took a moment to compose himself, and then asked, ‘You will stay for the final rehearsal of our nativity play, won't you? I am sure you will enjoy our very own Yorkshire version, which the children have written and produced themselves. They took the Bible story and re-wrote it in their own inimitable words. I suppose some might say it's not really appropriate to go tinkering about with the Good Book but, then again, it has been translated into a fair few languages in its time and I reckon God won't object if He hears it in dialect – especially since God is, of course, a Yorkshireman,' he added, with a twinkle in his eye.

I sat in at the back of the large room as the children performed their drama on the makeshift stage. Of all the nativity plays I had seen over the years, this was undoubtedly one of the most original and perhaps the most memorable. The cast had dispensed with the usual attire – sandals, dressing gowns, pasteboard crowns, coloured towels draped over heads (usually held in place by elastic belts with snake clasps), cottonwool beards, cloaks, cardboard wings and tinsel halos, and had opted for simple modern dress.

A large, fresh-faced girl with long flaxen hair and attired in black slacks and a white blouse stood at the side of the stage as two children, the boy dressed in jeans and denim jacket, the girl in a bright flowery dress, entered holding hands.

‘And it came to pass,' said the narrator, ‘that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, the Emperor in Rome, that all the world should be taxed. Joseph, the carpenter, took Mary, his wife, who was having a baby, from Galilee to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, in Judea from where his family came. They walked wearily along the hot and dusty road and into the town, which was crowded with people all there to be counted. Very soon Mary and Joseph, tired from their long journey, arrived at an inn looking for somewhere to stay.'