Welcome or Welcome Not

The highlight of our Christmas activities is this entertainment by the wonderful Tim Laycock and Alisadair Braidwood who performed folk carols , songs and writings from Dorset’s folk heritage . The readings from William Barnes and Thomas Hardy are delivered with authentic Dorset accents . Some of the stories by Hardy I hadn’t heard before - ‘ The Thieves who couldn’t stop Sneezing !’  They also reminded us of the Church music from the locals in the ‘galleries’ being replaced by the more stately organs ! 
The setting in the Great Hall of Athelhampton House was perfect ( see extras ) .
https://www.timlaycock.co.uk/page1/page1.html
The gallery of Mellstock Church had a status and sentiment of its own. A stranger there was regarded with a feeling altogether differing from that of the congregation below towards him. Banished from the nave as an intruder whom no originality could make interesting, he was received above as a curiosity that no unfitness could render dull. The gallery, too, looked down upon and knew the habits of the nave to its remotest peculiarity, and had an extensive stock of exclusive information about it; whilst the nave knew nothing of the gallery folk, as gallery folk, beyond their loud-sounding minims and chest notes. Such topics as that the clerk was always chewing tobacco except at the moment of crying amen; that he had a dust-hole in his pew; that during the sermon certain young daughters of the village had left off caring to read anything so mild as the marriage service for some years, and now regularly studied the one which chronologically follows it; that a pair of lovers touched fingers through a knot-hole between their pews in the manner ordained by their great exemplars, Pyramus and Thisbe; that Mrs. Ledlow, the farmer’s wife, counted her money and reckoned her week’s marketing expenses during the first lesson—all news to those below—were stale subjects here.
From Under the Greenwood Tree : “Old William sat in the centre of the front row, his violoncello between his knees and two singers on each hand. Behind him, on the left, came the treble singers and Dick; and on the right the tranter and the tenors. Farther back was old Mail with the altos and supernumeraries.”