1638

Charles I was on the throne the year that Willyam Snell died and was buried in Northamptonshire. Civil War was looming.

It is strange to be faced with the past. It shouldn't be, but it is. I mean, at the ruined church, I think of those for whom the spring was sacred. Those who built and worshipped in the church.

But some of them are still here.

I saw one fancy tomb - it was hard to read the name and impossible to read the date, but on the end-stone, I could read that three children of this man and his wife were also buried inside.

And the place is still "becoming". There have been two women buried in the cemetery this year.

I sat to eat my lunch, and saw that three cinnabar moth caterpillars had eaten the ragwort plant on which they had been laid, or whatever starts the caterpillar process. I moved them to healthier plants and they immediately started munching.

And I noticed a "new" engraving on the soft sandstone of the ruins.

At second glance, I see J, but at first I thought it was Chinese.