Ruled by Kings, Built by Squirrels !
"The Greatest Empire the world has ever seen"
“The Author of the Industrial Revolution”
“The Mother of Democracy”
How often are these hyperbolic sentences repeated in the history books of the 20th century ?
Don’t answer!
An almost incredible truth lies behind the redoubtable enigma of what came to be known as: England.
She has spanned the globe with her Politics, Industry, Commerce, Religions, Laws, Language, Art, Literature, Science, Philosophy and even her values. It was once said that, “the Sun never sets on Her Empire”, which for a number of decades was indisputably true.
Not the England we see today, but let’s go back awhile.
What provided the vehicle for that expansion?
The Sea !
The Naval domination of the oceans of the world were the key to Her success.
During the last 500 years and more, the shipbuilding output of this tiny island, nestled in the crook of Europe, was phenomenal. By any standard.
There is a well known, ‘hornpipe’ on these Celtic shores, that rejoices in the lines, “ Hearts of Oak are our Ships, Jolly Tars are our Men.”
Hearts of Oak ? Yes. God had deemed to bless this little island with an inordinate amount of English Oak.
‘Albion’ was once described by a Roman writer as being “covered” with this very valuable commodity. It has been said that a man could ride from the South Coast to the Yorkshire Dales, (check it in your atlas!), without ever coming out from the cover of the Oak canopies of Summer. Now that’s a whole lotta Oak !
A wood perfectly suited to the making of ships.
Why were there so many Oak trees in merry England?
Well, we all know that Oak trees come from acorns.
A substantial part of the diet of SQUIRRELS .
The indigenous squirrel of England is the Red Squirrel; now an endangered species due to the introduction of Grey Squirrels from other parts of the world. Paradoxically brought here by wooden ships !
But it’s not that the Greys are killing the Reds, they avoid each other! It’s the fact that the Greys out forage the Reds and carry diseases that the Reds are not immune to.
But long before the diseases ever took their toll on the Red population, their foraging and storing skills were their downfall.
Now, something I was not aware of until a few years ago.
The Red Squirrel, above all others, has a poor memory!
Although the Red Squirrel remembers where it created caches at a better-than-chance level, its spatial memory is substantially less accurate and durable than that of Grey Squirrel.
Long before the Greys came to England, the little Red guys spent hundreds of years, burying acorns and forgetting where they were !
I really see God’s genius in this.
The incredible detail of creating such a small and innocuous creature, deliberately designed with a poor memory, grew into the greatest empire the world has ever seen.
Ruled by Kings, Built by Squirrels.
I think that’s an encouragement to us all, when we feel our deficits. If God can turn the poor memory of a rodent, into a world empire, just think of what He can do with a creature made in His own image !
Peace and Love,
Grape x
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