This Sceptered Isle Britain on Film

We live in a fertile land,

a land of goodly crops, of fragrant flowers.

Of sturdy animals.

Fertility is the basis of our national life.

A new life that comes unfailingly every year.

A new life that is a never-ending miracle.

More than 4,000 years ago, the ancient Celts practised

in Britain a form of fertility worship which went on for centuries.

Not surprising.

If the gods weren't pleased, the people starved or died out.

And even today, in many parts of the country, the old fertility customs

are still kept up, even though the old superstitions are dead.

At Padstow in Cornwall, every year on May Day,

the hobby horse custom is danced

and most of its 3,000 people turn out for the celebrations.

The hobby horse, symbolic of life triumphing over death, begins

his dance round the maypole with his traditional followers and musicians.

They sing and they dance and the whole town dances

and sings with them.

They dance through the town and they dance into people's homes.

They repeat again and again the story of new life

and the more they dance, the more fervent they become.

They dance in the streets and down on the harbour.

And they sing, even in the rain.

Nearly 300 miles away, in the heart of London,

is the headquarters of a society, one of whose objects is to keep

alive the old fertility customs.

Cecil Sharp House is the centre to which

hundreds of people from all over the world come to learn

about English traditions and to see some of Britain's dances.

The English Folk Dance and Song Society,

which has been celebrating its golden jubilee,

has gathered together an immense library of books, music

and knowledge of folklore from every part of the country.

Director Douglas Kennedy and his staff are continually looking for

evidence of the origins of national folk dances and music

and are always finding new exhibits

for their collections of Mumming and Morris dolls.

Morris dancing is another fertility custom.

There are over 1,000 serious Morris dancers in England

who perform publicly from May Day to midsummer.

Outside St Paul's Cathedral are some of London's Morris dancers.

The Beaux of London City, as they call themselves,

are dancing with the hobby horse

and the fool with the traditional music and the colourful costumes.

The Tutti-men of Hungerford in Berkshire go one better.

Every Hocktide, that's just after Easter, the chosen

Tutti-men are allowed to kiss as many girls as they can in one day.

They carry staves of flowers and they reckon

a girl is anything between eight and eighty.

Based on an ancient fertility rite,

this ceremony is connected with the annual court which regulates

the freedoms and land given to the people of Hungerford by John O'Gaunt

in the 14th century, before the days of lipstick, of course.

But at Helston in Cornwall, they're more formal

when the town turns out for its annual Furry Dance.

It's also known as the Flora Dance

and Flora was the goddess of fertility.

Here too, they don't let rain damp their ardour.

From early morning, they dance, a celebration of the awakening

of spring with all its fruits and new life.

Once a year, many of Britain's 250,000 students take time off

from their books and studies for the serious business of making whoopee.

And the crazier and madder it is, the better they like it.

And in the process,

they virtually take over their local town or city, so that everyone,

especially the police, knows that Rag Day is here again.

In this way, the students hope to collect more money for charity,

which is the whole point, or excuse, for holding Rags at all.

The highlight of any Rag is the procession,

like this one at Sheffield, when 35 floats and hundreds

of students move through the city under the eye of the police.

With vehicles and drivers lent by local firms, the students

entertain the crowds in the hope of extracting still more money.

Spectacular ideas are always needed for Rag days.

Sheffield University has made use of their local river, the Don,

for a popular event. It's the Boat Race, but with a difference.

Students must build their own boats

and each boat mustn't cost more than a pound.

A mass start and they're off!

More than 40 odd-shaped craft

leave for the mile-and-a-half sprint downstream.

The river runs through the centre of the city,

so spectators get a good view of the race.

But the weir is the favourite place to watch,

where casualties come thick and fast.

Craft sink, others have to be manhandled,

and a few reach the finishing line.

It all makes for a good laugh.

On a local boating lake, students of Leeds University square up

for their annual Rag water battle.

It's the School of Technology versus the Engineers.

The winner has to knock the opposing team off their raft.

It's a free-for-all. Anything can be used. And the Engineers win.

They always do! There are always more of them in the battle.

Although the Rag itself lasts only a day,

all sorts of stunts lead up to it.

Planning and preparation go on for months beforehand.

Manchester's Rag is now controlled by regulations

agreed between the students and the local authorities after

a recent Rag Day procession got out of hand.

Flour bombs, such as these lads are making,

or any form of missile, are now banned in the streets.

Penalties include fines, or even dismissal from the university.

The chance of being Manchester's Rag Queen always draws

a queue of student beauties.

But it might be the £25 prize money they're after.

A panel of judges fires questions at each girl,

for personality as well as beauty counts here.

The winner in the centre is 19-year-old Sheila Clivery,

who studies domestic science.

Good cooking pays off in Manchester too!

But what's this?

Two late arrivals were determined to get in on the act.

Every girl must be given her chance, even if

she's skipped those eliminating trials.

Wait a minute! Is this another stunt?

As the months of planning come to an end, stunts and competitions

whip up the students' enthusiasm for Rag Day itself.

The pipe smoking competition is a big draw and a big cough for some!

Pipes and tobacco are supplied,

but some students, like these technicians, bring their own.

With five minutes to light up,

the winner is the person who can keep their pipe alight longest.

Incidentally, this chap gets no more tobacco than the others.

Manchester won the women's Varsity record for pipe-smoking,

just over 43 minutes.

Then the final day comes.

Rag Day, when a procession of nearly 50 floats heads for the city centre.

Floats representing films are very popular.

On a fine day, about 70,000 people come out to see the show,

and every collecting box is there too, after their money.

Work is brought to a stop, and, in places, the crowds almost

prevent the floats from getting through.

But thousands enjoy the fun, and in Manchester alone it means

nearly £20,000 a year for good causes.

The stately homes of England, how beautiful they stand.

Mid their tall ancestral trees, or all this present land.

And what they say today is this,

the stately homes of England,

how lucrative they stand.

And if they were not lucrative, or at least helping to pay their way

many of them would not be standing at all.

In these days of high taxation, it is becoming increasingly impossible

for one man and his family to live solvent

amid his ancestral splendours.

So the stately home has had to become the public show.

All over Britain, the castle gates, once so firmly closed, are being

thrown wide open to the world and his wife,

and their children as well.

About three million people a year

are drawn by the irresistible attraction

of seeing not only the treasures of these great houses,

but how a duke or a lord lives when he's at home.

There are now more than 400 castles, halls and mansions in Britain,

the majority in the south of England, which keep open house.

At a price, of course.

Average entrance fee is half a crown.

Top of the stately homes league is Woburn Abbey,

home of the Duke of Bedford.

Faced with a bill of £5 million death duties,

he's made it the liveliest stately home in the world.

The great state rooms include a magnificent bedroom,

used by Queen Victoria.

With a bed once occupied by Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria.

The Duke's own voice gives visitors the details over a walkie-talkie.

Finest of the state rooms is the state dining room.

Commentary points out

that this is not the way the family dines every day.

The centrepiece is the Ascot Gold Cup of 1846.

The table is laid with a priceless silver service,

made in 1770.

Women visitors are apt to say, "Well, I wouldn't like

"the job of washing up that lot."

But the grounds and the outbuildings are places where the Duke has

really gone to town to please his public.

No wonder, with all these attractions,

that he gets over 430,000 visitors a year.

There is even a stagecoach to recapture the joys of an age

when parks meant open spaces.

Probably the most popular sideshow is this, the Duke's stepdaughter,

his Duchess,

and the Duke himself selling souvenirs.

All this puts the Duke of Bedford about 130,000 visitors

ahead of his nearest rival.

Derby Day is not just the date of a great horse race,

it's Britain's unofficial bank holiday.

A day out for nearly half a million people who flock to the Downs.

Show folk converge on Epsom from all over the country.

Their fairs, booths and caravans set up days beforehand.

And everything is spit and polish. Yes, even the kids, on THE morning.

The beautifully carved horse-drawn carriages of yesterday

are side-by-side with the deluxe models of today,

complete with TV and fridge.

Coach parties, booked up a year ago, roll in from all over the country.

The gypsies meet everyone. "Heather for luck, Mum? A bit of heather?"

"A winner for the big race, sir? Only two bob."

For over 300 years, there's been racing here at Epsom,

while the Derby itself goes back as far as 1780.

The big race of the day isn't run until mid-afternoon,

so the crowds flock to the fairs, the coconut shies,

the roundabouts and the hurdy-gurdies.

Music, fun and laughter everywhere.

And then, the food, the eats and the drinks.

Candy floss, enough to cover the one-and-a-half-mile Derby course.

Ten tons of ice cream go down the same way as the jellied eels.

"Oi, they're luvverly!"

It's the air of the Downs. Everyone wants to eat.

Some even bring the dining room suite.

Mmm! That looks good!

Spread it out on the grass.

But what about the big race? After all, that's what we came for.

Or did we?

As the big race gets nearer, the crowd gets bigger,

and the tic-tac men work overtime.

The money rolls in to the 300 bookies on the course

in bob-each-way bets and up.

On the Derby, 7-1 on the field, ten bar!

7-1, seven on the deal. Ten bar!

Two bob for Dalgo. Two bob par, yes?

And here comes the Queen and Prince Philip.

A practical owner and enthusiastic racegoer,

her Majesty has 24 horses in training.

And although she was leading owner in 1954 and 1957,

she's yet to win the Derby.

They're under starter's orders.

And, yes, they're off!

This year, an all-time record of just over £36,000 for the winner.

But how many spotted him?

Number 21, Parthia.

Yes, it's over. Fortunes have been won and lost.

The price of a drink made, a drink lost.

One woman on her first Derby visit hears that she's just

won £5,000 on a gypsy's tip.

Others, well, some even lost their shirts.

Ah, here we are, the greengrocer's.

Now, what did he have on his list?

Elephants do forget sometimes, you know.

Ah, yes, apples, that's it!

There's a lot to be said for self-service.

All the best people go in for it.

But only a bloke his size can get away without paying.

Now here's a chap who doesn't attract any attention at all,

but he could be a much bigger source of irritation. He's got fleas.

They're in the little bag he's carrying.

Fleas don't enjoy as much freedom as elephants.

They find people are always itching to get rid of them.

Whereas the elephant gets a welcome wherever it goes.

Come right in, mate. Mind the door!

These kids, of course, have seen an elephant before, but in this

clean, new world made safe by DDT, they've never seen a flea.

Who'd have thought the time would come

when people would pay to see what a flea can do?

Not that fleas live for very long, only about ten days.

The professor's got some new recruits this morning.

They cost him half a crown a head

and they'll be finished with this world in less than a fortnight.

No wonder he starts to get them into harness straight away.

Literally into harness.

Professor Tomlin, like most flea trainers before him,

served an apprenticeship as watchmaker and jeweller.

Even then it took him two years to harness his first flea.

What next, I wonder? Can I have a flea, Mum?

You'd know it if you got one, son.

Especially a busy one like either of these two.

They're best of pals offstage.

Each day they duel to the...

well, not quite death, but until one of them's disarmed.

SWORDS CLASH

FLEA SQUEALS

Incidentally, records show that wherever there's been a flea circus,

there's been a blonde.

Like fleas and gentlemen, elephants also seem to prefer blondes,

and chasing a blonde helps to keep them fit.

If you're a clumsy dancer,

unkind people might say that you dance like an elephant.

But in spite of his size, the elephant loves to dance,

and when they play a waltz, there's hardly anything more graceful.

With trainer Gosta Cruz up, the elephants make a spectacular exit.

And another satisfied audience leaves the flea circus,

and it's all over until the next show.

Percy goes home on his bike.

And Jumbo in his car.

But there is, of course, a moral to all this.

You may feel as a big as an elephant, or as small as a flea,

but you won't get very far if you don't come up to scratch.

When the kettle's boiling in Britain, everything stops for tea.

That's not really surprising,

since we in the United Kingdom are the world's champion tea drinkers.

Our lives are organised around tea breaks.

And sometimes a threat to stop tea-breaks

can bring factories to a standstill.

Tea runs through our lives like a great river.

For generations, it has been Britain's most popular drink.

Every year in Britain,

we drink more than 90 thousand million cups of tea.

And in factories like this, cups, saucers

and spoons are turned out in hundreds of thousands.

Plastic tableware has become more popular as its quality

and colours have improved.

Handles used to be made separately for plastic teacups.

Now, many are moulded like these in one operation.

The outsides and insides of these cups are made in two colours,

which are moulded together under great heat.

The makers claim that, given proper care,

plastic tableware is almost indestructible.

Today, you can buy a machine which will do almost anything,

including making a nice cup of tea in the morning,

or any time you like, provided you set the alarm.

There are machines for making tea on a grand scale too,

which are being used in factories and offices.

This one actually prepares the tea with tea-leaves and fresh milk, and,

by pressing the right button, you can have it with or without sugar.

A model made for Russia provides tea with lemon.

Cups of tea in the office are now as indispensable

as the boss's secretary.

Even iced tea in some offices.

People in many countries prefer lemon with their tea.

But most of us in Britain have been drinking tea with milk

almost as long as we've been drinking tea.

Or gulping it!

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd