IN FOVANT’S FIELD

New Zealand Listener, Volume 2, Issue 27, 29 December 1939, Page 34

IN FOVANT’S FIELD

ISTENERS familiar with the BBC talks on rural topics know A. G. Street as a delightful radio speaker. To others he. is the author of Moonraking, Country Calendar, and Farmer's Glory, but to his neighbours he is known and most appreciated as a good farmer. As I watched a flock of ewes and lambs recently, I was reminded of Mr. Street’s description of a broadcast from the actual lambing-down pens in Fovant’s Field. On that occasion the ewes and lambs went on with their work undismayed by the presence of the men with the microphone. It was a little more difficult to get the shepherd in charge to be as_unselfconscious, but even microphones are forgotten in moments of stress — and such a moment gave the dweller in the city a brief but illuminating insight into the ways of shepherds and the flocks they tend. In Moonraking Mr. Street tells of the excitement of the men with the "mike" when a lamb actually arrived at their feet. One point in his tale, which the present situation makes poignantly touching, he describes as follows:There was one curious thing about the setting of that show — the sheep were on the actual site of Fovant Camp, and 18 years before, the ground on which the lambing pen stood was covered’ with army huts, which were occupied by German prisoners. Wiltshire may not have beaten her swords into ploughshares, but she has replaced army huts and German prisoners with a lambing pen, and sheep and lambs. Where I was standing by the microphone in that peaceful simple setting, I could not help thinking of this change for the better. Does anyone want to see the sheep and lambs disappear and the army huts return to Fovant’s Field? Surely not! The quiet beauty and wholesomeness of the present use of these acres in England — surely that is the better part? May it never be taken away!" When Wiltshire lambs come again, who can say what Fovant’s Field may hold?