Mrs Bradshaw's Handbook (Discworld 40.50)

The modern descendants of Antipater’s plants, now somewhat pacified, yield leaves so strong their fibres can be twisted into robust twine. Great Slack twine is much favoured by farmers and stockmen and is the best cash crop this community has ever had. The sixty-foot-long twine walk may be worth a visit if it’s raining.

Big Cabbage’

s Big Cabbage is visible from several miles away, rising above the flat fields of brassica that surround it like an enormous prize horticultural specimen. From a distance it looks remarkably realistic, but as the train approaches it is possible to see a large door in what is a crude and badly painted concrete structure. The new station is, in contrast, very smart, the woodwork and benches finished in a bright green paint and the station sign decorated with every possible species of brassica. It is a short walk from the station to the amusement park and a regular coach service takes visitors to the modern agricultural centre.

•BIG CABBAGE•

POPULATION: 830

CLACKS TERMINAL

POST OFFICE

ACCOMMODATION: The Green Crown, The Railway Hotel, Furby’s Family Hotel and Camp Site.

BANK: Bank of Big Cabbage, Sto Lat.

BRASSICA MARKET: daily.

The Grand Cabbage and Sprout Fair, 1st–3rd Sektober, includes finals of the Sto Plains Cabbage Queen competition; cabbage futures bought and sold. The Big Cabbage Carnival of Kale takes place on 5th Ember.

Big Cabbage, the green heart of the Sto Plains, is a centre of horticultural excellence as well as providing a fun day out for farming families.

BIG CABBAGE IS totally dedicated to the brassica in all its wonderful manifestations. Over the years it has developed from the original Cabbage Growers’ Association offices and model farm to become the world centre for training as well as research and development and is, in many ways, a foliate university.

It holds the archive seed collection for not just the Sto Plains, but places as far flung as Lancre and Genua, and there are now ‘state of the art’ holding pens and grading systems for worms. The Department for Biological Pest Control recently released the results of a landmark investigation into the decline in insect infestations on land near to clacks terminals, concluding that this was not, as first thought, the effect of strange rays emanating from the machinery, but the simple result of the many goblins who are now so efficiently employed in operating the system augmenting their diet.

A vast amusement park has been built up around the scientific centre to provide entertainment for the families of visiting farmers and this is now the main attraction for the hundreds of day-trippers, eclipsing even the Museum of Caterpillars. The old concrete Big Cabbage acts as a visitor centre and various fairground rides provide refreshment and relentless merriment for all.

5

TRAVELLERS IN SEARCH of exotic destinations aboard the train may take the Altiplano Express, which starts its long journey hubwards from Sto Lat Junction. A ticket guarantees a private sleeping compartment for the trip as well as a good breakfast in the restaurant car.

I have previously detailed the exterior design of the station, but the interior of this edifice is no less impressive. However, I must say that the numerous arches and columns placed in a seemingly random arrangement present serious obstacles to the troll porters with their luggage trolleys, and the fortifications around the booking office make it almost inaccessible.

The Altiplano Express leaves at eight in the morning from platform 1 which, once you have found your way there, offers a welcome refuge in the form of the fragrant aroma of a coffee shop. Miss Painsworth dispenses exceedingly good coffee in her comfortable and hospitable establishment. The passengers, many of them trolls and dwarfs who are visiting their families back home in Uberwald, gather in groups on the platform beside their allocated carriages. The railway company accommodates dwarfs in special two-tier carriages with heavy blinds at the windows. Families of trolls pile on to their special reinforced flatbed carriage located behind the engine and tender. They pay a premium to be located here where they can inhale the rich mix of sparks, swirling smoke and smuts which to them is an airborne treat. I suppose to us it might be like being in a shower of biscuits.

This train also has a very large and well-protected mail coach. On my visit there were crates clearly marked ‘Igor to Igor’ being trollhandled on board, some audibly sloshing despite the ‘Handle with Care’ stickers which were pasted all over them. The troll porters were also, rather more cautiously, loading a large sarcophagus into a windowless carriage at the rear of the train; this was accompanied by an Igor in full morning dress. As I understand it only black-ribbon vampires are permitted to travel on the railway and I imagine the document that the Igor was proffering to the guard was some proof of compliance. But how could they be sure? Happily the sleeping compartments are located at the front of the train.

The new Railway Watch guard this train. They are well-armed men wearing the Ankh-Morpork coat of arms and the railway cipher over their smart uniforms. In my experience there is little or no crime on a train journey unless you fall in with a bad lot and play games of chance such as dice or Cripple Mr Onion with kind-looking gentlemen who have lazy eyes and quick fingers. However, additional risks apply on this route, as it passes through the Carrack Mountains and beyond, traditionally a haunt of bandits and highwaymen. Reports in the Ankh-Morpork Times tell alarming stories about bandits who block the track with boulders and extort money from travellers. It was a relief to note that all the windows of the sleeping carriage had strong metal shutters. The compartment, though small, contains everything a person might need for a long journey. In addition to a comfortable bed there is a small washbasin with running water, and adequate storage for clothes and hats.

The journey to Big Cabbage is speedy and, with the exception of a couple of brief halts to take on coal and water, non-stop. Half an hour hubwards of Big Cabbage the train crosses the new bridge over the River Ankh. The bridge is guarded by a troll wearing a large red rosette; it seems that he was this year’s winner of the Best Kept Bridge Award. The main purpose of this competition is of course to encourage good structural maintenance of the track and bridges, but the contest has revealed a somewhat surprising aspect of troll nature. Many have enhanced their environment with flowering plants, water features and elaborate collages of shells and interesting shales. Sadly it has been found necessary to introduce certain regulations governing these decorative extravaganzas as they are in danger of encroaching on the track, defeating the original purpose of the challenge.

•HAY-ON-ANKH•

POPULATION: 450

CLACKS TERMINAL

ACCOMMODATION: The Swan Inn, Horneyold Arms.

MARKET DAY: Tuesday.

Annual Regatta in June, Duck race the second Octeday in Spune.

A pretty riverside town popular for fishing and boating holidays.

On the far side of this bridge is Hay-on-Ankh, a small riverside town that has caught a touch of gentility from the numerous ‘dressed for boating’ visitors who travel on the railway for a weekend of messing about in the river. The original residents, horny-handed fisherfolk who had for generations stood waist-deep in ice-cold water netting coy carp and rimbow trout for little return, other than occupational rheumatics, soon realized that they could rent out their boats and rods and go to the pub instead.