The perfume of clover is faint in the air

The night is so sweet and so still

There’s nought to be heard

Save that one singing bird

And the wheel of the old water mill

I will rouse me again for the battle of life

And bid my heart’s longings be still

Why be tempted to yearn for what cannot return

By the wheel of the old watermill.

 Please, can anyone name the composer of the above - an extract from The Old Watermill, learned by us during the 1930s when we were pupils at Huntington School.  During that time our uncle was the miller at Halls Mill.  We lived just down the lane at Llanarrow and   often stayed with our aunt and uncle in the house that Grace is now having “done up”.  We spent many happy hours playing in and around the mill, watching the water flowing over and turning the wheel.  (Pity the big wheel didn’t survive the war, but it probably did its bit to help win the war by being turned into munitions along with park railings, garden fences and other metal which could be managed without.)  

  The mill was rather a frightening place in those days, at least for little girls, what with the rumbling of the workings which seemed to shake the whole building, the pit where the inner wheel was (now at the back of the kitchen) which you stood back from for fear of being drawn in, and the banging of the trapdoors as the sacks of corn where hoisted up to the hoppers on the top floor.  We also still remember the smell - slightly musty, and the thick covering in this white dust, corn dust, and lots of cobwebs covered in this white dust.

  It’s lovely to see the mill so tastefully converted, and no longer just a ruined building.  A very pleasant journey back through time for us.

  L. Darke and  K. Whittall (nee Lily and Katie Turner).

  P.S.  We remember lots of mice and even a rat or two, but this time, not EVEN ONE MOUSE DROPPING!  Thank you, Grace, Mary and Gordon.  See you again in August.