Please excuse the poor photograph: in the sealed-up portion of the former church was a sort of deep windowless alcove, screened off by a thick heavy curtain. It was obviously once used as a vestry. Hanging on the wall was a line of photographs of former vicars (I sometimes think of these images of earnest Victorian and Edwardian gentlemen, hanging in the darkness and silence of the abandoned chancel alcove, keeping watch for the Day of Judgement when the words of their sermons will finally be justified).

Anyway, the caretaker and I stood outside the church/social hall talking about the local area, and I noticed on the row of cottages opposite was a datestone with the inscription Sea On Land Terrace 1884. Indicating the name, I said the reference to the sea was curious considering how inland we were, miles from the nearest coast. The caretaker, who had lived in the village all his life, said the "sea" was a huge shallow inland lake that used to form in winter in a wide basin across the southern half of the vale, turning the village into an island. Once the "sea" had formed it would last several months - sometimes as long as the first weeks of Summer. Drainage schemes since the Second World War had reduced this flooding, and the lake now appeared only after exceptional rainfall, lasting only a week or so.