THE GONG FARMER
Sylas Shytschuvler was a fifth generation "gong farmer" with a passion for filth.
Being of Dutch heritage he loved cheese and clogs, which he he ate every day and wore on his feet. Trudging the fields around Clerkenwell were a delight whilst wearing the generously proportioned clogs imported from Eindhoven. These ingeniously designed clogs floated on the crud soaked ground as if hovering above the filthy mulch below him.
The fields of Clerkenwell were of particular interest to Sylas, as the valley of the river Fleet was beginning to clog with shit, and thus was a superb hunting ground for his staple. Although the shit blocked river was fed by sparkling fresh springs and wells located a few miles to the north west, in Hampstead and Kilburn, by the time the river had reached the fleet valley it was an open sewer.
The flood plain of the river was rapidly being encroached by industries relying on abundant water, both for the production of their product and the dumping of the effluent and waste that the production created.
However, there were still plenty of small market gardens, kept fertile by the nutrients in the shit, that produced bountiful quantities of fruit and vegetables for the nearby city of London. It was these small but profitable micro businesses that Sylas targeted with his pungent product.
He would wake before dawn and tramp the river banks and rivulet's emptying in to the river, collecting surface effluent and trapped turds left beached by the burst banks of the Fleet. He would then venture in to the crowded streets beyond the fields, closer to the thriving metropolis, and offer his services to empty their cesspits and privies of their succulent turds and night dirt.
It was a laborious process that involved many return trips to and from his hovel located on the edge of the built up area, shovelling his putrid product in to hessian sacks and storage pits.
To be continued......
