City spirit in Terry Pratchett

I wrote the previous post in the wonderful Cafe Soya in the Arcadian centre. It was still early when I came out so I had a wander in the dark city of a Sunday evening before getting the bus home. I went through the market & down Allison Street towards Fazeley Street. In Allison Street I suddenly felt very comfortable. I felt reassured that this was my patch, & while there are bad things going on in the dark, I needn't worry because I'm it.
It reminded me of the witch in one of Terry Pratchett's books who doesn't like the country, so some quotes from her are appended below.
I walked on to Fazeley Street. Digbeth is quite different on a Sunday evening. I was surprised at the relative silence, while there were lots of cars parked in the street. Some of them obviously belonged to Asians who were as obviously having family celebrations. Snooker clubs were lit up to varying degrees, & looking dodgy to varying degrees. The cars outside tended to look like drug dealers' cars: round here they don't go for huge limousines but small nippy souped-up numbers.
'I didn't know you *could* be a witch in the city,' said Tiffany. 'I was told once that you need good rock to grow witches, & everyone says the city is built on slime & mud.'
'And masonry,' said Mrs Proust gleefully. 'Granite & marble, miscellaneous sedimentary deposits, my dear Tiffany. Rocks that once leaped & flowed when the world was born in fire. And do you see the cobbles on the streets? Surely every single one of them, at some time, has had blood on it. Everywhere you look, stone & rock. Everywhere you can't see, stone & rock! Can you imagine what it feels like to reach down with your bones & feel the living stones? And what did we make from the stone? Palaces, & castles & mausoleums & gravestones, & fine houses, & city walls, oh my! Not just in this city either. The city is built on itself, all the cities that came before. Can you imagine how it feels to lie down on an ancient flagstone & feel the power of the rock buoying you up against the tug of the world? And it's mine to use, all of it, every stone of it, & that's where witchcraft begins. The stones have life, & *I'm* part of it.'
(Terry Pratchett: I Shall Wear Midnight. Doubleday, London, 2010, pp. 122 - 123.)
Mrs Proust raised her eyebrows. 'My dear, I treasure my ignorance of stoats & weasels. Sounds like countryside stuff to me. Can't abide countryside. Too much green makes me feel bilious,' she said, giving Tiffany's dress a shuddering glance.
(Ibid, p. 127.)
'I've got to go into the...country,' said Mrs Proust, looking around the crowded shelves in case there was another working broomstick there. Her son stared. 'Are you sure, Mother? You've always said it's bad for your health.'
(Ibid, p. 282.)
'...topiary is not actually illegal, although I rather suspect that one or two folk are going to be the first up against the hedge when the revolution comes. Hedge witches - that's what we call country witches in the city.'
(Ibid, p. 300.)
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