SWEET ODOURS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 21, Issue 535, 23 September 1949, Page 21

SWEET ODOURS

CARTS AND CANDLESTICKS, by ‘Alison Uttley, illustrated by C. F. Tunnicliffe; Faber and Faber. English price, 8/6. LISON UTTLEY has written 12 chapters about the country of her childhood; written them simply, sincerely and lovingly. There is no forcing or contrivance here; she describes her book best herself with a phrase on page one: ". .. a powder of pollen and seeds and sweet odours of the lanes." She brings out curious bits and pieces of information: the legend that the baby son of James II was a pretender, inserted into the bed of the queen in-a warming pan; a piece about the salamander, "a romantic utensil ... with a wrought iron head of oval shape and a thick handle about a yard long with a ting for hanging it up at the end." It was left in the kitchen fire till 1ed hot, and used to light other fires and in cookery, in place of a grill, to brown the dishes when they came out of the oven. Yet, in spite of the diversity of material, this is not a messy book stuffed with protruding rubbish like an untidy bird’s nest. It has unity and is smoothly serene. Childhood in the country must have been happy for Alison Uttley. New Zealanders can note differences in outlook with advantage. It is not easy to imagine a New Zealand child content, as she was, to sit on a distant hillside under an oak tree, "looking down over many fields and copses to the little green patch like a pale handkerchief where the white-clad cricketers played, like diminutive clockwork toys."’ She did not know who had won the game till the servant boy came back with the milk cart next morning. Few New Zealanders could subdue their competitive spirit to such an extent. So she goes on her diverse way, talking about parcels and singing games and

spring water, country words, country | customs, country food; of observed child- | | hood magic, the musical notes of a dripping tap and the shape of the drops as they broke off, the life which seeps into | inanimate things when they have stood | in their household patterns for years on. end, kettle steam with a rainbow in it. One reads about these details a chapter at a time, not realising till the end that the unity of the whole is the unity of life close to earth, the mother of life. | ; | | Mr. Tunnicliffe’s rather craggy illustrations are most suitable and add to the

charm of the book.

G. leF.

Y.