Memories of the Vale

Book excerpt: First published in 1866 as "A Berkshire Village: its history and antiquities", this little collection of memories and true tales from the Vale of the White Horse has charmed generations of readers. At a time of rapid change in the English countryside the author, curate Reverend Lewin G. Maine, sought to record for posterity local people's recollections of a lost way of life. Now, exactly 150 years later, Rev Maine's work has been given an extra lease of life in this new edition edited by local historian Julie Ann Godson. With more than 20 delightful period illustrations, the book takes the reader from the most obscure period of British history through to the final days of a truly rural existence before the Great Western Railway thundered into this quiet corner of England.