The _Plough_ and _Harrow_ are both primitive emblems, and agricultural signs such as these point to a very high antiquity. The _Plough_ at Kingsbury is supposed to be more than eight hundred years old.
At the Upper Dicker in Sussex there is an inn called the _Plough_, which is worth visiting by motorists on their way to the _Star_ at Alfriston, especially as it will enable them to get a glimpse of Michelham Priory on an island in the Cuckmere close by. The tap-room of this inn has a generously-planned fireplace with an ancient fireback and dogs. Up till quite recently it was the custom to keep a fire constantly burning, and in the hottest weather the warmth of this fire was far from unwelcome owing to the thickness of the outer walls. This tradition of the ever-burning fire is a curious one, found in remote districts, and pointing to a time when the public-house was necessarily resorted to for purposes of this kind. At the _Chequers Inn_, Slapestones, near Osmotherly, in Yorkshire, the hearth-fire has been burning uninterruptedly for at least a hundred and thirty years.
Some inns now known as the _Ship_ were possibly at one time the “Sheep,” as will be readily understood by those acquainted with rustic dialect. _Shepherd and Crook_, _Load of Hay_, _Woodman_, are all to be found in rural districts throughout England. The _Wheatsheaf_, whether it surmounts a fine old coaching house in a market town, or a little wayside inn far from the madding crowd, reminds us that we once could boast of the finest wheat culture in the world; while the _Harvest Home_ pleasantly recalls the merry-making which concluded the ingathering of the crops.
In some country villages there are a very large number of small inns close together, perhaps three in a row. At Steeple Ashton, in Oxfordshire, there are thirteen, and at East Ilsley, in Berkshire, nearly as many to a population of about five hundred. The street seems almost to consist of public-houses. But it would be quite wrong to suppose that the inhabitants of these districts are unduly given to convivial habits. The reports of the petty sessions show that drunkenness is exceedingly rare. In Steeple Ashton division no charge of drunkenness has been heard for the past six years. Such villages are decayed market towns, which become important at the time of their periodical sheep fairs, when an army of graziers and shepherds from the distant downs must find board and lodging. For a week these inns are crowded with dealers in velveteen jackets, and grizzled veterans clad in those blue smock coats and slouched hats, which were once the universal dress of village labourers, with a shaggy bob-tail dog under every chair. When fair-time is over they are quite deserted.