Of Interest
Feather Watch
Slimbridge revisited
“When full moon rises over the river at dusk,
It is the sudden call of geese,
half heard above the roar of the wind,
that brings the greatest thrill of all”.
Peter Scott, Founder, 1947
It is very easy to sit at home during these dark winter months and leave the outside world to the snow, rain, and wind, but there are places that can give you a special treat and are well worth a visit.
Just down the motorway, the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust is just such a place, and in the words of it’s founder, Peter Scott, “you will see some mysterious birds from far away northern lands”. These are wild and wary birds, a traditional quarry of man since earliest times. I believe that the call of the wild geese in this wonderful place will lift the spirit.
Can it really be over fifty years since I came here from school, armed with my trusty Brownie camera and a pair of binoculars! The staff were just as friendly and admission prices reasonable.
The day was spent watch a spectacular collection of geese, ducks and swans from all the corners of the earth…… as well as our native ducks—graceful pintails, beautiful little teals, comic tufted ducks and a flight of mallards which had just arrived.
The arrival of many varieties of geese makes this a favourite place for bird watchers. The music from the skeins of geese can be heard as they sweep down from the clouds onto the mudflats by the river Severn.
There is also an observation tower, with lift, that gives one a fine view over the whole sanctuary and the river and mudflats beyond. On the day we were there we saw as many as five hundred lapwings put to flight by a pair of peregrine falcons interested in finding dinner! Nature red in tooth and claw!
A family of North American otters also live in their own enclosure, away from the wildfowl. To see these beautiful animals at close hand, diving and playing in their pool , was another unexpected treat.
It was a thoroughly pleasant day and made the call to visit wild places more insistent than ever.
The Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust website is; wwt.org.uk
Philip Kedward
Christmas at LITTLE MALVERN PRIORY
A visitor’s persrective
It was a warm Saturday afternoon in July 1980 that I first saw Little Malvern Priory. I was driving up towards the Malvern Hills from Welland when it suddenly came into view. Nestled at the foot of the wooded hillside it quietly and gently presented itself as a sacred and spiritual place. My visit confirmed this to be so, and that chance discovery is now preserved as a well cherished memory.
Since then I have never failed to visit when I have journeyed through this part of England; though, until recently, never at a time for more formal worship.
That changed at Christmas 2009, when my wife and I decided to spend our Christmas at the Malvern Hills Hotel: and that is how, for the first time in over a quarter of a century, I had the opportunity to attend both the Christmas Eve and Christmas Day services, and to create yet another precious memory.
It is difficult to express just what it all meant to me; the thoughts and the feelings are largely ineffable, but some of the experience can be described. The spontaneous kindness of a member of the congregation handing me a small torch at the Christmas Eve candlelit service, and the powerful and inspiring awareness of being absorbed into the joyful celebrations of a long-established and strong Christian community. I recall the sense of spiritual warmth radiating from the closely bonded and happy family of five in the pew in front of me at the 11 am. Christmas Day service: a forcible reminder of the value of Christian family life, and Christian community. All this in the context of the Christmas Day sermon, with its focus on crime and of the good and the bad in our society. As a criminal lawyer practising in the South East of England the sermon had a particular and personal resonance.
It was all so valuable and memorable, and I thank you all for the experience of being welcomed into your loved and loving Church.
“In small proportions we just beauties see:
And in short measures life may perfect be.” Ben Jonson.
Geoffrey Birch.
After sending a request to be allowed to publish this letter, I received the following reply:
I certainly would have no objection to you publishing my letter in the next edition of Pewsletter; I think it only right that the members of your congregation should know that your policy of offering a warm welcome to visitors has been, and is, deeply appreciated. Sadly, I share your opinion about some churches, who fail to extend a welcome to visitors and treat them almost like ecumenical aliens! Joyfully, as I hope that I have made clear, Little Malvern certainly succeeded in fulfilling the Christmas message of goodwill to all this Christmas past - from pulpit and congregation. My wife and I look forward to visiting you again, hopefully, in the not too distant future. With gratitude, Geoffrey Birch ( St Albans).
Thank you ALL and carry on caring. Editor
Churchyard Flora
The churchyard is probably one of the few pieces of land which has remained untouched since the Benedictines were at Little Malvern Priory—no ploughing, no insecticides, just some gentle mowing and trimming. We therefore asked a local expert, Peter Garner, if he would do a plant count for us and we were amazed when he produced a list of 73 different flowers and trees growing on this small area of land– flowers with marvellous names such as common mouse-ear, Yorkshire fog and pellitory-of-the-wall. He identified a further 17 species in the car park opposite the church. (There is a copy of his research in the porch. Do have a look at it.)
We are enormously grateful to him for doing this for us.
Jocelyn
Lent Studies
The Revd Canon Alvyn Pettersen has made a special study of the scholars of the church who formed its doctrine in the first 500 years. For instance, the creed we use in the service of Holy Communion was produced in AD 325 at Nicaea. This is one of the results of the debates that took place between the leading thinkers in the church during that time. The issues and conflicts of the church during that time are the foundations upon which it was built and are very similar to those we face today. We find our ancient buildings of interest because of what they tell us of our ancestors, their lives and their worship. Here we have the opportunity to learn about their thinking and what that tells us of them and our church of today.
Listen!
On one of the seats in the churchyard is carved the word ‘Listen’. At least that’s what I thought it said when I first saw it. Then I wondered if it said ‘Lister’ and was the name of the man who had made it, but I prefer my first interpretation because it is exactly the right place to sit and take in all that is happening around —–- the call of a blackbird, the song of a robin, grass being mown, the cry of a buzzard overhead ........... all the sounds of country life.
Why don’t you try it? Who knows, you might even hear the voice of God.
Jocelyn Bailey
1
We’ve been planting, we’ve been stitching,
For the New Millennium.
We’ve been planting, we’ve been stitching,
And its really been quite fun.
2
Beside the Yew tree in the Churchyard
Near the ancient pillar,
We’ve lifted turf to push in bulbs,
Crocus, anemone and cilla.
3
Some crouching and some kneeling,
Some in less elegant pose,
Provoking rather cheeky comments,
Which I’d better not disclose.
4
Meanwhile in houses various
Ladies have collected,
Some working quietly confident
Others more directed.
5
Concentration on their faces,
Needles at the ready,
Forward girls, we must be brave
And strong and firm and steady.
Marian Tosello and the new stained glass windows
As I hope many of you know our lovely new stained glass windows celebrating William Langland were given in memory of Marian Tosello.
What many of us don’t know is much about is Marian Tosello herself.
Her mother, Mrs Phelps Penry, came to Little Malvern from Bournemouth because of the war and rented Little Malvern Court from 1940 -1945 when Marian Tosello was a little girl. She then bought Moorlands in Malvern Wells in 1946. Marian therefore spent her childhood at the Court and in Little Malvern.
Mrs Phelps Penry took in unmarried mothers and their babies and looked after them in the Court as part of her “bit” for the war effort. There are 5 babies in the baptism register that must have been from that time. I think it’s rather lovely to imagine the prams outside the Court and the Mums being cherished in such special surroundings, especially during the war.
One of the babies was adopted by Mrs Phelps Penry and became an adopted brother to Marian and her brother John.
Marian went to school initially at Kirklands on the Wells Road, next door to St Wulstan’s, (This school has now moved to St Richard’s in Bredenbury), and then on to Lawnside in Malvern.
One ongoing connection with Marian is that Ursula Tremlett (nee Mortimer) went to school with Marian and was Veronica (“Log”) Hall’s sister. Log still attends Little Malvern Priory. Ursula married Caspar Tremlett, the headmaster of St Richards School, and moved to Bredenbury. She continued to look after Mrs Phelps Penry’s grave in Little Malvern Priory churchyard for many years when Marian was in Switzerland, until Log took over as she lived so much nearer. Sadly Ursula died a few years ago.
Marian met Mr Tosello (a catholic) on the steps of St Patrick’s Cathedral in New York in 1949. They married on 17th April 1950 and shortly afterwards moved to live in Switzerland. Eventually they had a house built in a small village called Corminboeuf. There Marian created one of the most beautiful gardens in the canton of Fribourg , reminiscent of the English gardens she was so fond of -and so far away from. However, she kept in contact with Little Malvern as her mother is buried in the churchyard. Henrietta, her daughter, was born in Malvern and christened here, but being catholic is not in our registers. She was apparently christened by the priest who looked after the Nuns who were at the Court then. They were the Little Sisters of the Assumption and were evacuated here from Birmingham after the war. Her sister Manuela ( Manou ) came next ( she was born in 1953 ) and Thibaut is the youngest and the only one to have been born in Switzerland
Apart from gardening, Marian had another passion, which was collecting antiques together with her husband. She also had a very strong sense of justice and founded the first Amnesty International Group in Fribourg. Although she spent most of her life in Switzerland, she never adapted to the Swiss mentality and way of life. Her youth in England had been too different, she was too independent to feel at ease there and therefore created a world of her own at Pré St George (the name of the house in Corminboeuf), her home from home.
Our knowledge of Marian is rather sparse and if anyone has any further information about her or her family it would be good to have it for the archives. We can then honour her more knowingly in her beautiful windows.
All Marian’s children and their spouses are coming to the dedication of the
windows by the Bishop of Worcester which is to take place during evensong on March 28th.
Do come and rejoice with us in this new embellishment of our lovely old church building.
Alex Berington has been given some photos of Marian by her brother and these will be on display in church when the window is dedicated.
Anne Burge January 2010