diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old/45065.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/45065.txt | 5629 |
1 files changed, 5629 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/old/45065.txt b/old/45065.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..82cb26c --- /dev/null +++ b/old/45065.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5629 @@ +Project Gutenberg's English Pictures, by Samuel Manning and S. G. Green + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: English Pictures + +Author: Samuel Manning + S. G. Green + +Release Date: March 7, 2014 [EBook #45065] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH PICTURES *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger from page images generously +provided by The Internet Archive + + + + + + + +ENGLISH PICTURES + +By The Rev. Samuel Manning, LL.D., and The Rev. S. G. Green, D.D. + +1889 + +[Illustration: 0006] + +[Illustration: 0007] + +[Illustration: 0009] + + + + +PREFACE: + +A British nobleman--so runs the story--when travelling in Switzerland +was so impressed by the gloomy grandeur of one of the mountain passes, +that he exclaimed, "Surely there is no other view like this in the world!" + +"I am told, my lord," said the guide, "that there is but one,"--naming a +view in the Scottish I lighlands. + +"Why," replied the nobleman, "that is on my own estate, and I have never +seen it!" + +The anecdote may be doubtful historically, but in idea it is true. _Non +e vero, ma ben trovato_. + +The number of Englishmen who really know their own country is +comparatively few; and no doubt there are motives quite independent +of the love for natural beauty, which lead the hard-worked men of our +generation to escape at intervals to as great a distance as possible +from the scene of their daily occupations. The effort for this, however, +often leads to yet more harassing distractions; and many return from the +eager excitements of foreign travel more jaded and careworn than when +they began their journey. Nor is it so easy to escape after all! The +great event of the day at every Continental hotel is the arrival of _The +Times_; and you are at least as likely to meet your next neighbour on +a Rhine steamboat or at the Rigi Kulm, as in the valley of the Upper +Thames, or at Boscastle or Tintagel. + +It is true that our rivers do not flow from glaciers, and our proudest +mountain heights may easily be scaled in an afternoon; we have no gloomy +grandeur of pine forests or stupendous background of snowy peaks; but +there is beauty, and sublimity too, for those who know "how to observe" +the earth, and sea, and sky: and in less than a day's journey, the tired +dweller in cities may find many a sequestered retreat, where pure air +and lovely scenery will bring to his spirit a refreshment all the +more welcome because associated with the language, the habits, and the +religion of his own home. + +The volume now in the reader's hand is intended to recall, by the aid of +pen and pencil, some English scenes in which such refreshing influences +have in the past been enjoyed. And, as every wanderer over English +ground finds himself in the footsteps of the great and good, ample use +has been made of the biographical and literary associations which these +scenes continually recall. + +[Illustration: 0010] + +[Illustration: 0013] + +[Illustration: 0014] + + + + +THE RIVER THAMES + +[Illustration: 0016] + +[Illustration: 0017] + +|THE Thames, unrivalled among English rivers in beauty as in fame, is +really little known by Englishmen. Of the millions who line its banks, +few have any acquaintance with its higher streams, or know them further +than by occasional glances through rail way-carriage windows, at +Maidenhead, Reading, Pangbourne, or between Abingdon and Oxford. +Multitudes, even, who love the Oxford waters, and are familiar with +every turn of the banks between Folly Bridge and Nuneham, have never +thought to explore the scenes of surpassing beauty where the river flows +on, almost in loneliness, in its descent to London; visited by few, +save by those happy travellers, who, with boat and tent, pleasant +companionship, and well-chosen books--Izaak Walton's _Angler_ among the +rest--pass leisurely from reach to reach of the silver stream. Then, +higher up than Oxford, who knows the Thames? Who can even tell where it +arises, and through what district it flows? + +There is a vague belief in many minds, fostered by some ancient manuals +of geography, that the Thames is originally the Isis, so called until +it receives the river _Thame_, the auspicious union being denoted by the +pluralising of the latter word. The whole account is pure invention. No +doubt the great river does receive the Thame or Tame, near Wallingford; +but a Tame is also tributary to the Trent; and there is a Teme among +the affluents of the Severn. The truth appears to be that Teme, Tame, +or Thame, is an old Keltic word meaning "smooth," or "broad;" and that +Tamesis, of which Thames is merely a contraction, is formed by the +addition to this root of the old "Es," water, so familiar to us in +"Ouse," * "Esk," "Uiske," "Exe," so that Tam-es means simply the "broad +water," and is Latinised into Tamesis. The last two syllables again of +this word are fancifully changed into Isis, which is thus taken as a +poetic appellation of the river. In point of fact, Isis is used only by +the poets, or by those who affect poetic diction. Thus, Warton, in his +address to Oxford: + + "Lo, your loved Isis, from the bordering vale, + With all a mother's fondness bids you hail." + +The name, then, of the Thames is singular, not plural; while yet the +river is formed of many confluent streams descending from the Cotswold +Hills. Which is the actual source is perhaps a question of words; and +yet it is one as keenly contended, and by as many competing localities, +as the birthplace of Homer was of old. Of the seven, however, only two +can show a plausible case. The traditional Thames Head is in Trewsbury +Mead, three miles from Cirencester, not far from the Tetbury Road +Station, on the Great Western Railway, and hard by the old Roman road of +Akeman Street, one of the four ** that radiate from Cirencester, or, as +the Romans called the city, Corinium. Here the infant stream is at once +pressed into service, its waters being pumped up into the Thames and +Severn Canal, whose high embankment forms the back-ground to the wooded +nook which forms the cradle of the river. It is an impressive comment +on the reported saying of Brindley the engineer, that "the great use of +rivers is to feed canals." Half-a-mile farther down, and when clear +of the great pumping-engine, the baby river issues again to light in a +secluded dell, and now has room to wander at its own sweet will. The cut +on the preceding page delineates its early course, and shows "the Hoar +Stone," an ancient boundary, mentioned in a charter of King AEthelstan, +a.d. 931. + +The river now receives a succession of tiny rivulets, which augment its +volume and force until, near the village of Kemble, it is crossed by a +rustic bridge,--"the first bridge over the Thames," as depicted for us +in the charming volume of Mr. and Mrs. S. C. Hall, with its three narrow +arches, and its sides undefended by a parapet, with the solitary figures +of the labourer and his boy, wending their way home after work. + + * "The Ouse, whom men do Isis rightly name."--Spenser, + Faerie Queen. + + ** The other three were the Fossway, or "entrenched road," + running to the north-east, the Ikenild Street or "road to + the Iceni," nearly due east, and Ermine or Irmin Street, + passing through Cirencester, north-west to Gloucester, and + south-east to Silchester. Akeman Street is a continuance of + the Fossway, and runs south-west to Bath. Its name probably + means, "Oak-man," or Forester. + +[Illustration: 8019] + +What a contrast with the _last_ bridge that spans the river, with its +mighty sweep of traffic below and above! + +But we must dally yet among scenes of rural quietude. A few miles beyond +Kemble, the Thames has acquired force sufficient to turn a mill. Hence, +leaving the highway, and taking our path through pleasant meadows, +we pass by one or two rural villages, and so to Cricklade, the first +market-town on the Thames. And here a considerable affluent joins the +stream--a river, in fact, that has come down from another part of the +Cotswold Hills, with some show of right to be the original stream. + +[Illustration: 8018] + +This is the Churn (or Corin; Keltic "The Summit"), which rises at "the +Seven Springs," in a rocky hill-side, about three miles from Cheltenham, +and runs by Cirencester (Corin-cester) down to Cricklade. I he claim of +the Churn is the twofold one, of greater height in its source than the +traditional meadows and beside quiet villages: much, to say the truth, +like other rivers, or distinguished only by the transparency of its +gentle stream. For, issuing from a broad surface of oolite rock, it has +brought no mountain debris or dull clay to sully its brightness, no town +defilement, nor trace of higher rapids, in turbid waves and hurrying +foam. It lingers amid quiet beauties, scarcely veiling from sight the +rich herbarium which it fosters in its bed, save where the shadows of +trees reflected in the calm water mingle confusedly with the forms of +aquatic plants. Meanwhile other streams swell the current. As an unknown +poet somewhat loftily sings: + + "From various springs divided waters glide, + In different colours roll a different tide; + Murmur along their crooked banks awhile:-- + At once they murmur, and enrich the isle, + Awhile distinct, through many channels run, + But meet at last, and sweetly flow in one; + There joy to lose their long distinguished names, + And make one glorious and immortal Thames." + +Of the little streams thus loftily described, the most important are the +Coln and the Leche; as Drayton has it in his _Polyolbion_: + + "Clere Coin and lovely Leche, so dun from Cotswold's plain." + +[Illustration: 9020] + +The confluence of these streams with the Thames at Lechlade makes the +river navigable for barges; and from this point it sets up a towingpath. +At this point also end may be seen--a distant glimmering circle--from +the other. Then the canal pursues a level course for some miles, and +descends about 130 feet to the Thames at Lechlade, having traversed in +all a distance of rather more than thirty miles. + +Below Lechlade the river passes into almost perfect solitude. Few walks +in England of the same distance are at once so quietly interesting +and so utterly lonely as the walk along the grassy towing-path of the +Thames. A constant water-traffic was once maintained between London and +Bristol by way of Lechlade and the canal; but this is now superseded by +the railway, and the sight of a passing barge is rare. + +[Illustration: 0021] + +The river after leaving Gloucestershire divides, in many a winding, the +counties of Oxford and Berks. The hills of the latter county, with their +wood-crowned summits, pleasantly bound the view to the south; Farringdon +Hill being for a long distance conspicuous among them. Half-way between +Lechlade and Oxford is the hamlet of Siford, or Shifford--one of the +great historic spots of England, if rightly considered, although now +isolated and unknown. For there, as an ancient chronicler commemorates, +King Alfred the Great held Parliament a thousand years ago. + + "There sat at Siford many thanes and many bishops, + Learned men, proud earls and awful knights, + There was Karl AElfric, learned in the law, + And AElfred, England's herdsman, England's darling, + He was King in England. + He began to teach them how they should live." + +Not far off is New Bridge, the oldest probably on the Thames. But it was +"new" six hundred years ago. Its solid construction shows that it was +once a great highway; while its buttresses, pointed up the stream, +betoken the power of the floods which the careful draining of later days +has done so much to moderate. + +A short distance farther, the Windrush flows down from the north, by +Bourton-"on-the-water," Burford and Witney, to unite with the broadening +river; then the Evenlode, which the traveller by the Oxford, Worcester, +and Wolverhampton Railway so often crosses and recrosses in his journey. + +Throughout, the river is carefully adapted for the purposes of a +navigation now little needed. The occasional locks and the frequent +weirs break the level, and the latter especially--sometimes miniature +rapids or waterfalls--add picturesqueness to the scene. An expert +oarsman may descend them all with safety; but many prefer to lift the +boat on to the bank and drag it down to the lower level. These are +interruptions to the journey, which, on the whole, is very enjoyable. +Should the tourist have time at command, he may diverge to the right +hand or to the left, to scenes of rich beauty or historic interest. +Cumnor Hall, a name familiar to all readers of Sir Walter Scott from the +tragic fate of Amy Robsart, lies a little way to the right of Bablock +Hythe Ferry; Stanton Harcourt a short distance to the left. At the +latter place Alexander Pope once resided, in a tower of the old mansion, +which time or reverence has spared, in the ruin of almost all the rest. +A pane of glass, in one of the tower windows, bore an inscription from +the poet's own hand. "In the year 1718, Alexander Pope finished here the +Fifth Volume of Homer." The pane is now at Nuneham Courtney, the mansion +of the Harcourts. At Bablock Hythe Ferry the traveller is scarcely four +miles from Oxford by the direct road; but if he keep to his boat, which +he will not regret, he will find the distance fully twelve. The detour +leads him first past the lovely wooded slopes and glades of Wytham +Abbey, then to the scanty ruins of Godstow Nunnery, with its memories of +Fair Rosamond. But we must not linger now, though opposite to the ruins +a charming country hostelry offers its attractions, and the trout are +leaping in the stream; for we are on our way to Oxford. + +The impression which the first sight of this fair and ancient city makes +upon the stranger is probably unique, in whatever direction he first +approaches it, and from whatever point he first descries its spires and +towers. True, of late years the accessories of the railway invasion, so +long resisted by the University authorities, have given a new aspect +to the scene; but nothing can quite destroy the stately dignity +and venerable calm. The traveller who approaches by the way we are +describing, receives the full impression. As he floats along the quiet +surface of the river, the stately domes and towers come suddenly in +sight, and the green railway embankment in the foreground scarcely +impairs the antique beauty of the picture. + +Oxford is probably Ousenford--the ford over the Ouse or "Water." Its +waters indeed are many, and almost labyrinthine; but we get clear of +the river at Hythe Bridge, and care for awhile only to explore Colleges, +Halls, and Libraries; pausing before the Martyrs' Memorial, to breathe +the hope that "the candle" once lighted there may still brightly burn, +while Keble College, farther on, is a memorial of one, who though of +another school of thought from ourselves, has given musical and touching +expressions tu the deepest thoughts of devout hearts. + +[Illustration: 0023] + +But to describe this wonderful city is beyond our present scope. Let us +hurry down to Christ Church Meadows, where the Cherwell sweeps round to +join the Thames; then across to the Broad Walk, past Merton Meadow and +the Botanical Gardens, to Magdalen Bridge, where a splendid view of the +city is again obtained; thence up High Street to the centre of the city, +and down St. Aldate's Street to Folly Bridge, where boats of all sizes +are in waiting. This bridge may appear strangely named, as a main +approach to the renowned seat of learning. + +[Illustration: 9024] + +Various stories are told as to the origin of the name. Perhaps it may +be from some tradition of Roger Bacon, who had his study and laboratory +here, over the ancient gate. There was a saying, that this study would +fall when a man more learned than Bacon passed under it; so that the +name may be an uncomplimentary reference to the troops of students +entering Oxford by this thoroughfare. But such speculations need nut +hinder us. We are bound for London--a voyage of some 115 miles, though +only 52 by rail. Many boatmen will prefer to take the train for Goring, +saving six-and-twenty miles of water travelling, and avoiding the most +tedious and on the whole least picturesque part of the journey. +Still, in any case Nuneham must be seen, with Iffley Lock and Sandford +Lasher--familiar names to boating men!--upon the way. + +[Illustration: 8024] + +Nuneham is a charming domain, scene of picnic parties innumerable, yet +freshly beautiful to every visitor who can enjoy woodland walks and +verdant slopes, with gardens planned by Mason the poet, in which art and +taste have, as it were, only improved upon the hints and suggestions of +nature; and breezy heights from which the prospect, if less extensive +than some other far-famed English views, may surely vie in loveliness +with any of them. + +The intending visitor must be careful to ascertain the days and +conditions of access to the grounds; and in his ramble must be sure to +include the old "Carfax" conduit, removed in 1787 from the "four ways" +(for the "Car" is evidently _quatre_, whatever the "fax" may be) in +Oxford, and set on a commanding eminence, the distant spires and towers +of the city, with Blenheim Woods in the back-ground, being seen in one +direction, and the view in another bounded by the line of the Chiltern +Hills. + +[Illustration: 8025] + +When the oarsman has once left behind the wooded slopes of Nuneham, with +the overhanging trees reflected in the silvery waters, he will find the +way to Abingdon monotonous. He will perhaps be startled by seeing picnic +parties in large boats, towed from the shore by stalwart peasants, +harnessed to the rope. Let us hope that the toil is easier than it +looks! On the whole, we do not recommend the long detour by Abingdon, +although Clifton Hampden is charming, and Dorchester, near the junction +of the Thame and the Thames--once a Roman camp, afterwards the see of +the first Bishop of Wessex, but now a poor village--is well worth a +visit. It is startling to find a minster in a hamlet. + +Probably, however, the antiquarian may be more interested in the remains +of the Whittenham earthworks, which in British or Saxon times defended +the meeting-point of the rivers. The Thame Hows in on the left. + +On the hill to the right is Sinodun, a remarkably fine British camp. +The whole neighbourhood, so still and peaceful now, tells of bygone +greatness, and of many a struggle of which the records have vanished +from the page of history. Not far, however, from Dorchester in another +direction is Chalgrove Field, where the brave and patriotic Hampden +received his death-wound. His name, and that of Falkland, to be noticed +farther on, awaken in these scenes now so tranquil the remembrance of +the stormy times when, in this Thames Valley, were waged those conflicts +out of which in so large a measure sprang the freedom and progress of +modern England. + +At Dorchester we are still eleven miles by water from Goring; and though +the angler may loiter down the stream, we must hasten on, though ancient +Wallingford and rustic Cleeve are not unworthy of notice. At Goring the +chief beauties of the river begin to disclose themselves. + +Ralph Waldo Emerson says of the English landscape, that "it seems to +be finished with the pencil instead of the plough." Our fields are +cultivated like gardens. Neat, trim hedgerows, picturesque villages, +spires peeping from among groves of trees, cottages gay with flowers +and evergreens, suggest that the landscape gardener rather than the +agriculturist has been everywhere at work. If this be true of England as +a whole, it is yet more strikingly true of the district through which +we are about to pass. A thousand years of peaceful industry have subdued +the wildness of nature; and the river glides between banks radiant +with beauty: "The little hills rejoice on every side; the pastures are +clothed with Hocks, the valleys are covered over with corn; they shout +for joy, they also sing." + +Yet there is no lack of variety. The course of the river is broken up by +innumerable "aits" ("eyots"), or little islands; some covered with trees +which dip their branches into the stream, others with reeds and osier, +the haunts of wild fowl; on others, again, a cottage or a summer-house +peeps out from amongst the foliage. Sometimes these aits seem to block +up the channel, and leave no exit, so that the boat seems to be afloat +on a tiny lake, till a stroke or two of the oar discloses a narrow +passage into the stream beyond. Sometimes a line of chalk down bounds +the view, its delicately curved sides dotted over with juniper bushes, +the dark green of which contrasts finely with the light grey of the +turf. Then comes a range of hanging beech-wood coming down to the +water's edge, or a broad expanse of meadow, where the cattle wade +knee-deep in grass, or a mansion whose grounds have been transformed +into a paradise by lavish expenditure and fine taste, or a village, the +rustic beauty of which might realise the dreams of poet or of painter. +The locks, mill-dams, or weirs with their dashing waters, give +animation to the scene. Nor is that additional charm often wanting, of +which Dr. Johnson used to speak. "The finest landscape in the world," +he would say, "is improved by a good inn in the foreground." True, +there are no great hotels, after the modern fashion; but a series of +comfortable homely village inns will be found, such as Izaak Walton +loved, and which are still favourite haunts with the brethren of "the +gentle craft." The landlord, learned in all anglers' lore, is delighted +to show where the big pike lies in a sedgy pool, where the perch will +bite most freely, or to suggest the most killing fly to cast for trout +over the mill-pond; and is not too proud, when the day's task is done, +to wait upon the oarsman or the angler at his evening meal. + + * As we write, the following letter to the Times arrests our + attention; it is too graphic, as well as accurate, to be + lost:-- + + "I will not tell you where I am, except that I am staying at + an hotel on the banks of the River Thames. I hesitate to + name the place, charming as it is, because I am sure, when + its beauties are known, it will be hopelessly vulgarised. + Mine host, the pleasantest of landlords, his wife, the most + agreeable of her sex, will charge, too, in proportion as the + plutocracy invade us. I am surrounded by the most charming + scenery. Few know, and still fewer appreciate the beauties + of our own River Thames. I have been up and down the Rhine; + but I confess, taking all in all, Oxford to Gravesend + pleases me more. Herc, in addition to what I have described, + I am on the river's brink; I can row about to my heart's + content for a very moderate figure; excellent fishing; + newspapers to be procured, and postal arrangements of a + character not to worry you, and yet sufficient to keep you + _au fait_ with your business arrangements. What do I want + more? Prices are moderate, the village contains houses + suitable to all clashes, and the inhabitants are pleased to + see you. I can wear flannels without being stared at, and I + can see the opposite sex, in the most bewitching and + fascinating of costumes, rowing about (with satisfaction, + too) the so-called lords of creation. As for children, there + is no end of amusement for them--dabbling in the water, + feeding the swans, the fields, and the safety of a punt. We + have both aristocratic and well-to-do people here--names + well known in town; but I must not, nor will I, betray them. + On the towing-path this morning was to be seen the smartest + of our Judges in a straw hat and a tourist suit, equally + becoming to him as it was well cut. + + "Let me advise all your readers who are hesitating where to + go not to overlook the natural beauties of our River Thames. + There are one or two steamers that make the journey up and + down the river in three days, stopping at various places, + and giving ample opportunity for passengers both to see and + appreciate the scenery. + + "E. C. W." + +To describe in detail all the points of beauty that lie before us, would +require far more space than we have at disposal; and a dry catalogue +of names would interest no one. We have started, as said before, +from Goring, where the twin village Streatley--bearing in its name a +reminiscence of the old Roman road Ikenild Street,--nestles at the foot +of its romantic wooded hill. The comfort of the little hostelry and +the charm of the scenery invite a longer stay, but we must press on. +Pangbourne and Whitchurch, also twin villages, joined by a pretty wooden +bridge, once more invite delay. On the right, the little river Pang +flows in between green hills; on the left, or the Whitchurch side, +heights clothed with the richest foliage shut in the scene. The cottages +are embosomed amid the trees; the clear river catches a thousand +reflections from hillside, and sky; the waters of the weir dash merrily +down; and the fishermen, each in his punt moored near mid-stream, +yielding themselves to the tranquil delight of the perfect scene, +are further gladdened by many an encouraging nibble. Surely of all +amusements the most restful is fishing from a punt! Most persons would +find a day of absolute idleness intolerable. But here we have just +that measure of expectation and excitement which enable even a busy and +active man to sit all day doing nothing. + +[Illustration: 8027] + +Into the question of the cruelty of the sport we do not enter; but its +soothing, tranquillising character cannot be denied. For ourselves, our +business is not to angle, but to observe. As we row past these grave +and solemn men, absorbed in the endeavour to hook a dace or gudgeon, +and recognise among them one or two of the hardest workers in London, we +feel, at any rate, that the familiar sneer about "a rod with a line at +one end, and a fool at the other," may not be altogether just. + +Passing a series of verdant lawns, sloping to the river's brink, we +reach Mapledurham and Purley, on opposite sides of the river at one of +its most exquisite bends. The former place is celebrated by Pope as the +retreat of his ladye love Martha Blount; when + + "She went to plain-work, and to purling brooks, + Old-fashioned halls, dull aunts, and croaking rooks." + +The latter was the residence of Warren Hastings during his trial, and is +not to be confounded with the Purley in Surrey, where Horne Tooke wrote +his celebrated _Diversions_, on the origin and history of words. + +The next halting-place is Caversham, sometimes magniloquently described +as "the port of Reading." Here the Thames widens out, as shown in the +view which prefaces the present chapter; the eel-traps, or "bucks," +extending half across the river. On the occasion of our visit to the +spot, it was our intention to stop for the night at Caversham; but as +the inn was crowded and noisy, we resolved to push on to Sonning. The +evening was already closing in, and before we reached our destination it +had grown dark. The trees stood up solemnly against the sky, from which +the twilight had not wholly departed. Their shadows fell mysteriously +across the river, rendering the task of steering a difficult one. + +[Illustration: 9028] + +At length the welcome lights of the village were descried through the +deepening gloom; and we landed, having suffered no more serious mishap +than running into an ait, which our steersman mistook for a shadow, +in the endeavour to avoid a shadow which he mistook for the bank. Next +morning, after a plunge into the clear cool water of the pool at the +foot of Sonning Weir, a scamper round the village, a climb to the top +of the tower for the magnificent view, and a hearty breakfast, we were +ready for an early start, whilst the dew was yet on the grass, and +the air had not lost its freshness. Here the Kennet, "for silver +eels renowned," as Pope has it, flows in from the southwest, with its +memories of the high-minded and chivalrous Falkland, who fell at the +battle of Newbury, on the banks of this river. A little lower down the +Loddon enters the Thames from the south, between Shiplake and Wargrave. +The picturesque churches of these two villages were soon passed, and we +entered the fine expanse of Henley Reach, famous in boat-racing annals. +Here for many years the University matches were rowed before their +removal to Putney. No sheet of water could be better suited to the +purpose, and the change is regretted by many boating-men. + +[Illustration: 0031] + +About four miles below Henley, in one of the loveliest spots on the +river, are the ruins of Medmenham Abbey, notorious in the latter half of +the eighteenth century, as the scene of the foul and blasphemous orgies +of the "Franciscans." The club took its name from Sir Francis Dashwood, +its founder, and numbered amongst its members many who were conspicuous, +not only for rank and station, but for intellectual ability and +political influence. Its proceedings were invested with profound +secrecy; but enough was known to show that the most degrading vices +were practised, and the lowest depths of wickedness reached;--strange +profanation of one of Nature's loveliest shrines! + +We are now approaching the point at which the beauty of the river +culminates. From Marlow, past Cookham, Hedsor and Cliefden, to +Maidenhead, a distance of eight or ten miles, we gladly suspend the +labour of the oar, and let the boat drift slowly with the stream. As we +glide along, even this gentle motion is too rapid, and we linger on the +way to feast our eyes with the infinitely varied combination of chalk +cliff and swelling hill and luxuriant foliage which every turn of the +river brings to view: + +Woods, meadows, hamlets, farms, + +Spires in the vale and towers upon the hills; + +[Illustration: 8031] + + The great chalk quarries glaring through the shade. + + The pleasant lanes and hedgerows, and those homes + Which seemed the very dwellings of content and peace and sunshine." * + + * Down Stream to London. By the Rev. S. J. Stone. + +The "castled crags" of the Rhine and the Moselle,--the "blue rushing of +the arrowy Rhone,"--the massive grandeur of the banks of the Danube, are +far more imposing and stimulating; but the quiet, tranquil loveliness of +this part of the Thames may make good its claim to take rank even with +those world-famed rivers. There is something both unique and charming in +the dry "combes," or fissures in the chalk ranges, rapidly descending, +and garnished with sweeping foliage of untrimmed beech-trees. The +branches gracefully bend down to the slope of the rising sward; while, +from the steepness of the angle, the tree-tops appear from below as a +succession of pinnacles against the sky. Many a roamer through distant +lands has come home to give the palm for the perfection of natural +beauty to the rocks and hanging woods of Cliefden. That they are within +an hour's run of London does not indeed abate their claim to admiration, +but may suggest the reason why they are so comparatively little known. +The mansion on the height, designed by Sir Charles Barry, is now in the +possession of the Duke of Westminster. + +[Illustration: 9032] + +Maidenhead is on the other side of the river; Taplow opposite. The +bridge between them--one of Brunei's works, will be noted for its +enormous span; its elliptical brick arches being, it is said, the widest +of the kind in the world. From this point, if the beauty decreases, the +historical interest becomes greater at every turn. First we pass the +village and church of Bray. The scenery here is of little interest; but +it is impossible not to give a thought to the vicar, Symond Symonds, +commemorated in song. Let it be noted, however, that the lyrist has used +a poetic licence in his dates. The historian, Thomas Fuller, tells the +story: "The vivacious vicar, living under King Henry VIII., Edward VI., +Oueen Mary, and Oueen Elizabeth, was first a Papist, then a Protestant, +then a Papist, then a Protestant again. He had seen some martyrs burnt +(two miles off), at Windsor, and found this fire too hot for his tender +temper. The vicar being taxed by one for being a turncoat and inconstant +changeling. 'Not so,' said he, 'for I always kept my principle, which is +this--to live and to die the Vicar of Bray.'" The type is but too true +to human nature, and not only in matters ecclesiastical. But instead of +staying to moralise, we will notice with interest that in this church +is preserved an ancient copy of Fox's _Book of Martyrs_, chained to +the reading-desk, as in the days of Oueen Elizabeth. It is better to be +reminded of "the faith and patience of the saints," than of the light +conviction and easy apostacy of politic "believers;" and so the old +church at Bray has taught us a refreshing and unexpected lesson. + +Soon the towers of Windsor are seen rising above the trees; then Eton +College comes into view, with its + + "distant spires, antique towers + That crown the watery glade." + +[Illustration: 0033] + +Perhaps the best view of the castle from the Thames is that from a point +just beyond the Great Western Railway bridge. When the queen is absent, +access is easy. St. George's Chapel, built by Edward IV., is the finest +existing specimen of the architecture of that period; and the view from +the North Terrace, constructed by Queen Elizabeth, is perhaps the most +beautiful on the River Thames. + +A little lower down, and we are passing between Runnimede ("Meadow of +Council"), where the barons camped, and Magna Charta Island, where the +great charter of English liberty was signed; and a temporary struggle +between king and nobles laid the broad foundations of English freedom. + +[Illustration: 9034] + +As we sweep round the bend beneath the broad meadow and the wooded isle, +"while we muse the fire burneth,"--the ardour of grateful love to Him +who has shaped the destinies of our beloved land, and has never from +that hour withdrawn the trust then committed to the nation, of being the +guardians and pioneers of the world's freedom. A multitude of thoughts +and questionings throng in upon us, but we must not lose the opportunity +of impressing on our memory the outward features of the scene. There is +not much to see: if there be time to land upon the island, it will be +as well to do so, and enter the pretty modern cottage there erected, +containing the very stone--if tradition is to be believed--on which the +Charter was laid for the royal signature. + +From Runnimede, it is but an easy climb to the brow of Cooper's Hill, +with its far-famed view of the river, of Windsor, and its woods. Dr. +Johnson speaks of Sir John Denham's poem, of which we have taken some +lines as the motto to this chapter, as "the first English specimen of +local poetry." Its subject, as well as its style, will preserve it +from the oblivion to which the greater number of the poet's works have +descended. + +Another Coin falls into the river, to the left, a little farther +on--suggestive, in its name, of the Roman occupation; the "street" to +the west here crossing the Thames by a bridge. "London Stone," a few +hundred yards lower down, marks the entrance into Middlesex; then clean +and quiet Staines----"Stones," so termed, perhaps, from the piers of +the old Roman bridge, or, it may be, from the London Stone itself, comes +into view: but if the traveller has time to spare, he will rather pause +at Laleham, so well known to every Christian educator as the earliest +scene of Arnold's labours. + +[Illustration: 0035] + +"The first reception of the tidings of his election at Rugby," we are +told by his biographer, "was overclouded with deep sorrow at leaving +the scene of so much happiness. Years after he had left it, he still +retained his early affection for it, and till he had purchased his house +in Westmoreland, he entertained a lingering hope that he might return +to it in his old age, when he should have retired from Rugby. Often he +would revisit it, and delighted in renewing his acquaintance with all +the families of the poor whom he had known during his residence; in +showing to his children his former haunts; in looking once again on his +favourite views of the great plain of Middlesex--the lonely walks along +the quiet banks of the Thames--the retired garden with its 'Campus +Martins,' and its 'wilderness of trees;' which lay behind the house, +and which had been the scenes of so many sportive games and serious +conversations." * + +[Illustration: 9036] + +Chertsey, on the other side of the river, is next passed, the leisurely +traveller having the opportunity, if he so please, of visiting the +house of Cowley the poet, or of climbing to St. Anne's Hill, once the +residence of the statesman Charles James Fox. + +Then, still on the right, the mouth of the Wey is seen, the pretty town +of Wey-bridge not being far off. Towns and villages now multiply: the +villas of city men begin to dot the banks, and the suburban railway +station appears, with its hurrying morning and evening crowds. The +chronicle of names now would be like the monotonous cry of the railway +porter: "Shepperton; Walton; Sunbury; Hampton." But as yet we need +not join with the throng. The "silent highway"--as the river has been +called--is also a retreat. Still we can leisurely survey the charm, +which, so long as the sky, the water, and the trees remain, no builder +can efface, although he may try his best, or worst. + +A bend in the river between Shepperton and Walton is of historic +interest, as there Julius Caesar with his legions forced the passage of +the Thames, and routed the British General Cassivelaunus. "Caesar led +his army to the territories of Cassivelaunus, to the river Thames, +which river can be crossed on foot in one place only, and that with +difficulty. On arriving, he perceived that great forces of the enemy +were drawn up on the opposite bank, which was moreover fortified by +sharp stakes set along the margin, a similar stockade being fixed in the +bed of the river, and covered by the stream. Having ascertained these +facts from prisoners and deserters, Caesar sent the cavalry in front, and +ordered the legions to follow immediately. The soldiers advanced with +such rapidity and impetuosity, although up to their necks in the water, +that the enemy could not withstand the onset, but quitted the banks and +betook themselves to flight." * The name Cowey, or Coway Stakes, to this +day commemorates the event. + + * Stanley's _Life_ vol. i. p. 37. One of Arnold's Laleham + pupils, afterwards his colleague at Rugby, writes: "The most + remarkable thing which struck me at once in joining the + Laleham circle, was the wonderful healthiness of tone and + feeling which prevailed in it. Everything about me I + immediately felt to be most real; it was a place where a + new-comer at once felt that a great and earnest work was + going forward. Dr. Arnold's great power as a private tutor + resided in this, that he gave such an intense earnestness to + life. Every pupil was made to feel that there was a work for + him to do--that his happiness as well as his duty lay in + doing that work well. Hence, an indescribable zest was + communicated to a young man's feeling about life; a strange + joy came over him on discovering that he had the means of + being useful, and thus of being happy; and a deep respect + and ardent attachment sprang up towards him who had taught + him thus to value life and his own self, and his work and + mission in this world." September 23, 1872. + +[Illustration: 0038] + + "Who calls the council, states the certain day. + Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way."--_Pope_ + +[Illustration: 0039] + +Two or three miles farther, and just past Hampton village, on the left +bank, the traveller will notice a little rotunda with a Grecian portico +with a mansion of some pretensions in the wooded back-ground. The house +was Garrick's residence, and in the rotunda there originally stood +Roubiliac's famous statue of Shakspere, now in the British Museum. +Bushey Park and Hampton Court next tempt us to the shore. Great names of +history again rise to memory--Wolsey, Cromwell, Williams. But the charm +of Hampton Court is, that its palace and gardens are free of access to +the people; a privilege which, all the summer through, is appreciated +by eager, happy throngs. But let us cross the river to the comparative +solitude of the two Dittons--"Thames," and "Long." An _impromptu_ of +poor Theodore Hook, lively and graceful, according to his wont, has led +many a tourist in search of a holiday to this pretty neighbourhood, and +the poet's memory is reverenced in the village accordingly. Here are the +first and last verses: + + "When sultry suns and dusty streets proclaim town's 'winter season,' + And rural scenes and cool retreats sound something like high treason-- + I steal away to shades serene which yet no bard has hit on, + And change the bustling, heartless scene for quietude and Ditlon. + Here, in a placid waking dream, I'm free from worldly troubles, + Calm as the rippling silver stream that in the sunshine bubbles; + And when sweet Eden's blissful bowers, some abler bard has writ on. + Despairing to transcend his powers, I'll-ditto-say for Ditton." + +Then comes trim Surbiton with its villas, and Kingston--once, as its +name imports, a town of kings. Por here were crowned several Saxon +monarchs; is there not the coronation-stone in the market-place, +engraven with their names? Teddington Lock, a little lower down, is the +last upon the Thames; and here too the anglers of the river put forth +their chief and almost their final strength. The mile from Teddington to +Eel-pie Island off Twickenham will be a quiet one indeed, if the voyager +interfere not with the sport of one or other of these gentry, and draw +down their resentment accordingly. Strawberry Hill reminds us of Horace +Walpole, literary idleness, sham Gothic, and _bric-a-brac_. We glance +and pass on. Pope's Villa no longer exists; only a relic of his famous +grotto remains; but a monument to the poet is in Twickenham Church, +with an inscription by Warburton, setting forth that Pope "would not be +buried in Westminster Abbey." + +Past wood-fringed meadows on either hand, the "Broadwater," now rightly +named--sweeps on to Richmond, where we must ascend the far-famed hill, +to gaze once more upon the finest river-view in Europe. A little +farther down, on autumn days, off lsleworth, may be descried flights of +swallows, preparing for their outward journey. "They arrive," writes the +artist who has depicted the scene, "in a mass, at the same hour, +without confusion, as it were in regiments, and in some of their oblique +evolutions resemble a drift of black snow. At dusk they all sink down +into the island or 'ait' opposite the church of Isleworth, where a large +bed of osiers affords them in its slender wands a settling-place for the +night." + +[Illustration: 0041] + +From this point, all Londoners know their river. The beauty of nature +is no longer present, but a new sentiment of wonder and interest takes +possession of us. We feel the stir and hear the roar of the great +Babel. What were once quiet suburban villages are now but a part of +the metropolis. Still, however, they retain something of the quaint +picturesqueness of the last century. In many a nook and corner we +come upon solid comfortable houses of red brick, where our +great-grandmothers, over a "dish of tea," may have discussed the "poems +of a person of quality," or "the writings of the ingenious Mr. Addison." + +[Illustration: 8043] + +These relics of the last century are rapidly disappearing. + +Cheyne Walk at Chelsea, which now forms so striking an object from +the river, can hardly hold out much longer against the march of modern +improvement, and will probably ere long share the fate of the Lord +Mayor's barge, and disappear from view. + +The noble embankments which now skirt so large a portion of the London +river, and the bridges old and new, afford every facility for the full +study of the Thames in all its aspects. Yet those who only cross with +the hurrying crowd miss half the picturesqueness of what many who +have travelled far feel to be among the most picturesque city views in +Europe. Wordsworth's sonnet, beginning-- + + "Earth has not anything to show more fair," + +was written on Westminster Bridge! But then it was on an early summer +morning, when the "mighty heart" of the city was "lying still," and the +"very houses seemed asleep." The blue sky, unobscured by smoke, hung +in the freshness of the dawn over the dwellings of men and the +heaven-pointing spires. The night airs had swept away every city taint, +and the atmosphere was pure as among the mountains or by the sea. The +experiment is worth making still at the cost of an hour or two's earlier +rising, to prove how exhilarating, fresh, and delightful the London air +may be. + +Or perhaps the charm of the scene may be more deeply felt amid the +mystery of night, when the clouds have dispersed, and but for some rare +footfalls there is silence, and the countless lights stretch in long +lines, reflected by the gently rippling waters, while even the bright +glare of the railway lamps aloft only add colour and splendour to the +gleaming array, and the steadfast stars hang overhead. By night or in +early morning, perhaps through force of contrast, the full beauty of +these London river scenes are felt. Or, to vary the impression, we may +take boat, as did our fathers, from bridge to bridge, "from Westminster +to Rotherhithe," or farther down the broadening stream, with the +wealth of the world, as it almost seems, ranged on either hand in the +close-crowded vessels or the stupendous warehouses. Every such excursion +is a new revelation, even to minds accustomed to the scene, of what is +meant by English commerce, and of the ties which connect us with all +mankind. Yet there is much to remind us that the universal reign of +peace has not as yet set in. Grim preparations for defence and war +bespeak a nation prepared, if needs be, for strife. And as at length +we reach Tilbury Fort, and glow under the influence of the invigorating +sea-breeze, great memories rush in upon us of armaments once gathered +here; to lead, as it seemed, the forlorn hope;--to attain, as by God's +great mercy it proved, the triumphant victory, of British Protestantism +and liberty. + +When King James I. threatened the recalcitrant corporation of London +with the removal of the court to Oxford, the Lord Mayor, with scarcely +veiled sarcasm, replied, "May it please your Majesty, of your grace, not +to take away the Thames too!" If the Upper Thames awakens our admiration +by its loveliness, the Lower Thames inspires us with wonder and almost +awe at the boundless wealth and world-wide commerce which it bears upon +its ample bosom. Other rivers may vie with it in beauty. In far-reaching +influence it stands alone. As we sail through its forest of masts, or +follow its course down to the sea, we feel that we are surrounded by +influences which stretch to the very ends of the earth. The stream whose +course we have traced from the tiny rivulet in Trewsbury Mead has become +the channel of communications which, for good or evil, are affecting +every nation under heaven. May He who has endowed us with such wealth +and power lead us to hold them both under a deep sense of responsibility +to Him who gave them!--"Then shall our peace flow like a river, and our +righteousness as the waves of the sea." + + + + +SOUTH-EASTERN RAMBLES + +[Illustration: 0046] + +|HE is a benefactor to his species who makes two blades of corn grow +where only one grew before." The substantial truth of the aphorism none +will question; vet it would be a doubtful benefit if all our waste +lands were reclaimed and brought under the plough. Enclosure Acts, by +extending the area of our productive soil, have increased the resources +of the country and the food of the people. But the total absorption into +cultivated farms of heath, forest, and woodland would be to purchase the +utilitarian advantage at too high a price. + +The open commons of Surrey and the rolling downs of Sussex are, in their +way, of a beauty unsurpassed. Both are chiefly due to the great chalk +formation, which comes down in a south-westerly direction from the +eastern counties, breaks into the Chiltern Hills, extends over the +greater part of Wiltshire, Dorsetshire, and Hampshire; and in the east +of the last-named county becomes separated into two branches; one, +the "North Downs," running almost due east to the North Foreland +and Shakespere's Cliff; the other, the "South Downs," pursuing a +south-easterly direction to Beachy Head. In their long and undulating +course, they form innumerable combinations of picturesque beauty. Places +elsewhere, well known and deservedly famous, are rivalled in loveliness +by many a sequestered scene in the line of the lower chalk country, +of which few but the thinly-scattered inhabitants, and now and then an +unconventional tourist, have ever heard. + +[Illustration: 0048] + +The charm of these lines of rolling upland is much enhanced by the great +rough plain which they inclose--"the Weald" (i.e. Forest), as it is +termed--extending in an irregular triangle from the point where the +Downs diverge to the British Channel. Geologists have framed many +theories as to the formation of the Weald. It belongs to the Oolite +formation below the chalk; it is the uppermost member of that formation, +and was a deposit of sands and clays in a tropical climate, as is +abundantly evident from animal and vegetable remains found there. These +prove the existence of islands, banks and forests, forming the shores of +a vast estuary, the embouchure of some great river from the west. At +one time, the deep chalk deposit extended all over it; but this was +disturbed by a line of elevation running along its east and west axis, +the superincumbent chalk being broken up and washed away; hence the +cliff-like aspect of the Downs in many places, where they descend +precipitously to the sandy and gravelly edge of the valley, as to a +beach. The remains of the huge land lizards and iguanodons of the Weald, +collected by the late Dr. Mantell, form one of the most conspicuous +exhibitions of fossil bones in the British Museum. The pretty little +fossil ferns, Lonchopteris and Sphenopteris, found nature-printed on the +sandstones, are, on the other hand, the very counterparts, in size and +delicacy, of their present successors. + +In early times, as every local historian tells, the Weald was a chief +seat of the iron manufacture in Great Britain. The ironstone found here +was certainly wrought by the Romans and Saxons, if not by the ancient +Britons; and down to the seventeenth century the trade was prosperous. +Many an old manor-house, to the present day, attests this former +prosperity, while its memories linger also in such local names as +Furnace Place, Cinder Hill, and Hammer Ponds. The balustrades round St. +Paul's Cathedral are a relic of the Sussex ironworks. Want of fuel, and +the more abundant and rich ironstone of the Coal-measures, caused the +decay of the industry, after whole forests had been destroyed to feed +the furnaces. The old-fashioned cottages, here and there remaining, +speak of days of former prosperity among the working-classes; nor +are they even yet devoid of comfort, although the transition has been +great--ironworkers then, chicken-fatteners now! + +The ridge that runs through the centre of the Weald is called the Forest +Ridge and Ashdown. It is here that the chief beauties of the district +are concentrated, while the whole plain lies open to view from the +heights. Starting from East Grinstead, near to which is the source of +the Medway, a walk of extraordinary interest and sylvan beauty leads by +Forest Row and the ruins of Brambletye House up to High Beeches; from +which spot a pleasant excursion may be made to Horsted Keynes, where the +gentle and saintly Archbishop Leighton lies buried. His grave is in the +chancel; his tomb outside the church. Thence, bearing to the east, the +traveller may work his way to Crowborough Beacon, near the road from +Tunbridge Wells to Lewes, where, with a foreground of moss and fern, +dotted here and there by fir trees, he may look over the whole rolling +surface of the Weald, rich with the flowers of spring, the blossoms of +summer, or the golden fruitage and yellow corn of the autumn; while the +purple downs on either hand close in the prospect, with just one gleam, +beyond Beachy Head, of the distant sea. Then, if desirous of prolonging +his ramble to other points of view, he may cross the hills to +Heathfield, resting on the way at Mayfield, an old-world Wealden town, +once a residence of archbishops, and the traditional scene of the +renowned combat between Dunstan and the Devil. Here the traveller +may find a temporary resting-place in some rustic hostelry, where, +if luxuries are not obtainable, the eggs and bacon are wholesome and +abundant; the sheets are fragrant with lavender, and though perhaps +a little wondered at by the rustic children, he will have a home-like +welcome. + +[Illustration: 0050] + +Again we leave the beaten track, and push on through the vale of +Heathfield to the south; for a walk of seven or eight miles will bring +us to Hurstmonceux, inseparably connected with the name and work of +Archdeacon Hare, the philosophic theologian and devout Christian, whose +books on the Victory of Faith and the Mission of the Comforter have done +so much to elevate the religious thought of the age; and who, by +his _Vindication of Luther_, has made it impossible for any man of +competent knowledge and fair judgment to repeat old calumnies against +the great Reformer. + +[Illustration: 0051] + +We visit the castle--one of the finest remains of the later +feudalism--fortress and mansion in one. "Persons who have visited Rome," +writes Archdeacon Hare, "on entering the Castle-court, and seeing the +piles of brickwork strewn about, have been reminded of the Baths of +Caracalla, though of course on a miniature scale; the illusion being +perhaps fostered by the deep blue of the Sussex sky, which, when +compared with that in more northerly parts of England, has almost an +Italian character." After exploring the great ruddy-tinted ruins, we +may ascend to the church, taking a glance at the rectory, the home of +so much piety and genius, seeing once again in thought the archdeacon's +friend and curate, poor John Sterling, as described by Hare, with his +tall form rapidly advancing across the lawn to the study window; or +more pensively may pass to the churchyard, where so many members of the +parted family band sleep as "one in Christ." + +Before turning northwards, let us make our way to Beachy Mead, grandest +of the English chalk headlands in the south; or, resting for a while at +Eastbourne, that bright modern watering-place, between the sea and the +hills, with the quaint Sussex village in the background, we may prepare +for a long, health-giving, inspiring ramble over the South Downs, "that +chain of majestic mountains," as White of Selborne calls them--for the +most part bare treeless hills, sweeping in many a grand curve, broken +by shadowed "coombes," or wooded flowery "deans." On the way to Lewes, +Firle Beacon, one of the highest points of the Downs, may be ascended, +after which the traveller may take the rail to Brighton and Shoreham, +and strike up hill again into what is perhaps the finest part of the +range, where, from Chanctonbury Ring, he will be able to command at +one view all its most characteristic features. The height itself is +conspicuous far and wide, from its dark crown of fir trees. Probably the +"Ring" denotes here the ancient entrenchment, British or Roman, which +is circular, or it may be a reminiscence of the time when fairies were +believed in; "fairy rings" being a common feature of the Downs; caused +really by the growth of mushrooms, the grass, by the decay of the +latter, becoming of a deeper green. + +[Illustration: 0053] + +Steyning is the nearest station to Chanctonbury, and we would advise +the tourist to take train there for the North Downs, or better still, to +proceed in the opposite direction to Arundel, famous for its picturesque +castle and park, with its fair historic pastures: but in either case the +Weald will be crossed via Horsham. About half way between Arundel and +Horsham, many a traveller will be disposed to turn off to the little +Sussex town of Midhurst, on the edge of the Weald, where Richard Cobden +was born, and where the old "Schola Grammaticalis," the most prominent +building in the town, has the twin honour of the great Free Trader's +early education, as well as that of Sir Charles Lyell, the geologist. +Between this town and Dorking, whither the traveller is bound, he may +see to his left the wooded slopes and imposing tower-crowned summit of +Leith Hill, the loftiest elevation in southeastern England. If he can +leave the rail, say at the little roadside station of Capel, and climb +the hill from the south-east by Ockley and Tanhurst, he will not only +be richly rewarded, but may perhaps express his astonishment that such +views and such a walk should be found within a short afternoon's journey +of London. From the summit of Leith Hill, it is said that ten counties +are visible; not only Kent, Sussex, and Surrey, but Hampshire, +Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Middlesex. Hertfordshire, and +Essex. The eye ranges, in short, from a height of just less than 1000 +feet over a circumference of 200 miles of fair and various landscape; +valley and upland; broad meadows and wooded slopes, with many an open +ridge against the sky. Only the charm of river or lake is wanting; +but we are in no mood to be critical. Downwards, the walk is full of +interest, through wooded lanes to Anstiebury, where there is a fine +Roman encampment, and on to romantic Holmwood, with its pine woods and +breezy common; past Deepdene, the wonderfully beautiful seat of the +Hope family, and so to Dorking, where the wearied pedestrian will find a +pleasant rest, with nothing to excite him, save the remembrances of his +little excursion. + +[Illustration: 0055] + +If he were not well prepared for its exceeding loveliness beforehand, it +must have been to him a surprise as well as a delight. Comparisons are +proverbially distasteful, but we can understand, if we can not wholly +endorse, the rapturous verdict of John Dennis, who gives it as his +opinion that the prospect from Leith Hill "surpasses at once in rural +charm, pomp, and magnificence" the view of the Val d'Arno from the +Apennines, or of the Campagna from Tivoli. + +[Illustration: 0056] + +We are now fairly in the Surrey Hills, and may put what some will think +the very crown to these south-eastern excursions by a walk from Dorking +to Farnham. Ascending by one of many lanes, shadowed (at the time of our +visit) by hedges bright with hawthorn berries, and stately trees just +touched with the russet and gold of early autumn, we are soon upon an +upland stretch of heath and forest, still remaining in all the wildness +of nature. Sometimes the path leads us between venerable trees--oak and +beech and yew, whose branches form an impenetrable roof overhead, then +traverses a sweep of bare hill, bright with gorse and heather, then +plunges into some fairy dell, carpeted with softest moss. Many of the +"stately homes of England," with their embowering trees upon the lower +slopes, add a charm to the scene by their reminiscences as well as by +their beauty. To the left is Wotton; made famous by the name and +genius of John Evelyn, author of _Sylva_ and the _Diary_--the scholar, +gentleman, and Christian--pure-minded in an age of corruption, and the +admiration of dissolute courtiers, who could respect what they would not +imitate. It is to him that Cowley says: + + "Happy art thou, whom God does bless + With the full choice of thine own happiness; + And happier yet, because thou'rt blest + With wisdom how to choose the best." + +That the choice was made, for life and death, appears by the inscription +which Evelyn directed to be placed on his tombstone at Wotton. "That +living in an age of extraordinary events and revolution, he had learned +from thence this truth, which he desired might be thus communicated to +posterity: that all is vanity which is not honest, and that there is no +solid wisdom but real piety." + +Two or three miles further Albury is reached, with its lovely gardens +designed by Evelyn. The curious traveller may here inspect the sumptuous +church erected by the late Mr. Drummond, the owner of Albury, for the +followers of Edward Irving. The worth of Mr. Drummond's character, with +the shrewd sense and caustic wit by which he was wont to enliven +the debates of the House of Commons, laid a deeper hold upon his +contemporaries than his theological peculiarities; and the special views +of which this temple is the costly memorial have proved of insufficient +power to sway the minds and hearts of men. Still ascending, we reach +again the summit of steep downs, and advancing by noble yew-trees gain +at Newland's Corner another magnificent view. The hill of the "Holy +Martyrs'" Chapel, now corrupted to "Saint Martha's," may next be +climbed, and a short rest at the fine old town of Guildford will be +welcome. The castle, the churches with their monuments, and Archbishop +Abbot's Hospital, are all worthy of a visit; but, unless we have a day +to spare, we must be content with but a hurried glance, for we have +still the "Hog's Back" to traverse, a ten miles' walk to Farnham. + +Climbing from the station at Guildford through pleasant lanes, the +traveller emerges upon a narrow chalk-ridge, half-a-mile wide, and +nearly level, which etymologists tell us was called by the Anglo-Saxons +_Hoga_, a hill, whence the ridge received its name. Possibly, however, +a simpler derivation, as the more obvious, is also the more correct. The +long upland unbroken line might not unaptly have been compared with +one of those long, lean, narrow-backed swine with which early English +illuminations make us familiar; and the homeliness of the name +would quite accord with the habit of early topographers. The walk is +interesting, but, after the varied beauties of the way from Dorking to +Guildford, may appear at first slightly monotonous. On either side the +fair, fertile champaign of Surrey stretches to the horizon, broken +here and there by low wood-crowned hills, and at one point especially, +between Puttenham on the left, and Wanborough on the right, the +combinations of view are very striking. Puttenham church-tower, and the +manor-house, formerly the Priory, peep out from amongst the foliage of +some grand old trees. A few cottages and farmhouses lie scattered about +picturesquely, forming the very ideal of an old English village; while +pine-covered Crooksbury Hill, with the Devil's Jumps and Hindhead in +the farther distance, make a striking background to the view. "Wan" is +evidently "Woden," and here there was no doubt a shrine of the ancient +Saxon deity. + +We must not omit in passing to drink of the Wanborough spring, among the +freshest and purest in England; never known, it is said, to freeze. + +Pursuing our journey, we presently look down upon Moor Park and +Waverley, which we may either visit now, descending by the little, +village of Seale, or reserve for an excursion from Farnham. Waverley +contains the picturesque remains of an old Cistercian Abbey, built as +the Cistercians always did build, in a charming valley, embosomed in +hills, irrigated by a clear running stream, abounding in fish, and with +current enough to turn the mill of the monastery. The annals of this +great establishment, extending over two hundred and thirty years, were +published towards the close of the seventeenth century; and Sir Walter +Scott took from them the name now so familiar wherever the English +language is spoken. + +Divided from Waverley by a winding lane, whose high banks and profuse +undergrowth remind us of Devonshire, lies Moor Park. Hither Sir William +Temple retired from the toils of State, to occupy his leisure by +gardening, planting, and in writing memoirs. A trim garden, with +stiff-clipped hedges, and watered by a straight canal which runs through +it, is doubtless a reminiscence of Temple's residence as our ambassador +at the Hague. "But," says Lord Macaulay, "there were other inmates of +Moor Park to whom a higher interest belongs. An eccentric, uncouth, +disagreeable young Irishman, who had narrowly escaped plucking at +Dublin, attended Sir William as an amanuensis for board and twenty +pounds a year; dined at the second table, wrote bad verses in praise of +his employer, and made love to a very pretty dark-eyed young girl, +who waited on Lady Giffard. Little did Temple imagine that the coarse +exterior of his dependant concealed a genius equally suited to politics +and to letters, a genius destined to shake great kingdoms, to stir the +laughter and the rage of millions, and to leave to posterity memorials +which can only perish with the English language. Little did he think +that the flirtation in his servants' hall, which he, perhaps, scarcely +deigned to make the subject of a jest, was the beginning of a long, +unprosperous love, which was to be as widely famed as the passion of +Petrarch or Abelard. Sir William's secretary was Jonathan Swift. Lady +Giffard's waiting-maid was poor Stella." + +Just outside the lodge gate, at the end of the park furthest from the +mansion, is a small house covered with roses and evergreens. It is known +to the peasantry as Dame Swift's cottage. Our rustic guide pointed it +out by this name, but who Dame Swift was he did not know. He had never +heard of Stella and her sad history. An object of far greater interest +to him was a large fox-earth, a couple of hundred yards away, in which +some years ago "a miser" had lived and died. A whole crop of legends +have already sprung up about the mysterious inmate of the cave. He was +a nobleman, so said our informant, who had been crossed in love: he +had made a vow that no human being should see his face, and accordingly +never came out till after nightfall, even then being closely wrapped up +in his cloak. After his death a party of ladies and gentlemen came +down from London in a post-chaise and four; and having buried the body +carried away "a cartload of golden guineas and fine dresses, which he +had hid in the cave." + +[Illustration: 0059] + +The picturesqueness of the approach to Farnham, whether over the last +ridge of the Hog's Back, or through the lanes from Seale, Moor Park, +and Waverley, is much enhanced by the hop-gardens, which occupy about a +thousand acres in the neighbourhood. For excellence the Farnham hops are +considered to bear the palm, although the chief field of this peculiar +branch of cultivation is in Kent. No south-eastern rambles, especially +in the early autumn, would be complete without a visit to the gardens +where the hop-picking is in full operation. It is the great holiday +for thousands of the humbler class of Londoners, as well as the chosen +resort of thousands of the "finest pisantry" from the Emerald Isle. +Costermongers, watermen, sempstresses, factory girls, labourers of +all descriptions, young and old, bear a hand at the work. The air is +invigorating, the task to the industrious is easy, and the pay is not +bad. The hop-pickers, who are in such numbers that they cannot obtain +even humble lodgings in the villages, sleep in barns, sheds, stables, +and booths, or even under the hedges in the lanes. A rough kind of +order is maintained among themselves; although outbreaks of violence and +debauchery sometimes happen. On the whole the work is not unhealthy, and +the opportunity of engaging in it is as real a boon to the hop-pickers +as the journey to Scarborough or Biarritz to those of another class. +Besides which, the great gathering of people gives opportunities of +which Christian activity avails itself; and the evening visit to the +encampment, the homely address, the quiet talk, and the well-chosen +tract, have been instrumental of lasting good to those whom religious +agencies elsewhere had failed to reach. + +[Illustration: 0060] + +Farnham has special associations with both the Church and the Army; and +the impartial visitor will no doubt take an opportunity of seeing the +stately moated castle, the abode of the Bishops of Winchester, and of +visiting the neighbouring camp of Aldershot. The politician will recal +the name of William Cobbett, who was born in this neighbourhood, and +in his own direct and homely style, often dwells on his boyish +recollections of its charms. Some will not forget another name +associated with this little Surrey town. One among the sweetest singers +of our modern Israel, Augustus Toplady, was born at Farnham. He died +at the age of thirty-eight, but he lived long enough to write "Rock of +Ages, cleft for me and none need covet a nobler earthly immortality." + +[Illustration: 0062] + + + + +OUR FOREST AND WOODLANDS + +|WHEN Britain was first brought by Roman ambition within the knowledge +of Southern Europe, the interior of our Island was one vast forest. +Caesar and Strabo agree in describing its towns as being nothing more +than spaces cleared of trees--"royds," or "thwaites" in North of England +phrase--where a few huts were placed and defended by ditch or rampart. +Somersetshire and the adjacent counties were covered by the Coit Mawr, +or Great Wood. Asser tells us that Berkshire was so called from the Wood +of Berroc, where the box-tree grew most abundantly. Buckinghamshire was +so called from the great forests of beech (boc), of which the remnants +still survive. The Cotswold Hills, and the Wolds of Yorkshire, are shown +by their names to have been once far-spreading woodlands; and the +same may be said of the Weald of Sussex, the subject, in part, of the +preceding chapter. "In the district of the Weald," writes the Rev. Isaac +Taylor, "almost every local name, for miles and miles, terminates in +_hurst, ley, den, or field_. The _hursts_ were the dense portions of the +forests; the _leys_ are the open forest-glades where the cattle love to +lie; the dens are the deep wooded valleys, and the _fields_ were little +patches of 'felled' or cleared land in the midst of the surrounding +forest. From Petersfield and Midhurst, by Billinghurst, Cuckfield, +Wadhurst, and Lamberhurst, as far as Hawkshurst and Tenterden, these +names stretch in an uninterrupted string." And, again, "A line of +names ending in _den_ testifies to the existence of the forest tract in +Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, and Huntingdon, which formed the western +boundary of the East Saxon and East Anglican Kingdoms. Henley in Arden +and Hampton in Arden are vestiges of the great Warwickshire forest of +Arden, which stretched from the Forest of Dean to Sherwood Forest." * +Hampshire was already a forest in the time of William the Conqueror: +all he did was to sweep away the towns and villages which had sprung +up within its precincts. Epping and Hainault are but fragments of +the ancient forest of Essex, which extended as far as Colchester. +Lancashire, Cheshire, Yorkshire, and the other northern counties, were +the haunts of the wolf, the wild boar, and the red deer, which roamed at +will over moorland and forest, and have given their names here and there +to a bold upland or sequestered nook. + +Even down to the time of Oueen Elizabeth immense tracts of primeval +forest remained unreclaimed. Sir Henry Spelman ** gives the following +list of those which were still in existence. + + * Words and Places, pp. 381-3. + + ** Quoted in _English Forests and Forest Trees._ + +[Illustration: 0064] + +[Illustration: 0065] + +This list is evidently far from complete. It may, however, serve to show +the extent of unreclaimed land in England so recently as the sixteenth +century. And here, it should be noted, that though, as a matter of fact, +forest lands are generally woodlands also, this is not essential to +the meaning of the word. A "forest," says Mr. Hensleigh Wedgwood, * "is +properly a wilderness, or uncultivated tract of country; but, as such +were commonly overgrown with trees, the word took the meaning of a large +wood. We have many forests in England without a stick of timber upon +them." It is especially so in Scotland, as many a traveller who has +ridden all the long day by the treeless "Forest of Breadalbane" will +well remember. + + * _Dictionary of English Etymology._ + +The question has been recently much discussed whether our forests +ought to be retained in their present extent. Economists have shown +by calculation that forests do not pay. It is said that they encourage +idleness and poaching, and thus lead to crime. Estimates have been made +of the amount of corn which might be raised if the soil were brought +under the plough. Yet few persons who have wandered through the glades +of our glorious woodlands would be willing to part with them. Admit that +the cost of maintenance is in excess of their return to the national +exchequer; yet England is rich enough to bear the loss; and it is a poor +economy which reduces everything to a pecuniary estimate. "Man shall +not live by bread alone." In God's world beauty has its place as well as +utility. "Consider the lilies." + + "God might have made enough--enough + For every want of ours, + For temperance, medicine, and use, + And yet have made no flowers." + +"He hath made everything beautiful in his time;" and means that we +should rejoice in His works as well as feed upon His bounty and learn +from His wisdom. While by no means insensible to the charm of a richly +cultivated district, where "the pastures are clothed with flocks, the +valleys also are covered over with corn," yet let us trust that the day +is far distant when our few remaining forests shall have disappeared +before modern improvements and scientific husbandry. + +To the lover of nature, forest scenery is beautiful at all seasons. +How pleasant is it, in the hot summer noon, to lie beneath the "leafy +screen," through which the sunlight flickers like golden rain; to watch +the multitudenous life around us--the squirrel flashing from bough to +bough, the rabbit darting past with quick, jerky movements, the birds +flitting hither and thither in busy idleness, the columns of insects +in ceaseless, aimless gliding motion--and to listen to the mysterious +undertone of sound which pervades rather than disturbs the silence! +Beautiful, too, are the woods when autumn has touched their greenery +with its own variety of hue. From the old Speech House of the Forest +of Dean we have looked out as on a billowy, far extending sea of +glory--elm, oak, beech, ash, maple, all with their own peculiar tints, +yet blending into one harmonious chord of colour in the light of the +westering sun; whilst from among them the holly and the yew stood out +like green islands set in an ocean of gold. + +A little later in the year, and we tread among the rustling leaves, +whilst over us interlaces in intricate tracery a network of branches, +twigs, and sprays:-- + + "The ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang." + +Return a few weeks afterwards, and surely it will be felt that forest +scenery is never more fairy-like than when the bare boughs are feathered +with snowflakes, or sparkle with icicles, that flash like diamonds in +the wintry sunlight, or faintly tinkle overhead as they sway to and fro +in the icy breeze. Never is the forest more solemn than when, with a +sound like thunder or the raging sea, the wind tosses the giant branches +in wild commotion. We cannot wonder that Schiller delighted to wander +alone in the stormy midnight through the woods, listening to the tempest +which raged aloft, or that much of his grandest poetry was composed amid +scenes like these. + +Nor must we forget the aspect of the woods in early spring, when Nature +is just awaking from her winter's sleep. It needs a quick eye to trace +the delicate shades of colour which then succeed each other--the dull +brown first brightening into a reddish hue, as the glossy leaf-cases +begin to expand, then a faint hint of tender green as the pale leaves +burst from their enclosure one after another, tinging with colour the +skeleton branches which they are soon to clothe with their beautiful +mantle. + + "Mysterious round! What skill, what force divine, + Deep felt, in these appear! A simple train, + Yet so delightful, mixed with such kind art, + Such beauty and beneficence combined, + Shade unperceived so softening into shade. + And all so forming an harmonious whole, + That, as they still succeed, they ravish still." + +The New Forest claims precedence over all others, from its extent, its +picturesque beauty, and its historical associations. Though greatly +encroached upon since the time that the Conqueror "loved its red deer as +if he were their father," and the Red King fell beneath the arrow of Sir +Walter Tyrrell, it still contains long stretches of wild moorland, +and mighty oaks which may have been venerable in the days of the +Plantagenets. The red deer have entirely disappeared. About a hundred +fallow-deer yet remain. They are very shy, hiding themselves in the +least visited recesses of the Forest, and are rarely seen except during +the annual hunt, which takes place every spring. In 1874 a pack of +bloodhounds was brought down by Lord Londesborough, who owns a beautiful +park near Lyndhurst. The sport, however, is said not to have been very +good. Numerous droves of forest ponies run wild, and with the herds +of swine feeding upon the acorns and beech-mast give animation to the +scene. Amid the forest glades even pigs become picturesque. + +Charming excursions may be made into the Forest from the towns on its +borders, Southampton, Lymington, Christchurch, or Ringwood. But he +who would fully appreciate its beauties must take up his quarters at +Lyndhurst, in the very heart of its finest scenery. From this centre, +walks or drives may be taken in every direction, and in almost endless +variety. One of these, describing a circuit of about twelve miles, past +the Rufus Stone and Boldrewood, claims especial mention. The road leads +for a short distance through a richly-wooded and highly cultivated +district. On a knoll to the left is a farm-house occupying the site +of the Keep of Malwood, where William Rufus slept the night before his +death. From this point vistas, locally known as "peeps," are cut +through the trees, commanding noble views over the Forest, and extending +southwards to Southampton Water, the Channel and the Isle of Wight. The +soil now becomes more barren, and the trees more sparse and stunted. At +the bottom of a steep descent stood a pyramidal stone, marking the spot +where the king was slain, bearing on its three sides a record of the +event. This has now been cased by an iron cylinder, with the original +inscriptions in bold relief. To the left stretches a long bare ridge of +moorland, from the summit of which the eye ranges over grand sweeps +of fern, gorse, and heather, bounded by woodlands to the verge of the +horizon. + +[Illustration: 0068] + +The road now passes through a succession of forest glades, over +smooth green turf, beneath arches of beech and oak, with a luxuriant +undergrowth of holly and yew. At Burley Lodge we reach some of the +finest and oldest timber in the Forest. Here formerly stood twelve +magnificent oaks, known as the "Twelve Apostles." Most of these have, +disappeared, but two yet remain, which for size, beauty, and venerable +antiquity are perhaps unequalled. A little farther on, a grove of +beeches arrests the traveller by the grandeur and beauty of their forms, +and is a favourite halting-place. Enthusiastic lovers of sylvan scenery, +artists and others, not infrequently encamp here for days together, +screened from wind and weather not only by the canvas of their tent, +but by the impenetrable roof of foliage overhead. Bearing to the south, +along an intricate labyrinth of woodpaths, through modern plantations +alternated with clumps of primeval forest, we reach& the cultivated +district, with smiling farms, stately mansions, and picturesque +villages, returning thus to Lyndhurst. + +[Illustration: 0069] + +Before we bid a regretful adieu to this little forest town, we must by +all means visit the new church. The noble fresco of the Ten Virgins by +Leighton which forms the altar-piece, is understood to be the munificent +gift of the artist. The look of sullen or of wild despair on the faces +of the foolish virgins as they are rejected, and the expression of +sternness blended with pity in that of the angel who repels them, may +well awaken solemn thought: + + "Too late! too late! ye cannot enter now!" + +[Illustration: 0070] + +The Forest of Dean, though less extensive than the New Forest, is hardly +less beautiful;-- + + "The queen of forests all that west of Severn lie."--_Drayton_. + +It occupies the high ground between the valleys of the Severn and the +Wye. What Lyndhurst is to the one, the Speech House is to the other. +The Foresters' Courts have been held here for centuries, in a large +hall panelled with dark oak and hung round with deer's antlers. Here the +"verderers," foresters, "gavellers," miners, and Crown agents meet +to discuss in open court their various claims in a sort of local +parliament. Originally the King's Lodge, it is now a comfortable inn, +affording good accommodation for the lovers of sylvan scenery. The deer +with which the forest once abounded diminished in numbers up to 1850, +when they were removed. But, as in the New Forest, droves of ponies +and herds of swine roam at large among the trees, giving animation and +interest to the landscape. A different feeling is aroused by the sight +of furnaces and coal-pits in different directions, indicative of the +mineral treasures hidden beneath the fair surface of this forest. +Ironworks have in fact existed here from very early times; the +forest-trees having, as in the Weald of Sussex, afforded an abundant +supply of fuel, though (thanks to the coal-beds beneath) without the +same result in denuding the district of its leafy glories. + +Savernake Forest, in Wiltshire, the property of the Marquis of +Ailesbury, is the only English forest belonging to a subject, and is +especially remarkable for its avenues of trees. One, of magnificent +beeches, is nearly four miles in length, and is intersected at one point +of its course by three separate "walks" or forest vistas, placed at such +angles as with the avenue itself to command eight points of the compass. +The effect is unique and beautiful, the artificial character of the +arrangement being amply compensated by the exceeding luxuriance of the +thick-set trees, and the soft loveliness of the verdant flowery +glades which they enclose. The smooth bright foliage of the beech is +interspersed with the darker shade of the fir, while towering elms and +majestic wide-spreading oaks diversify the line of view in endless, +beautiful variety. At one point, a clump of trees will be reached--the +veterans of the forest, with moss-clad trunks and gnarled half-leafless +branches; the chief being known as the King Oak, but sometimes called +the Duke's, from the Lord Protector Somerset, with whom this tree was +a favourite. The railway from Hungerford to Marlborough skirts this +forest, the southern portion of which is known as Tottenham Park. An +obelisk, erected on one of its highest points, in 1781, to commemorate +the recovery of George III., forms an easily-recognisable landmark, +and may also guide the wanderer in the forest glades, who might else be +bewildered by the very uniformity of the lone lines of foliage. On the +whole, if this Forest of Savernake has not the vast extent, or the wild +natural beauty of some other forests, it has all the charm that the +richest luxuriance can give, while some of its noblest I trees will be +found away from the great avenues, on the gentle slopes or in the mossy +dells, which diversify the surface of this most beautiful domain. Nor +will the visitor in spring-time fail to be delighted by the great banks +of rhododendron and azalea, which at many parts add colour and splendour +to the scene. + +Among our smaller woodlands, Burnham Beeches claim special notice. They +are reached by a charming drive of five or six miles from Maidenhead. +The road leads at first through one of the most highly cultivated and +fertile districts in England, and then enters Dropmore Park, with its +stately avenues of cedar and pine, and some of the finest araucarias +in Europe. The Beeches occupy a knoll which rises from the plain, over +which it commands splendid views, Windsor Castle and the valley of the +Thames being conspicuous objects in the landscape. The trees are many +of them of immense girth; but having been pollarded--tradition says by +Cromwell's troopers--they do not attain a great height. They are thus +wanting in the feathery grace and sweep which form the characteristic +beauty of the beech; but, in exchange for this, the gnarled, twisted +branches are in the very highest degree picturesque, and to the wearied +Londoner few ways of spending a summer's day can be more enjoyable than +a ramble over the Burnham Knoll, with its turfy slopes and shaded dells, +or better still, a picnic with some chosen friends in the shadow of one +or other of these stupendous trees. + +[Illustration: 0072] + +Space will not allow us to do more than refer to the forests of Epping +and Hainault, Sherwood and Charnwood, Whittlebury and Delamere, with +many others. The names recal the memories of happy days spent beneath +their leafy screen, or in wandering over the wild moorlands on which +they stand, with grateful thoughts, too, of-- + + "That unwearied love + Which planned and built, and still upholds this world, + So clothed with beauty for rebellious man." + + + + +SHAKESPEARE'S COUNTRY + +[Illustration: 0074] + +[Illustration: 0075] + +|THE traveller who would enter into the full charm of "Shakspere's +country" is recommended to start from the quaint and ancient city of +Coventry, and to pursue the high road to Warwick, taking Kenilworth in +his way. There is scarcely a walk in England more perfect in its own +kind of beauty than the five miles from Coventry to Kenilworth. A wide, +well-kept road follows, almost in a straight line, the undulations +of the hills. Soon after leaving the city, a broad, flower-enamelled +coppice, open to the road, is reached; then the hedgerows are flanked +on both sides with noble elms, forming a stately avenue, through which +glimpses are ever and anon obtained of purple wood-crested hills in +the distance. Broad rolling pastures, and cornfields, rich in promise, +stretch away on either hand; the grassy road-side and high hedge-banks, +showing the deep red subsoil of the sandstone, or variegated clays of +the red marls, are bright with wild flowers, and the air is musical +with the song of birds. Travellers are few; the railway scream in the +distance, to the left, suggests that all who are in a hurry to reach +their destination have taken another route; if it be holiday time, +parties of young men on Coventry bicycles are sure to flash past; but +it is our delight to linger and enjoy. We are, as Thomas Fuller says, +in the "Medi-terranean" part of England; and English scenery nowhere +displays a more characteristic charm. + +[Illustration: 0076] + +Kenilworth old church and the castle at length are reached; the latter, +a stately ruin. The visitor will duly note Caesar's Tower, the original +keep, with its walls, in some parts, sixteen feet thick; then the +remains of the magnificent banqueting hall, built by John of Gaunt, +and, lastly, the dilapidated towers erected by Robert Dudley, Earl of +Leicester, one part of which bears the name of poor Amy Robsart. No +officious cicerone is likely to offer his services; a trifling gate-fee +opens the place freely to all, either to rest on the greensward, or to +climb the battered ramparts; to survey, at one view, the ancient moat, +the castle garden, the tilt-yard, where knights met in mimic battle; +the bed of the lake, where sea-fights were imitated for a monarch's +sport--in short, the impressive memorials of a fashion in life and act +that have long since yielded to nobler things. "The massy ruins," says +Sir Walter Scott, "only serve to show what their splendour once was, +and to impress on the musing visitor the transitory value of human +possessions, and the happiness of those who enjoy a humble lot in +industrious contentment." There are other lessons, too, national, +as well as individual; and we turn away from old Kenilworth with +thankfulness that the ruins of the nineteenth century will at least tell +to our descendants no tales of feudal tyranny, of royal murders, or of +sanguinary civil strife. + +[Illustration: 0078] + +The town of Kenilworth is of considerable size, containing, at the last +census, more than 3,000 inhabitants. The traveller may rest here, or in +a quaint little hostelry close to the castle gates, not forgetting to +visit the ancient church--that at the other end of the town is modern, +and need not detain him. After due refreshment, he will probably be in +the humour for another five miles' walk, or drive, along a road almost +equal in beauty to that by which he came, to Warwick, calling at Guy's +Cliff by the way. He had better make up his mind, for the time at least, +to believe in Guy, "the Saxon giant who slew the dun cow," and, after a +life of doughty deeds, retired to a hermitage, here where the Avon opens +into a lake-like transparent pool, at the foot of the exquisitely-wooded +cliff. The cave of the giant's retreat may be seen; and the traveller +will be charmed by the fair mansion on the one side overhanging the +Avon, and on the other opening down a long avenue, flowery and verdant, +to the high road. + +[Illustration: 0079] + +Warwick Castle is so frequently visited, that it needs little +description. The winding road, cut out of the solid rock from the +lodge to the castle gate, is a fitting approach to the stately +fortress-palace, and well prepares the visitor for what is to follow. +Some will prefer to roam the gardens, so far as watchful custodians +permit, turning aside to the solid-looking Gothic conservatory to see +the great Warwick vase, brought from fair Tivoli; others will follow the +courteous housekeeper down the long suite of castle halls, poting the +glorious views from the deep embayed windows, duly admiring the bed in +which Queen Anne once slept, with the portrait of her majesty, plump and +rubicund, on the opposite wall. The logs heaped up, as logs have been +for centuries, in readiness for the great hall-fire, carry the mind +back to olden fashions; the inlaid table of precious stones, said to be +"worth" ten thousand pounds, excites a languid curiosity; the helmet +of Oliver Cromwell, an authentic relic, suggests many a thought of +the great brain which it once enclosed; and, while other items in the +antique show pass as phantasmagoria before the bewildered attention, +there are some portraits on the walls, to have seen which is a lasting +pleasure of memory. It is a happy thing that these were spared by the +fire of 1871; justly counted as a national calamity rather than a +family misfortune. The traces of the conflagration are now almost wholly +removed, although some priceless treasures have been irrecoverably lost. + +[Illustration: 0080] + +At the lodge, by the castle gate, there is a museum of curiosities, +which will interest the believers in the great "Guy," and will amuse +others. For there is the giant's "porridge pot" of bell-metal, vast in +circumference and resonant in ring; with his staff, his horse's armour, +and, to crown all, some ribs of the "dun cow" herself! What if, in sober +truth, some last lingerer of a species now extinct roamed over the +great forest of Arden, the terror of the country, until Sir Guy wrought +deliverance? + +Warwick itself need not detain us long; the church, however, demands +a visit; and the Beauchamp Chapel, with its monuments, is one of the +finest in England. But the pedestrian will probably elect to spend the +night at Leamington, close by, before continuing his pilgrimage. A visit +to the ever beautiful Jephson Gardens, with their wealth of evergreen +oaks, soft turfy lawn, and broad fair water, will afford him a +pleasant evening, and the next morning will see him _en route_ for +Stratford-upon-Avon. + +[Illustration: 8081] + +Again let him take the road, drinking in the influence of the pleasant +Warwickshire scene; quiet, rural loveliness varying with every mile, and +glimpses of the silver Avon at intervals enhancing the charm. A slight +detour will lead to Hampton Lucy, and Charlecote House and Park, +memorable for the exploits of Shakspere's youth, and for the worshipful +dignity of Sir Thomas Lucy, the presumed original of Mr. Justice +Shallow. The park having been skirted, or crossed, the tourist +proceeds three or four miles further by a good road, and enters +Stratford-upon-Avon by a stone bridge of great length, crossing the Avon +and adjacent low-lying meadows. + +The bridge, which dates from the reign of Henry VII., has been widened +on an ingenious plan, by a footpath, supported on a kind of iron +balcony. + +It is easy, however, to imagine its exact appearance when Shakspere +paced its narrow roadway, or hung over its parapet to watch the skimming +swallow or the darting trout and minnow. + +This Warwickshire town has been so often and so exhaustively described, +that we may well forbear from any minute detail. Every visitor knows, +with tolerable accuracy, what he has to expect. He finds, as he had +anticipated, a quiet country town, very much like other towns; neither +obtrusively modern, nor quaintly antique--in one word, common-place, +save for the all-pervading presence and memory of Shakspere. The house +in Henley Street, where he is said to have been born, will be first +visited, of course; then the tourist will walk along the High Street, +noting the Shakspere memorials in the shop-windows, looking up as he +passes to the fine statue of the poet, placed by Garrick in front of the +Town Hall. + +At the site of New Place, now an open, well-kept garden, with here and +there some of the shattered foundations of the poet's house, protected +by wire-work, on the greensward, the visitor will add his tribute of +wonder, if not of contempt, to the twin memories of Sir Hugh Clopton, +who pulled down Shakspere's house in one generation, and of the Rev. +Francis Gastrell, who cut down Shakspere's mulberry-tree in another. +Just opposite are the guild chapel, the guild hall, with the +grammar-school where the poet, no doubt, received his education; and, +after some further walking, the extremity of the town will be reached, +where a little gate opens to a charming avenue of over-arching +lime-trees, leading to the church. + +[Illustration: 0082] + +Before he enters, let him pass round to the other side, where the +churchyard gently slopes to the Avon, and drink in the tranquillity and +beauty of the rustic scene. Then, after gaining admission, he will go +straight to the chancel and gaze upon those which, after all, are the +only memorials of the poet which possess a really satisfying value, the +monument and the tomb. + +[Illustration: 0084] + +As all the world knows, the tomb is a dark slab, lying in the chancel, +the inscription turned to the east. No name is given, only the lines +here copied from a photograph: + + "Good Frend for Jesvs sake forbeare + To DIGG THE DVST ENCLOASED HEAEE: + Blest be ye man v'spares thes stones, + And cvrst be he yl moves mv bones. + +[Illustration: 0085] + +To suppose these lines written by Shakspere himself, seems absurd. +They are not, indeed, the only doggrel unjustly fathered upon him. The +prostrate figure on a tomb in the east wall of the chancel, representing +Shakspere's contemporary and intimate, John-a-Combe, suggests another +stanza, even inferior in taste and diction. But we have no room now +for such thoughts. Above us, on the left, is the monument of the poet, +coloured; not content with "improving" the plays, caused the bust +also to be improved by a coating of white paint, how the barbarism was +removed in 1861, and the statue restored, is a tale often told. The +effigy certainly existed within seven years of Shakspere's death, so +that, in all probability, we have a faithful representation of the poet +as his contemporaries knew him. + +[Illustration: 9086] + +The inscription is clumsy enough, but proves that the poet's greatness +was not, as sometimes alleged, unrecognised in his own generation. The +epitaph on Mistress Susanna Hall, a higher note. Thus it began + + "Witty above her sex--but that's not all-- + Wise to salvation, was good Mistress Hall. + Something of Shakspere was in that; but this + Wholly of Him with Whom she's now in bliss." + +It is to be regretted that this inscription has been effaced, to make +room for the epitaph of some obscure descendant. That to Shakespere's +widow, the wife of his youth, Anne Hathaway however remains placed over +Her grave by her son; there is something in it pathetically and nobly +Christian. It is in Latin, and may be rendered freely: "My mother: thou +gavest me milk and life: alas, for me, that I can but repay thee with a +sepulchre! Would that some good angel might roll the stone away, and +thy form come forth in the Saviour's likeness! But my prayers avail not. +Come quickly, O Christ! then shall my mother, though enclosed in the +tomb, arise and mount to heaven!" + +Before leaving the church we may note some monuments worth attention, +at least in any other place; as well as a stained glass window, not yet +complete, but intended to illustrate from Scripture Shakspere's Seven +Ages of Man. Moses the infant, Jacob the lover, Deborah the Judge, and +one or two other representations are finished, but the observer feels +that the types of character are not Shakspere's. + +The day's explorations are not yet over. The epitaph on Anne Hathaway's +tomb, if nothing else, has quickened our desire to know something more +of her surroundings in those days when Shakspere won and wooed her in +her rustic home. Retracing our steps through the town, we are directed +to a field-path bearing straight for Shottery, a village but a mile +distant. It is not difficult to picture the youthful lover, perhaps, +out here in the fair open country, among the wild flowers which line the +walk, and which he has so well described, for there are few traditions +of Stratford-upon-Avon better authenticated than that which represents +this as Shakspere's walk in the clays when he "went courting." The +village is a straggling one, with a look of comfort about its farmsteads +and cottages; and, at the furthest extremity from Stratford, in a +pleasant dell, opposite a willow-shaded stream, we find the cottage, +not much altered, it may be, in externals, since the poet, then a lad of +eighteen, there found his bride. The capacious chimney-corner, where +no doubt the lovers sat, is genuine; and other antique relics, from a +carved bed to an old Bible, carry the mind back, at least, to the era +of the poet; while the garden and orchard, with the well of pure spring +water, must be much as Shakspere saw them. + +And now having returned to our comfortable hotel--where almost every +room, by the way, is named after one of the dramas, ours being "All's +well that ends well"--what was the net result of the visit in regard +to the personality and history of the great poet? It may seem a strange +thing to confess, but the effect of the whole was to put Shakspere +himself further from us, and to deepen the mystery which every student +of his life and works finds so perplexing. For, save the monument and +the tomb, there was absolutely nothing to tell of the poet's life; +no scrap of his writing, no book known to have been his, no original +authentic record of his words and deeds, no contemporary portrait, no +object, whether article of furniture, pen, inkstand, or other implement +of daily use, associated with his name. Strange that a generation, +which, as we have seen, so honoured his genius and character, should not +have preserved the poorest or smallest memorial of his life among them! +True, there is an old, worm-eaten desk in the birth-place, at which he +may have, sat in the grammar-school; in a room in the town above the +seed-shop there is a rude piece of carving, representing David and +Goliath, which once ornamented a room of the house in Henley Street, and +bears an inscription, "said to have been composed by Shakspere," A.D. +1606. Let our readers judge: + + "Goliath comes with sword and spear, + And David with his sling: + Although Goliath rage and swear + Down David doth him bring." + +For the rest, the relics are evidently imported: an ancient bedstead, +old-fashioned chairs, and the like; interesting in their way, but +with nothing to tell us of the poet. He remains to the most zealous +relic-hunter as great a mystery as Homer himself. Or if in anything here +we see the poet, it is in those scenes of external nature which he has +so vividly pictured. We find him among the flowers: beside the + + "bank whereon the wild thyme blows, + Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows, + Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine, + With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine." + +[Illustration: 0089] + +By a happy ingenuity the garden of the house in Henley Street, now +prettily and daintily kept, has been planted to a great extent +with Shakspere's flowers; "pansies for thoughts," "rosemary for +remembrance," with "columbines," the "blue-veined violets," the wild +thyme, woodbine, musk-rose, and many more. His works are his true +monument; and of these there is, in the same house, a very large and +noble collection, with a whole library of literature bearing upon them, +gathered with admirable care. Yet how few autobiographical details do +the volumes contain! How hopeless the task of constructing, even from +the sonnets, a connected picture of his life and career! And of the +half-dozen anecdotes which have in one way or other descended to us of +his words and ways, who can say that any detail is true? + +[Illustration: 9090] + +It is, perhaps, from the portraits, after all, that we may gain the most +trustworthy impression of the poet's individuality. That on the tomb is +for obvious reasons the most valuable. There it has been, in the sight +of all men, from the very days of Shakspere. The eyes of his widow and +of their children must often have rested upon it; and there can be no +doubt that it presents the true aspect of the man. The engravings of +the bust, and even the photographs, seem to us to exaggerate the calm, +serene expression of the countenance. Partly, it may be, from the effect +of the colouring on the full and shapely cheeks, there is an air almost +of joviality about the face. It is quite as easy to recognise the +Warwickshire squire of New Place, as to feel the presence of the poet +of all time. There is, in the Henley Street house, a portrait of +extraordinary history; lately discovered. The antiquity of this portrait +seems indubitable; but the face seems a copy, and, so far as we could +judge without seeing the two side by side, of that on the monument. +For the we naturally associate with Shakspere, we must go rather to +the "Chandos portrait," now in the National Portrait Gallery, or to the +terra-cotta bust, disinterred in 1845, from the site of the old theatre +in Lincoln's Inn Fields, and presented by the Duke of Devonshire to +the Garrick Club. In a somewhat rough fashion, the Droeshout portrait, +prefixed to the first folio edition of the plays, in 1623, gives +a similar impression of power; and Ben Jonson, who knew Shakspere +personally, testifies strongly to its correctness: + + "This figure that thou here seest put, + It was for gentle Shakspere cut; + Wherein the graver had a strife + With Nature, to outdo the Life." + +But most of all is the greatness of Shakspere brought home to us by the +simple record of the names of those who, from all quarters of the world, +have come to this little Warwickshire town, to do homage to his memory. +In all the world there is no shrine of pilgrimage like this, not only +in the number of the visitants, but in their wonderful variety in +character, temperament, and belief. + +[Illustration: 9091] + +The power of the spell shows the magician. The fading pencilled +inscriptions which cover the walls of the chamber in Henley Street; the +pages of the autograph books; the words in which visitors have recorded +their impressions, attest the strange attractiveness and power of this +one genius. Perhaps the most interesting of the autograph books is that +which was removed from the house in Henley Street many years ago, and is +now to be seen in the room over the seed-room, to which we have referred +already. It seems to have been purchased and presented by an American +gentleman, Mr. T. H. Perkins, of Boston, in 1812; and its pages contain +the autographs of Sir Walter Scott, Lord Byron, Miss Edge-a Baillie, +James Professors Sedgarence," "Arthur, Duke of Wellington," with a host +beside. A thoughtful hour may well be spent in turning the well-worn +pages, and in meditating on "the vanity and glory of literature." + +For there was one point in which even Shakspere failed, and the admiring +reverence with which we join the throng of pilgrims to the shrine never +passes into _worship_. We mean, of course, such "worship" as a +merely human being may supposably claim; and, in view of the highest +possibilities of our nature, we mark in Shakspere a certain limitation +on the _heavenward_ side of his genius. The point at which intellectual +sympathy and admiring affection pass into adoration, is the point +at which we are raised _beyond ourselves_, and made conscious of the +infinite. Never will our moral nature consent to unite with our reason +and our heart in yielding its deepest worth, reverence, until it is +uplifted into that sphere in which we can only walk by faith, and from +which we can look down upon earthly things dwarfed and humbled by the +comparison with the illimitable beyond. + +Now Shakspere's genius belongs essentially to the lower sphere. On +earth he is the master. Every phase of nature, every subtilty of the +intellect, every winding of the heart, is familiar to him. To use +the comparison, often repeated because always felt to be so true, his +wonderful mind was the mirror of all earthly shapes and various human +energies. His own idiosyncracy never appears; the mirror is absolutely +colourless and true. His genius is universal: in reading him we are but +surveying the face of nature. To many a subtle criticism, the answer has +been given, Shakspere surely never meant this! The reply may be, perhaps +not, but nature meant it; and, therefore, we have a right to find it +there! Such is the highest achievement of _literature_, whose business +it is to reflect the facts of the world, of society, of the human +heart--plentifully to declare the thing as it is, and compendiously +to reduce this round world into the microcosm of a book. Here is +Shakspere's transcendent power, and the secret of his supremacy among +writers. He is simply the greatest literary man that ever lived. +The transparency of the mirror, to return to the illustration, is +maintained, not only by the absence of intrusive individuality, but by +his perfect mastery over the instrument of expression. It is worth while +to read his dramas over again, as a study of language alone. No writer +has ever approached Shakspere in the precision, picturesqueness, and the +finished, yet seemingly careless, beauty of his diction. His prose is +even more marvellous than his poetry. In the sense in which we use the +word "classic," his works may truly be called the foremost classic of +the world. + +What, then, is the defect which will for ever prevent Shakspere from +receiving the entire homage of the heart of man? In a sentence, the +mirror is turned towards earth alone, and in its very completeness hides +heaven from the view. "It would be impossible," says a contemporary +writer, "to find a more remarkable example of a genius wide as the +world, yet _not_ in any sense _above_ the world, than our great English +poet's." And again, "it would be almost impossible to find any great +Christian poet whose type of imagination is so entirely and singularly +_contrasted_ with that of the Bible, or in whom that peculiar faculty +which, for want of a better term, we are forced to call the thirst _for +the supernatural_, is more remarkably absent." + +This statement we accept, in full remembrance of the morals manifold, +the theological references, and Scriptural parallels, which are +scattered through the poet's writings. Bishop Wordsworth, of +St. Andrew's, and others, have spent much labour, not altogether +unprofitably, in showing that Shakspere knew his Bible: while, oddly +enough, among the passages expunged by the estimable Bowdler, the +Biblical references occupy a considerable place, as though it had been +profanity to introduce them in such a connexion! The most is made of +Shakspere's religiousness by the present Archbishop of Dublin, in a +sermon preached at Stratford-upon-Avon at the Shakspere Tercentenary, in +1864. + +He knew the deep corruption of our fallen nature, the desperate +wickedness of the heart of man; else he would never have put into the +mouth of a prince of stainless life such a confession as this: 'I am +myself indifferently honest: but yet I could accuse one of such things +that it were better my mother had not borne me.... with more offences +at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give +them shape, or time to act them in.' He has set forth the scheme of +our redemption in words as lovely as have ever flowed from the lips of +uninspired man:-- + + 'Why, all the souls that live were forfeit once, + And He that might the vantage best have Look, + Found out the remedy.' + +He has put home to the holiest here their need of an infinite +forgiveness from Him who requires truth in the inward parts: + + 'How would you be, + If He, which is the top of judgment, should + But judge you as you are?' + +"He was one who was well aware what a stewardship was his own in those +marvellous gifts which had been entrusted to him, for he has himself +told us:-- + + 'Heaven does with us as we with torches do, + Not light them for themselves: for if our virtues + Did not go forth of us,'twere all alike + As if we had them not.' + +And again he has told us that + + 'Spirits are not finely touched + But for fine issues:' + +Assuredly not ignorant how finely his own had been touched, and what +would be demanded from him in return. He was one who certainly knew that +there is none so wise that he can 'circumvent God;' and that for a man, +whether he be called early or late, + + 'Ripeness is all.' + +Who shall persuade us that he abode outside of that holy temple of our +faith, whereof he has uttered such glorious things--admiring its beauty, +but not himself entering to worship there? + +To the same effect, we may quote the preliminary sentence of Shakspere's +will: "I commend my soul into the hands of God, my Creator, hoping, +and assuredly believing, through the only merits of Jesus Christ, my +Saviour, to be made partaker of life everlasting." With such a master of +words, this avowal would be no mere formality. During Shakspere's last +residence at Stratford, moreover, the town was under strong religious +influences. Many a "great man in Israel," in fraternal visits to +the Rev. Richard Byfield, the vicar, is said to have been hospitably +entertained at New Place; and memorable evenings must have been spent in +converse on the highest themes. In addition to all this, the following +sonnet furnishes an interesting proof that the heart of Shakspere, at an +earlier period, had not been unsusceptible to religious sentiments and +aspirations:-- + + "Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, + Fooled by those rebel powers that thee array, + Why dost thou pine within, and suffer dearth, + Painting thy outward walls so costly gay? + Why so large cost, having so short a lease, + Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? + Shall worms, inheritors of thine excess, + Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end? + Then, soul, live thou upon thy body's loss, + And let that pine to aggravate thy store; + Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; + Within be fed, without be rich no more: + So shalt thou feed on death, that feeds on men, + And, death once dead, there's no more dying then." + --_Sonnet_ 146. + +All that such words suggest we gladly admit among the probabilities +of Shakspere's unknown life. But in his dramas themselves we find no +assured grasp of the highest spiritual truth, nothing to show that such +truth controlled his views of life with imperial sway; little or +nothing to uplift the reader from the play of human passions and the +entanglement of human interests to the higher realms of Faith. It is +the same Shakspere who reveals the depths of human corruption, and the +nobleness of human excellence. But in portraying the latter, he stops +short, and fails exactly where the higher light of faith would +have enabled him to complete the delineation. His best and greatest +characters are a law unto themselves: his men are passionate and strong; +his women are beautiful, with a loveliness that scarcely ever reminds us +of heaven: he has neither "raised the mortal to the skies," nor "brought +the angel down." + +We turn, then, from Stratford-upon-Avon, feeling, as we have said, +more deeply than ever the mystery that overhangs the career of the man, +admiring, if possible, more heartily than ever the genius of the poet, +and acknowledging, not without mournfulness, how much greater Shakspere +might have been. For there was an inspiration within his reach that +would have made him chief among the witnesses of God to men; and his +magnificent endowments would then have been the richest offering ever +placed by human hand upon that Altar which "sanctifieth both the giver +and the gift." + + + + +THE COUNTRY OF BUNYAN AND COWPER. + +[Illustration: 0096] + +[Illustration: 0097] + +|SOME of the most characteristic excursions through the gently +undulating rural scenery which distinguishes so large a portion of the +south midland district of England may be made along the towing-paths of +the canals. The notion may appear unromantic; the pathway is artificial, +yet it has now become rusticated and fringed with various verdure; some +of the associations of the canal are anything but attractive--but upon +the whole the charm is great. A wide, level path, driven straight across +smiling valleys and by the side of hills, here and there skirting a fair +park, and occasionally bringing some broad open landscape into +sudden view, with the gleam and coolness of still waters ever at the +traveller's side, affords him a succession of pictures which perhaps the +"strong climber of the mountain's side" may disdain, but which to many +will be all the more delightful, because they can be enjoyed with no +more fatigue than that of a leisurely, health-giving stroll. + +It was by such a walk as this through some of the pleasantest parts +of Hertfordshire that we first made our way to Berkhampstead--the +birthplace of William Cowper, turning from the canal bank to the +embowered fragments of the castle, and through the quiet little town to +the "public way,"--the pretty rural bye-road where the "gardener Robin" +drew his little master to school: + + "Delighted with the bauble coach, and wrapped + In scarlet mantle warm, and velvet capped," + +while the fond mother watched her darling from the "nursery window," the +memory of which one pathetic poem has made immortal. + +In a well-known sentence, Lord Macaulay affirms in reference to the +seventeenth century, "We are not afraid to say, that though there were +many clever men in England during the latter half of that century, there +were only two minds which possessed the imaginative faculty in a very +eminent degree. One of these minds produced the _Paradise Lost_; the +other, the _Pilgrim's Progress_." Similarly, with regard to the brilliant +literary period which began towards the close of the eighteenth century, +"we are not afraid to say," that although there were many poets in +England of no mean order, there were but two to whom it was given to +view nature simply and sincerely, so as adequately to express "the +delight of man in the works of God." One of these poets produced the +_Task_, the other the _Exclusion_. + +[Illustration: 0098] + +When Macaulay wrote, the place of Bunyan in literature was still held +a little doubtful; the place of Cowper among poets is not wholly +unquestioned now. Some are impatient of his simplicity, others scorn his +piety, many cannot escape, as they read, from the shadow of the darkness +in which he wrote. But we cannot doubt that, when the coming reaction +from feverishness and heathenism in poetry shall have set in, the name +of Cowper will win increasing honour; men will search for themselves +into the source of those bright phrases, happy allusions, "jewels five +words long, that on the stretched forefinger of all time sparkle for +ever," for which the world is often unconsciously indebted to his +poems; while his incomparable letters will remain as the finest and +most brilliant specimens of an art which penny-postage, telegrams, and +post-cards have rendered almost extinct in England. + +No one at any rate will wonder now that we should turn awhile from more +outwardly striking or enchanting scenes to the ground made classic and +sacred to the English Christian by the memories of Bunyan and Cowper. We +may associate their names, not only from their brotherhood in faith and +teaching, but from the coincidence which identifies their respective +homes with one and the same river, and blends their memories with the +fair still landscapes through which it steals. + +[Illustration: 0099] + +The Ouse, most meandering of English streams, waters a country almost +perfectly level throughout, though here and there fringed by the +undulations of the receding Chilterns;--with a picturesqueness derived +from rich meadows, broad pastures with flowery hedgerows, and tall +stately trees; while in many places the still river expands into a +miniature lake, with water lilies floating upon its bosom. Among scenes +like these the great dreamer passed his youth, in his village home at +Elstow; often visiting the neighbouring town of Bedford, where we may +picture him as leaning in many a musing fit over the old Ouse Bridge, on +which the town prison then stood. How little, did John Bunyan then think +what those prison walls would become to him and to the world! The bridge +is gone, the town has become a thriving modern bustling place; only the +river remains, and the country walk to Elstow is little changed. There +is the cottage which tradition identifies with Bunyan: with the church +and the belfry, so memorable in the record of his experiences, the +village green on which in his thoughtless youth he used to play at +"tip-cat:" there is nothing more to see, but it is impossible to pace +through those homely ways without remembering how once the place was +luminous to his awe-stricken spirit with "the light that never was on +sea or shore," and the landscape on which his inward eye was fixed was +that which was closed in by the great white throne. + +[Illustration: 9100] + +It is remarkable that there is in Bunyan's writings so little of +local colouring. His fields, hills and valleys are not of earth. The +"wilderness of this world" through which he wandered was something quite +apart from the Bedfordshire flats, although indeed "the den" on which +he lighted is but too truthful a representation of the prison on the old +Ouse Bridge. Even where familiar scenes may have supplied the groundwork +of the picture, incidental touches show that his soul was beyond +them. His hillsides are covered with "vineyards;" the meadows by the +riverside are fair with "lilies;" the fruits in the orchard have mystic +healing virtue. The scenery of Palestine rather than of Bedfordshire is +present to his view, and his well-loved Bible has contributed as much +to his descriptions as any reminiscences of his excursions around his +native place. * + + * It has recently been argued, with some plausibility, that + Bunyan may have derived some of his pictures of scenery from + his preaching excursions to the Surrey hills and the Sussex + Weald (see pp. 33-35), where he would often cross the track + of "the Canterbury pilgrims." "It is said that he frequently + selected the hilly districts of South Surrey as his hiding- + place; two houses, one on Quarry Hill, Guildford, and the + other known as Horn Hatch, on Shalford Common, being pointed + out as among those he occupied.".... "The struggles of the + pedestrian through the Shalford swamp might have given + Bunyan the original idea of the _Slough of Despond_; the + Surrey Hills he loved so well might be called the + _Delectable Mountains_; St. Martha's Hill would answer + perfectly his description of the _Hill Difficulty_; the Vale + of Albury, amid the picturesque scenery of which he passed + so many days of true humiliation, might be considered the + _Valley of Humiliation_; and lastly, the name _Doubting + Castle_ actually exists to this day, near the Pilgrims' Way, + being approached, as its namesake was supposed lo be, by a + path near Box Hill. It is right, however, to state that the + antiquity of the last name quoted is not verified."--Notes + on the Pilgrims' Way in West Surrey; by Captain E. Renouard + James, R.E. Stanford, 1871. + +But it was after all in no earthly walks or haunts of men that he found +the prototypes of his immortal pictures. They are idealised experiences, +and from the Wicket gate to the Land of Beulah they all represent what +he had seen and felt only in his soul.* No doubt the people are in +many cases less abstract. A very remarkable edition of the _Pilgrim's +Progress_, published some years ago by an artist of rare promise, since +deceased, portrayed the personages of the allegory in the very guise +in which Bunyan must often have met their originals up and down in +Bedfordshire. Such faces may be seen to-day. We ourselves thought we saw +Mr. Honesty, in a brown coat, looking at some bullocks in the Bedford +market-place. Ignorance tried to entice us into a theological discussion +at the little country-side inn where we rested for the night: the next +morning, as we passed along, Mercy was knitting at a farmhouse door, +while young Mr. Brisk, driving by in his gig, made her an elaborate bow, +of which we were glad to see she took the slightest possible notice. + + * The impression made upon a passing traveller through + Bunyan's Country is well expressed in some verses entitled + +Bedford is now at least rich in memorials of its illustrious citizen and +prisoner for conscience' sake. The Bunyan Statue, presented by the Duke +of Bedford, was erected in 1874, and is one of the noblest and most +characteristic out-of-door monuments in England. It has indeed been +suggested that Bunyan might more appropriately have been represented +in the attitude of writing than in that of preaching; but it should be +remembered that the latter was the work he chose and loved, and that +his greatest works were penned during the period of enforced silence. +It is therefore with a fine appropriateness that he is represented as +standing, as if in the presence of some vast congregation, the Bible +in his hand, his eyes uplifted to heaven, while upon the pedestal are +carved his own words, expressive of his own highest ideal. + + "THROUGH BEDFORDSHIRE BY RAIL. + + "Far behind we leave the clangour of the smoky northern town; + Now' we hurry through a country all brown-green and sweet grey-brown: + Landscapes gently undulating where light shadows softly pass, + Quiet rivers silent flowing through the rarely-trodden grass. + + Here and there a few sheep grazing 'neath the hedgerow poplars tall. + Here and there a brown-thatched homestead or a rustic cottage small; + As we rush on road or iron through the fields on either hand, + In the autumn twilight gravely smiles John Bunyan's land. + + More than all the fells and mountains we have passed upon our way, + More than e'en that giant city we shall greet ere close of day, + Touches us the tender beauty, soft, harmonious, simple, quaint, + Of these fields and winding bye-lanes where yet linger, sweet and faint, + Echoes of long-vanished ages, rustic homes one might have seen + In the old days when John Bunyan played at cat on Elstow Green, + Meadows still as when he wandered seeking God; while on each hand, + Gravely smiling in the twilight, lay John Bunyan's land. + + Tender as the closing music of the Mighty Dreamer's lay, + Lies the country gently round us, all brown-green and soft brown-grey. + Tender are our thoughts towards it, as we ponder o'er the book + That has travelled through the wide world from this homely, rural nook. + + Tenderly we name John Bunyan, martyr, poet, hero, saint, + Faithful pastor, strong and loving, like his Bedford, simple, quaint. + Ah! the happy tears half blind us as we gaze on either hand + O'er the gravely smiling beauty of John Bunyan's land."--Lizzie Aldridge. + +[Illustration: 0102] + +No visitor to Bedford will neglect the rapidly accumulating Bunyan +Museum, comprising not only some simple relics of his lifetime, as +his staff, jug, and the like, with books bearing his autograph--his +priceless Bible and Foxes Martyrs--but the various editions of his +works, and in particular a collection of the illustrations of the +_Pilgrim's Progress_, from the first rude designs to the latest products +of artistic skill. These are stored with reverent care, in connexion +with the place of worship occupied by the Christian Church to which he +ministered, and now known as Bunyan Meeting. To this edifice, likewise, +a pair of massive bronze gates have been contributed by the Duke of +Bedford, with panels illustrative of scenes from the allegory. + +[Illustration: 0104] + +Altogether, if we have found in the neighbourhood of Bedford no +Delectable Mountains, nor Valley of Humiliation, nor Land of Beulah, +we have at least seen much pleasant English scenery, a fertile, +well-cultivated country, and in the very absence of more outwardly +exciting prospects, have had the more "leisure of thought" to dwell in +the ideal world which Bunyan has made as familiar to us as our own home. + +[Illustration: 8105] + +From Bedford to Olney the distance by rail is between ten and eleven +miles; by "the sinuous Ouse" probably between thirty and forty. + +Few travellers, therefore, will care to ascend by the river banks, and +the frequent shallows preclude the thought of a boating excursion, which +otherwise would by its leisurely length be some preparation for our +exchange of the associations of the seventeenth century for those of the +eighteenth. One hundred and three years separated the birthday of Bunyan +from that of Cowper. + +The interval marks the greatest advance that had ever been made in the +history of English thought and freedom. But in the essentials of faith +and teaching the two men were one; nor in some of their experiences were +they very dissimilar. Both were sensitive, conscientious, and often in +the midst of their holiest longings after God were most terror-stricken +by thoughts of the wrath to come. Some pages of Bunyan's Autobiography +may compare in their passionate anxiety with the annals of Cowper's +despair. The great dreamer soon escaped from Doubting Castle to the +Delectable Mountains; but for the poet, the dungeon bars remained +unloosed until the final summons came to the everlasting hills. * + + * "From the moment of Cowper's death, till the coffin was + closed," writes his friend and relative Mr. Johnson, "the + expression with which his countenance had settled was that + of calmness and composure, mingled, as it were, with _holy + surprise."--Southey's Life._ + +The sensitiveness of Cowper to external influences was so great, as to +raise the doubt whether other scenes and a different atmosphere might +not have prevented many of his sorrows. + +[Illustration: 9106] + +On the death of his father, when the poet had reached the age of +twenty-five, he touchingly and expressively tells us that it had never +till then occurred to him "that a parson has no fee-simple in the house +and glebe he occupies. There was," he says, "neither tree, nor gate, nor +stile in all that country to which I did not feel a relation, and the +house itself I preferred to a palace." To Huntingdon, where he first +made acquaintance with the Ouse, and became an inmate with the Unwins, +he clung very lovingly, although he does not rate the charms of the +neighbourhood very highly. "My lot is cast in a country where we have +neither woods nor commons nor pleasant prospects: all flat and insipid; +in the summer adorned only winter covered with a flood." But it was at +Olney that Cowper found such scenery as he could appreciate and love. +"He does not," in the words of Sir James Mackintosh, "describe the +most beautiful scenes in nature; he discovers what is most beautiful in +ordinary scenes." + +[Illustration: 8106] + +In fact, Cowper saw very few beautiful scenes, but his poetical eye, and +his moral heart, detected beauty in the sandy flats of Buckinghamshire." +The walk, especially, from the quiet little town to the village of +Weston Underwood, he has made classic among English scenes by the +description in the first book of the _Task_. + +Leaving Olney, where, in truth, there is not much to detain us, save the +poet's home--the same in outward aspect, at least, as during the twenty +years spent by him within its walls,--and the summer-house in the garden +where he sat and wrote, while Mrs. Unwin knitted, and Puss, Tiny, and +Bess sported upon the grass--we may climb the little eminence above the +river, and with an admiration like that of the poet ninety years ago, +"dwell upon the scene." "Here is the "distant plough slow moving," and + +[Illustration: 0107] + + "Here Ouse, slow winding through a level plain + Of spacious meads, with cattle sprinkled o'er, + Conducts the eye along his sinuous course Delighted. + + There, fast rooted in their bank, + Stand, never overlooked, our favourite elms. + That screen the herdsman's solitary hut; + While far beyond, and overthwart the stream, + That, as with molten glass, inlays the vale, + The sloping land recedes into the clouds; + Displaying on its varied side the grace + Of hedgerow beauties numberless, square tower, + Tall spire, from which the sound of cheerful bells + Just undulates upon the listening ear; + Groves, heathes and smoking villages remote." + +We are now at the upper corner of the Throckmorton Park. Pursuing our +way, we listen to the music of "nature inanimate," of rippling brook or +sighing wind, and of "nature animate," of "ten thousand warblers" +that so soothed the poet's soul. A dip in the walk from where the elms +enclose the upper park, and the chestnuts spread their shade, brings us +into a grassy dell where by "a rustic bridge" we cross to the opposite +slope, reascend to the "alcove," survey from the "speculative height" +the pasture with its "fleecy tenants," the "sunburnt hayfield," the +"woodland scene," the trees, each with its own hue, as so exquisitely +depicted by the poet, while Ouse in the distance "glitters in the sun." +At length the great avenue is reached. + + "How airy and how light the graceful arch, + Yet awful as the consecrated roof + Re-echoing pious anthems! while beneath, + The chequered earth seems restless as a flood + Brushed by the wind. + So sportive is the light + Shot through the boughs, it dances as they dance, + Shadow and sunshine intermingling quick, + And darkening and enlightening, as the leaves + Play wanton, every moment, every spot. + +[Illustration: 9108] + +Such were the scenes dearest to Cowper, and dear to many still for +his sake. T rue, they are not unlike others. A thousand scenes are +as beautiful, and many an avenue up and down in English parks is of a +nobler stateliness. Yet may this be visited with a special delight, for +its own sake and for Cowper's. It is something to be able to look with +a poet's eye, to have his thoughts and words so familiar to memory as +to blend with the current of our own, as if spontaneously. We learn anew +how to observe, and our emotions become almost unconsciously ennobled +and refined. + +It is characteristic of Cowper's mind that scenery of a loftier and +more exciting order had a disquieting effect upon him. Of his journey +to Eastham, in Sussex, to visit his friend Hayley, he writes: "I indeed +myself was a little daunted by the tremendous height of the Sussex +hills, in comparison with which all that I had seen elsewhere are dwarfs. +But I only was alarmed; Mrs. Unwin had no such sensations, but was +always cheerful from the beginning of our expedition to the end of it." +And again: "The charms of the place, uncommon as they are, have not in +the least alienated my affections from Weston. The genius of that +place, suits me better; it has an air of snug concealment, in which a +disposition like mine feels peculiarly gratified, whereas here, I +see from every window woods like forests, and hills like mountains--a +wildness, in short, that rather increases my natural melancholy." A +little while before, on Mr. Newton's return from the glories of Cheddar, +Cowper writes: "I would that I could see some of the mountains which you +have seen, especially because Dr. Johnson has pronounced that no man is +qualified to be a poet who has never seen a mountain. But mountains I +shall never see, unless perhaps in a dream, or unless there are such in +heaven. Nor those," the poor, heart-stricken poet makes haste to add, +"unless I receive twice as much mercy as ever yet was shown to any man." + +[Illustration: 0109] + +The last sentence prepares us for East Dereham, with its sad +associations. But even from these we need not shrink. The homely Norfolk +town brought to the troubled soul deliverance. Few, it may be, would +turn aside to visit the place for its own sake; but the remembrance of +the poet may well attract. The house in which he died has been replaced +by a Congregational Church bearing his name--twin brother, so to speak, +though with scarcely the same appropriateness, to Bunyan Chapel in +Bedford. But it is in the church where he lies buried, and in the tomb +raised to his memory, that the true interest lies. Never was death more +an angel of mercy than to this darkly-shadowed spirit. We all know the +words in which the most gifted of poetesses, at "Cowper's Grave," has +set the thoughts of many Christian hearts to words that deserve to be +immortal: + + "Like a sick child that knoweth not his mother while she blesses, + And drops upon his burning brow the coolness of her kisses: + That turns his fevered eyes around--_My mother! where's my mother?_ + As if such tender words and looks could come from any other! + The fever gone, with leaps of heart he sees her bending o'er him, + Her face all pale from watchful love, the unweary love she bore him! + Thus woke the poet from the dream his life's long fever gave him, + Beneath those deep pathetic eyes, which closed in death to save him! + Thus? oh, not thus! no type of earth could image that awaking, + Wherein he scarcely heard the chant of seraphs round him breaking, + Or felt the new immortal throb of soul from body parted, + But fell those eyes alone, and knew. My Saviour! not deserted!" + +[Illustration: 0110] + +[Illustration: 0112] + + + + +THE PEAK OF DERBYSHIRE + +[Illustration: 0113] + +|THE traveller into Derbyshire, unaccustomed to the district, may not +unnaturally inquire for "the Peak," which he has been taught to consider +one of the chief English mountains, and the name of which has always +suggested to him something like a pyramid of rock,--an English +Matterhorn. He will be soon undeceived, and then may paradoxically +declare the peculiarity of "the Peak District" to be that there is no +Peak! The range so called is a bulky mass of millstone grit, rising +irregularly from the limestone | formation which occupies the southern +part of Derbyshire, and extending in long spurs, or arms, north and +north-east into Yorkshire as far as Sheffield, and west and south into +Cheshire and Staffordshire. The plateau is covered by wild moorland, +clothed with fern, moss and heather, and broken up by deep hollows and +glens, through which streamlets descend, each through its own belt of +verdure, from the spongy morasses above, forming in their course many a +minute but picturesque waterfall. The pedestrian who establishes himself +in the little inn at Ashopton, will have the opportunity of exploring +many a breezy height and romantic glen; while, if he has strength of +limb and of lungs to make his way to Kinderscout, the highest point of +all, he will breathe, at the elevation of not quite two thousand feet, +as fresh and exhilarating an atmosphere as can be found anywhere in +these islands; the busy smoky city of Manchester being at a distance, +"as the crow flies," of little more than fifteen miles! It is no wonder +that a select company of hard-worked men, who have lighted on this nook +among the hills, having a taste for natural history, resort hither year +after year, finding a refreshment in the repeated visit equal at least +to that which their fellow-citizens enjoy, at greater cost, in the +terraces of Buxton, or on the gigantic slope of Matlock Bank. + +Where the limestone emerges from under the mass of grit, the scenery +altogether changes. For roughly-rounded, dark-coloured rocks, covered +with ling and bracken, now appear narrow glens, bold escarped edges, +cliffs splintered into pinnacles and pierced by wonderful caves +traversed by hidden streams. Of these caves the "Peak Cavern" at +Castleton is the largest, that of the "Blue John Mine" the most +beautiful, from its veins of Derbyshire spar. + +The tourist, however, who confines himself to the Peak District proper, +with its immediately outlying scenery, will have a very inadequate view +of the charms of Derbyshire. He can scarcely do better than begin at the +other extremity, ascending the Dove through its limestone valley as far +as Buxton, thence taking rail to Chapel-en-le-Frith, expatiating over +the Peak moorlands according to time and inclination, descending to the +limestone region again at Castleton, and following the Derwent in its +downward course to Ambergate, pausing in his way to visit Chatsworth and +Haddon Hall, and to stay awhile at Matlock. + +Having thus planned our own journey, our starting-point was Ashbourne, +a quiet, pretty little town at the extremity of a branch railway. +There was not much in the town itself to detain us: we could only pay +a hurried visit to the church, whose beautiful spire, 212 feet high, +is sometimes called the Pride of the Peak. There are some striking +monuments; and among them one with an inscription of almost unequalled +mournfulness. It is to an only child, a daughter: "She was in form and +intellect most exquisite. The unfortunate parents ventured their all on +this frail bark, and the wreck was total." Never was plaint of sorrowing +despair more touching. Let us hope, both that the parents' darling was +a lamb in the Good Shepherd's fold, and that the sorrowing father and +mother found at length that there can be no total wreck to those whose +treasure is in heaven! + +A night's refreshing rest at the inn, where several nationalities +oddly combine to make up one complex sign--the fierce Saracen, the +thick-lipped negro, the English huntsman in his coat of Lincoln +green!--and we sallied forth on a glorious day of early autumn to make +our first acquaintance with Dovedale. Leaving the town at the extremity +furthest from the railway station, we found ourselves on a well-kept, +undulating road, skirted by fair pastures on either hand; the absence +of cornfields being a very marked feature in the landscape. Turning into +pleasant country lanes to the left, we soon reached the garden gate of +a finely-situated rural inn, the "Peveril ut' the Peak," whence a short +cut would have led us over the brow of the hill into Dovedale; but we +were anxious to visit Ilam, and therefore made a detour as far as the +"Izaak Walton," so well known to brothers of the "gentle craft." A +little farther, and we were in the identical Happy Valley of Rasselas, +where we found a charming little village, with schoolhouse and +drinking-fountain, park and hall and church, and every cottage a +picture. + +[Illustration: 0116] + +Two little rivers meet here, one of them the Manifold, the other and +larger the Dove; and after a hurried view of the lovely vale, we lost no +time in making our way to the entrance of the far-famed Dale. As most of +our readers will know, the Dove divides Staffordshire from Derbyshire: +we took the Derbyshire side, entering at a little gate on the river +bank, and leisurely and with many a pause pursued a walk with which +surely in England there are few to compare. The river is a shallow, +sparkling stream, with many a pool dear to the angler, and hurrying +down, babbling over pebbles, and broken in its course by many a tiny +waterfall. On both sides rise tall limestone cliffs, splintered into +countless fantastic forms--rocky walls, towers, and pinnacles, and in +one place a natural archway near the summit, leading to the uplands +beyond. And all up the sloping sides, and wherever root-hold could be +obtained on pinnacle and crag, were clustered shrubs and trees of +every shade of foliage, with the first touch of autumn to heighten the +exquisite variety by tints which as yet suggested only afar off the +thought of decay. The solitude of the scene served but to enhance its +loveliness. For that road by the river side is no broad well-beaten +track. No vehicle can pass, and even the pedestrian has sometimes to +pick his way with difficulty. The stillness, on the day of our visit, +was unbroken save for the murmur of the water, the twitter of the birds, +and the rustling of the branches in the gentle breeze. The blue sky +overhead, and the sunlight casting shadows upon the cliffs and the +stream, completed the picture; and if the memory of Izaak Walton and +Charles Cotton haunted their favourite stream, it so happened that we +encountered none of their disciples. + +Many travellers leave the glen at Mill Dale, where a pleasant country +lane to the right enables them to gain the high road between Ashbourne +and Buxton. Time and strength permitting, however, we would strongly +advise the tourist to make his way by the river banks to Hartington, +passing through Beresford Dale, where at Pike Pool, represented in the +frontispiece to this chapter, all the beauties of the Dove Valley are +concentrated at one view. A limestone obelisk stands in the middle of +the river, with a background of rich foliage, just touched, at the +time of our visit, with autumnal hues, while the clear water eddied and +sparkled around its base. This pool was the favourite resort of Walton +and his friend Cotton. Many allusions to the spot will be found in _The +Complete Angler_; and the comfortable inn at Hartington, reached from +Beresford Dale by a walk for about a mile through pleasant meadows, +bears Charles Cotton's name. + +At Hartington, the high road to Buxton may be taken; or, far better, the +traveller may make his way to the famous watering-place by the plateau +which divides the valley of the Dove from that of its tributary +Manifold; he will then descend to the former valley near Longnor, and +thence may climb to Axe Edge, a great outlying southerly branch or spur +of the gritstone, from which the Dove has its rise. Parting with this +lovely river at its very fountain-head, we find it difficult to believe +that so much beauty and even grandeur can have been included in the +twenty miles' course of a little English stream, and are ready to +endorse the enthusiastic tribute of Cotton: + + "The rapid Garonne and the winding Seine + Are both too mean. + + Beloved Dove, with thee + To claim priority: + + Nay, Thame and Isis, when conjoined, submit + And lay their trophies at thy silver feet." + +[Illustration: 0118] + +At Buxton, easily reached from Axe Edge, we found every variety of +excursion and other enjoyments open to us, "for a consideration." The +Derbyshire dales that may be easily explored from this point are very +fine; and the whole of the Peak is open to the tourist. We could give, +however, but a hurried glance to these manifold beauties, being bent +upon descending the Derwent in some such leisurely fashion as that +in which we had ascended the Dove. We had, indeed, the railway now to +facilitate the latter half of our journey--no slight matter! and +yet this had the effect of bringing multitudes of travellers like +ourselves, so that the end of the Derbyshire tour was taken in company +with a crowd. For a time, however, we were comparatively alone to +Castleton, by Mam Tor, the wonderful "Shivering Mountain," where the +sandstone and mountain limestone meet;--so called from the loose shale +which is constantly descending its side, and which, in popular belief, +does not diminish the mountain's bulk: thence down through the Winnyats +or Windgates, a picturesque pass between lofty cliffs, taking its name +from the winds which are said to rage almost ceaselessly through the +narrow defile, although at the time of our visit the air was calm, +while the lights and shadows of a perfect autumn day beautified the grey +limestone crags. + +[Illustration: 0119] + +The ruins of Peveril's Castle, and the gloomy caves of Castleton, of +course were visited. Then began the journey down the Derwent, embracing +pretty Hather-sage, with its ancient camps, tumuli, and other remains +whose origin can only be conjectured. Here is the traditionary grave of +Robin Hood's gigantic comrade, "Little John." A "Gospel Stone" in this +village, once used as a pulpit, perpetuates the memory of the open-air +harvest and thanksgiving services of past generations; while in the +village of Eyam, three or four miles lower down, the "Pulpit Rock," in +a natural dell still called a "church," brings to mind the heroism of a +devoted pastor, who during the plague of 1665, when it would have been +dangerous to meet in any building, daily assembled his parishioners in +this place to pray with them, to teach and to console. + +[Illustration: 9120] + +The traveller will not regret the slight detour from the road by the +river to visit this most interesting spot; and he may return to the +Derwent by Middleton Dale, another magnificent pass through limestone +cliffs. Hence he will soon reach Edensor, the "model village," and +Chatsworth, "the Palace of the Peak." The splendours of the park and +mansion are so familiar to thousands,--to whom in fact "the Peak +of Derbyshire" is a name suggestive only of Chatsworth and Haddon +Hall,--that we need attempt no description here. The visitor may follow +his own bent, whether to wander in the stately park, or to join the +hourly procession along the silken-roped avenue through the corridors +and apartments of the Hall, with due admiration of the pictures, +the statuary and the wonderful carving; thence passing out into the +conservatory and the gardens, where nature has done so much, and art so +much more. Truly days at Chatsworth are among the bright days of life, +especially if there be time and opportunity also to visit Haddon Hall, +that almost unique specimen of an old baronial English home, empty and +dismantled now, but carefully preserved and beautiful for situation, +upon the Derbyshire Wye, which here comes down from its own limestone +glens and dales through the pretty town of Bakewell, to unite at Rowsley +with the Derwent. + +At this junction, too, the traveller comes upon the railway, and will be +tempted to pass only too rapidly by the beauties of the Derwent Valley +between Rowsley and Ambergate. We can but assure him that he will lose +much by so doing; that Darley Dale and Moor are very beautiful, and +that the tourist who rushes on to Matlock Bath without staying to climb +Matlock Bank does an injustice to Derbyshire scenery: while if he be +in pursuit of health, he can find no better resting-place than at the +renowned | hydropathic establishments which occupy the heights. + +[Illustration: 0121] + +Still, most who are in search of the picturesque will prefer to seek it +at Matlock Bath, where indeed they will not be left to discover it +for themselves. In this famous spot the beauties of nature are all +catalogued, ticketed, and forced on the attention by signboards and +handbills. Here is the path to "the beautiful scenery" (admission so +much); there "the Romantic Rocks" (again a fee); there the ferry to "the +Lovers' Walk," a charming path by the river-side, overshadowed by trees, +and so on. + +[Illustration: 0123] + +Petrifying wells offer their rival attractions, and caves in the +limestone are repeatedly illuminated during the season for the delight +of excursionists. The market for fossils, spar, photographs, ferns, and +all the wonderful things that nobody buys except at watering-places, is +brisk and incessant. But when we have added to all this that the heights +are truly magnificent, the woods and river very charming, and the +arrangements of the hotels most homelike and satisfactory, it will not +be wondered at that the balance of pleasure remained largely in favour +of Matlock. + +[Illustration: 0124] + +It would be certainly pleasanter to discover for one's self that here +is "the Switzerland of England," than to have the fact thrust upon +attention by placards at every turn; but perhaps there are those to +whom the information thus afforded is welcome, while the enormous +highly-coloured pictures of valley, dale and crag which adorn every +railway station on the line, no doubt perform their part in attracting +and instructing visitors. They need certainly be at no loss to occupy +their time to advantage, whether their stay be longer or shorter. + +[Illustration: 0125] + +Everything is made easy for them. To all the noblest points of view, +easy paths have been constructed: the fatigue of mountain-climbing is +reduced to a minimum; and certainly the landscapes disclosed even from a +moderate elevation by the judicious pruning and removal of intercepting +foliage, are such as to repay most richly the moderate effort requisite +for the ascent. Lord Byron writes, that there are views in Derbyshire +"as noble as in Greece or Switzerland." He was probably thinking of the +prospect from Masson, from which the whole valley, with its boundary of +tors, or limestone cliffs, is outspread before the observer, while the +river sparkles beneath, reflecting masses of foliage, with depths of +heavenly blue between; and beyond the scarred and broken ramparts of the +glen, purple moorlands stretch away to the high and curving line of the +horizon. + +The traveller southward, who has accompanied us thus far, if yet unsated +with beauty, will be wise in taking the road from Matlock to Cromford, +the next station, instead of proceeding by railway. The short walk +or drive between the limestone cliffs, although the great majority +of passengers pass it by unnoticed, is really, for its length, as +magnificent as almost any of the dales in the higher part of the +country. At Cromford there is the stately mansion of the Arkwrights, +and a little beyond, on the other side of the railway, is Lea Hurst, +the home of Miss Florence Nightingale, a name that will be gratefully +enshrined in the memories of the English people, even when war shall +be no more. From this spot the valley gradually broadens, still +richly-wooded up the heights, with fair meadows on the river banks. And +so we reach Ambergate, where we re-enter the busy world, bearing with us +ineffaceable memories of the beauties and the wonders of "the Peak." + +[Illustration: 0126] + +[Illustration: 0128] + + + + +WESTWARD HO! + +[Illustration: 0129] + +Almost every place of popular resort has its "season," when its charms +are supposed to be at their highest, and the annual migration of +visitors sets in. The period is not always determined by climate or +calendar; and such is the caprice of fashion, that many a lovely spot +is left well-nigh solitary during the weeks of its full perfection, +the crowd beginning to gather when the beauties of the place are on the +wane. Tastes will undoubtedly differ as to the most favourable time to +visit one or another beautiful scene; but none, we should imagine, +will dispute our opinion that the best season for travel in the west of +England is in the early spring. We leave the north, with patches of snow +yet on the hills, and the first leaflets struggling in vain to +unfold themselves on the blackened branches; or, if we hail from the +metropolis, we gladly turn our backs on wind-swept streets and bleak +suburban roads, to find ourselves in two or three hours speeding beneath +soft sunshine, between far-extending orchards, in all the loveliness of +their delicate bloom, while the grass is of a richer tint, the blue sky, +dappled with fleecy clouds, of a more exquisite purity, and instead +of the slowly-relaxing grasp of winter, the promise of summer already +thrills the air. "The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the +singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our +land." + +But whither shall we direct our steps? It is the perfection of comfort +in travelling to have time at command. We need be in no haste to leave +the apple-blossomy valleys of Somersetshire, even for the woods and +cliffs of Devon; and if the tourist would visit a spot which, in its +own way, is unique in England, let him turn aside, as we did, soon after +leaving Bristol, to a rift in the Mendip Hills, and make his way through +the pass between the Cheddar Cliffs. A more majestic scene it would +be difficult to find. For actual magnitude is only one element of +sublimity. The biggest mountain is not always the grandest, just as the +finest landscape is not always that which embraces the greatest number +of square miles. The Himalayas are said to be far less imposing than the +Alps. The width of the valleys, the more gradual slope of the mountains, +and the greater distance from the eye, detract from their apparent +height as compared with Mont Blanc or the Matterhorn. This little gorge +of the Mendips affords a striking illustration of the same kind. +The cliffs are less than five hundred feet high; yet under certain +conditions of atmosphere we have had as deep a sense of sublimity, and +under others as keen a sense of beauty here, as in districts where the +altitude is to be reckoned by thousands of feet instead of hundreds. + +The approach to Cheddar is by a short railway from Yatton, on the +Bristol and Exeter line, or by the road, which winds through a rich +valley. The hills on either side are green to their very summits, from +which fine views may be gained of the Bristol Channel, near Clevedon and +Weston. One of them, Dolbury, is crowned by a remarkably fine British +camp, enclosing within its ample area a Roman stronghold. Wrington, the +birthplace of John Locke, is passed. Glastonbury Tor comes into view, +and remains a conspicuous object for the rest of the journey. + +Immediately behind the village of Cheddar rises the bare grey ridge +of the Mendips. Cut sheer through it from summit to base is an +extraordinary cleft. The road which winds along the bottom of the +ravine is in some places only wide enough to allow two vehicles to pass +abreast. On the right-hand side a perpendicular wall of rock rises to +the height of about four hundred and thirty feet. Its surface is +broken by enormous buttresses, like the towers of some Titanic castle, +surmounted by spires and pinnacles, whose light airy grace contrasts +finely with the massive walls on which they rest. Down the face of the +cliff long festoons of ivy and creeping plants wave to and fro. The +scanty soil on the ledges and in the fissures is bright with wild +flowers. The yew and mountain ash, dwarfed into mere shrubs, seem to +cling with a precarious foothold to the face of the rock. Far above us +innumerable jackdaws and crows chatter noisily, and hawks, with which +the district abounds, soar across the narrow strip of sky overhead. The +opposite side of the ravine is less precipitous, though even here it is +steep enough to task the energies of the climber, and grand masses of +rock stand out from the hill-side. Conspicuous amongst these is the Lion +Rock, so called from its extraordinary resemblance to a crouching lion. +This district abounds in caverns, many of them of great extent and +beauty, which will well repay a visit. Local tradition affirms that one +reaches as far as Wookey Hole, a distance of ten miles. + +[Illustration: 8131] + +The devoted and self-denying efforts of Mrs. Hannah More must not be +forgotten in connection with Cheddar. When residing at Barley Wood, a +few miles distant, about the end of the last century, she was dismayed +at the ignorance and immorality of the villagers, who were "living like +the brutes that perish," and indulging in gross vices. Scarcely even +in the heart of Africa could more complete heathenism be found. As yet +Sunday Schools, Tract Societies and all the means of usefulness, now so +common, had no existence. + +Her endeavours for the amelioration of the people were as experiments to +be tried single-handed, under the most unpromising circumstances, and in +the face of the most violent hostility and abuse. + +Yet she did not shrink from the arduous duty which lay before her. A +house was taken, a pious teacher appointed, and the school was opened. +Gradually enemies were conciliated, as the happy effects of Christian +teaching became apparent. Many of the children learned to know and love +the Saviour. The influence spread from the children to the parents, +and by the blessing of God the experiment, which at first seemed so +hopeless, was crowned with a success beyond her utmost expectations. It +was in connection with her evangelistic work at Cheddar that she wrote +her first tract, _Village Politics, by Will Chip_. This led to the +preparation of her _Cheap Repository Tracts_, to be followed in due time +by the establishment of the Religious Tract Society, whose operations +now extend throughout the whole world. On the completion of the series, +Mrs. More wrote in her journal: "Bless the Lord, O my soul, that I have +been spared to accomplish this work. Do Thou, O Lord, bless and prosper +it to the good of many; and if it do good, may I give Thee the glory, +and take to myself the shame of its defects. I have devoted three years +to the work. Two millions of these tracts have been disposed of during +the first year! God works by weak instruments, to show that the glory is +all His own." + +From Cheddar the traveller may either continue his journey by way of +Wells, or may return at once to the main line, passing near the coast +of the Bristol Channel, with a wide alluvial plain at his left, once +covered by an arm of the sea, with islands, as Brent Tor and others, +emerging from the waters, and reaching as far as Glastonbury or +Avalon--"apple-island," famed in legend and song. + +[Illustration: 0132] + +A little further, and the marshy plain of the Parret stretches away in +one direction to Sedgemoor, scene of the "last battle fought on English +ground," * that in which the ill-fated Duke of Monmouth suffered +irretrievable defeat, and in another, to Athelney, the place of King +Alfred's retreat and noble rally against the Danes. In memory of the +stories that charmed our childhood, we could do no otherwise than take +the branch line at Durston, whence a few minutes' run places us in the +marshy unpicturesque scene so memorable in English story. The whole +neighbourhood was evidently once covered with woods and morasses; good +drainage has made it fertile now, but it must be confessed that it must +depend for all its attractiveness on its associations. On or near the +traditional site of the "neatherd's cottage," an unpretending stone +pillar with a lengthy inscription preserves the memory of Alfred's +sojourn. + + * Macaulay. The date was July 6, 1685 + +Resuming the journey westward, we soon discern the towers of the Taunton +churches, and may find a welcome night's rest in this bright and pretty +town; or turning again off the main line, may pass north west, by a +route full of interest, to the Ouantock Hills. On our way we pass Combe +Florey, famous as the residence for a time of Sydney Smith, and as the +scene of some of the most characteristic stories of his life. But we +must not linger in the valley: at every point the wooded hill-slopes +tempt us to climb upwards among shady groves of beech, over turf thick +with primroses and bluebells, then out upon the furzy heights. It hardly +matters which path we take, whether up Cothelstone, whence the view +is perhaps most magnificent, or Will's Neck, highest point of all, or +Hurley Beacon. From hilltop to hill-top we make our way, descending +into mossy glens, where the hill stream trickles down in miniature +waterfalls, or striking down some deep wooded combe, where the houses +of a village nestle among the trees, and the spacious church tells of +a time when the inhabitants far out-numbered the present scanty +population. In the valley below, to the north-east, we descry the +village of Nether Stowey, for some time the residence of Coleridge, +and further to the north, at the foot of one of the loveliest of wooded +combes, is Alfoxton, which was at the same time the home of Wordsworth. +The two friends have told us how they used to meet and discuss high +themes in many a charming stroll, their neighbours much wondering the +while, and the government of the day suspecting their advanced +opinions. The end was that they had to leave, not before they had made +imperishable record of the beauties of the place. Thus Wordsworth writes +to Coleridge, in the Prelude: + + "Beloved Friend! + When looking back, thou seest in clearer view + Than any liveliest sights of yesterday + That summer, under whose indulgent skies + Upon smooth Quantock's airy ridge we roved + Unchecked, or loitered 'mid her sylvan combes: + Thou in bewitching words, with happy hearts + Midst chaint the vision of that ancient man; + The bright-eyed Mariner, and rueful woes + Didst utter of the Lady Christabel." + +Coleridge, in a note to the _Ancient Mariner_, says, "It was on a +delightful walk from Nether Stowey to Dulverton, with Wordsworth and his +sister, in the autumn of 1797, that this poem was planned and in part +composed." + +The great hilly range to the west, in full view across the valley from +the Ouantocks, is an outlying rampart of Exmoor, and the brown peak in +the distance is Dunkery Beacon, the highest point in Somersetshire. Our +road leads between these heights and the sea, by Dunster, with its great +ivied castle overhanging the quaint feudal-looking little town, and +Minehead, a cheerful unpretending watering-place, to Porlock, where +the ascent of what the country people call a "terrable long hill," by a +zigzag moorland road, leads to a height from which, on looking back, we +have a prospect of surpassing grandeur. Let us gaze our fill: if the day +be fine, and the atmosphere clear, we shall see nothing nobler in the +west of England. To the south the huge masses of Dunkery, brown with +heather, rise from a foreground of woods and glens; below, to the east, +lies a fair valley, surrounded with hills of every picturesque variety +in form, prominent among which is the rugged side of Bossington Beacon. +Towards the south-east, heights on heights arise, some richly wooded, +others majestic in their bareness; while to the north and north-east +stretches the Bristol Channel, with the Welsh mountains dimly seen +beyond. + +[Illustration: 0134] + +Then we go southwards over a reach of wild moorland, and come upon the +indescribable loveliness of Lynmouth and Lynton. Far beyond railways, +accessible only by long walking or driving over hilly roads, or by small +boats from steamers on their way up and down the Channel, this fair spot +can never attract the crowd; but those who have wandered by its streams, +or climbed its heights, are singularly unanimous in pronouncing it the +most charming spot in England. Lynmouth is in the valley, on the shore; +Lynton on the height. The name is derived from the _lyns_, or torrents, +which descend separately, each through a wooded gorge or combe, until +they meet beside the sea. Great mossy rocks everywhere break the course +of the torrents, and the luxuriant foliage which lines the banks, +the ferns and flowers, with the overhanging trees, combine to make a +succession of perfect pictures. + +[Illustration: 0135] + +The traveller will, of course, go up Lyndale, the valley of the East +Lyn, as far as Watersmeet, and will not omit to explore the quieter, +more luxuriant, though less magnificent West Lyn. He will climb to +the summit of Lyn Cliff, and will survey at ease the prospect from the +summer-house; and will not omit the extraordinary Valley of the Rocks, +reached by a grand walk along the face of the cliff, which overhangs the +sea to the west of Lynton. At a break in this path he suddenly comes +to a gigantic gateway, formed of two rocky pyramids, and enters upon +a scene which, to his first view, appears strewn with the fragments of +some earlier world. "Imagine," says Southey, "a narrow vale between two +ridges of hills, somewhat steep: the southern hill turfed; the vale, +which runs from east to west, covered with huge stones, and fragments of +stone among the fern that fills it; the northern ridge completely bare, +excoriated of all turf and all soil, the very bones and skeleton of the +earth; rock reclining upon rock, stone piled upon stone, a huge terrific +mass. A palace of the pre-historic kings, a city of the Anakim, must +have appeared so shapeless, and yet so like the ruins of what had been +shaped after the waters of the flood subsided.... I never felt the +sublimity of solitude before." + +The drive from Lynton to Barnstaple, though not long, being, we believe, +somewhat under twenty miles, brought to us a crowd of half-forgotten +associations of early days when coach-travelling was the chief means of +locomotion. The coach itself was of the old build, spick and span in its +neatness; the coachman was of old-fashioned ways; the four sleek horses +were no mere omnibus hacks, but as they warmed to their work up and down +hill, showed a mettle akin to that of roadsters in days long ago. +Or perhaps we had only imagined until now that the old breed had +deteriorated! The villages on the way had no sign of "Station" or +"Station Hotel" about them; children ran from the cottage doors to shout +after the coach, or to bring primroses and violets to the passengers; +rustics gathered for a chat where the coachman pulled up, as he did +tolerably often, for time seemed but a small object in that old-world +region. And all around was outspread a landscape of rich, ever-changing +loveliness, ruddy in soil, rich in verdure, as at one time we descended +into lanes half-embowered by the already luxuriant hedgerows, and at +another emerged on open moorland swept by soft breezes from the sea, and +engirdled by the hazy forms of distant hills. At length the estuary of +the Taw came into view, the houses of Barnstaple appeared, the coach +drove into the station yard, and we were in the world again. + +Another route might have been taken from Lynton to Ilfracombe, by way of +Combe Martin, with its fine and rocky bay; but we were anxious to +reach less crowded and familiar spots than the famous North Devon +watering-place, though this also is in its way delightful. We must, +however, see one or two further points on the coast before striking +inland again; and accordingly, took up our night's quarters at Bideford, +famed for the length of its bridge, and the steepness of its streets. +Emerging early in the morning from the highest part of the town, we +made our way to Westward Ho! that magnificent possibility, whose stately +mansions and hotels, broad quays and pier, surrounded by vessels from +all parts, with its broad level plain by the sea and noble background +of wooded hills, had so often captivated us--in railway-station +waiting-rooms. We found it all there, except the mansions, the quays, +and the ships! The bay is glorious, the plain upon the shore stretches +far and wide,--to the satisfaction of golfers, for whose favourite game +no spot can be better adapted: there is a great pebble-ridge, a natural +breakwater two miles long and fifty feet wide, composed of rounded +pebbles of carboniferous "grit;" the background of wooded cliffs is +magnificent, while a lonely pier, one commodious hotel, a bath-house on +a splendid scale, some rows of villas, lodging-houses, and one or two +educational establishments give promise of prosperity to come. A great +sanatorium or hydropathic institution, to be called "the Kingsley," +after the gifted man who has set the stamp of his genius on this whole +neighbourhood, has been projected; and certainly for purposes of health +as well as enjoyment, no place could be better adapted than the woodland +terraces overlooking this most beautiful bay. + +The mention of Charles Kingsley reminds us of Clovelly, his early home, +and to the last his favourite spot. Early in the morning we started for +this unique Devonshire village, with high expectations, and under +the auspices of the British Government, as our chosen vehicle was the +"mail-cart," in the shape of a very comfortable waggonette filled +with pleasant chatty passengers, all the livelier, perhaps, from the +good-humoured sense of merit which early-rising is apt to engender. The +road was not particularly striking, save for glimpses of the channel +seen through the light morning haze: the breath of spring was in the +air, and when we alighted at the "Hobby" gate, we were fully prepared +for the three miles' walk by which our breakfast was yet to be earned. +The path, in reality a broad, well-kept drive, is carried along the face +of the cliff, which shelves gradually, covered thickly with trees and +brushwood, to the shore, while the bank towers above, soft with moss and +beautiful with flowers. The cliff curves in and out irregularly; broken +in one or two places by deep glens, over which the road is carried by +rustic bridges. Long shadows lay, that morning, across the path; above +and below, the tender budding foliage clothed the dark branches of oak +and elm, hazel and beech, in every variety of shade; the air was musical +with birds, and, stirred by the gentle morning breeze and the whisper of +the boughs, blended with the distant murmur of the sea. It was a walk to +be remembered. At length, at a turning of the road, Clovelly came +into sight, about a mile distant--a seemingly confused heap of houses +emerging on all sides from thick woodland, and slanting steeply down +to a stone pier jutting out into a little bay. At the end of the Hobby +walk, the summit of the village was gained, and we were soon descending +its curious steep street, not without longing looks at the quaint little +lodging-houses, all untenanted as yet. + +[Illustration: 8139] + +Clovelly is a place to linger in, and to dream! The practical need of +the hour, however, was breakfast, during the preparation of which meal +it was pleasant to sit in the hotel balcony, and look out upon the bay, +with its lines of light and shadow, and the long outline of Lundy Island +showing clear in the distance; for now the morning mists had lifted, +and the brightness of spring was over sea and land. A walk of marvellous +beauty followed, into the park of Clovelly Court, over springy turf, +through woodlands budding into leaf, and over a stretch of rugged +wilderness, preserved with some art in its primitive simplicity. Thence, +by a winding pathway, or over a steep grassy slope, the highest +point may be reached, a noble cliff, called from some old local story +Gallantry Bower. A little summer-house, nestling in the cliff-side, +commands a grand range of cliffs, with their curved, contorted strata, +peculiar to the carboniferous formation, while many a jutting or broken +crag gives a castellated aspect to this magnificent rampart of the +coast. Inland, the scene is full of beauties of hill and glen, in almost +measureless variety; but we could not linger to survey them all; for +our way lay in another direction, before we could feast again on the +beauties of cliff and sea. + +Hartland Point, a little farther on, is the true "Land's End" of +Devonshire, the terminating promontory of Bideford Bay, a tongue of +grassy land, not more than thirty or forty feet wide, at the summit of a +tremendous precipice on either side, pointing, it is said, to a similar +projection on the opposite Welsh coast, like twin pillars of Hercules, * +guarding the estuary of the Severn. + + * Ptolemy, the geographer (2nd cent.), is supposed to have + referred to Hartland Point, as the "Promontory of Hercules." + +[Illustration: 9140] + +It would now have been easy to visit Bude Haven, and so to travel south +and south-west along the cliffs which fringe the Atlantic, but our +present plan was to strike inland to Dartmoor. The little town of +Oke-hampton was therefore our first destination, reached by a somewhat +dull route,--whichever road may be taken,--but, when gained, most +interesting. The town lies in a valley, watered by a swift romantic +river which, at one point, sweeping round a wooded hill, crowned by the +ruins of an old castle, forms as lovely a picture as anything of the +kind in England. Kingsley abuses Okehampton, unjustly, we think: but, +whatever may be thought of the town and its immediate neighbourhood, +there can be no doubt as to the wonderful interest of the excursions +that may be taken from it as a centre. From the castle hill, as from +other points in the town, the chief object that arrests the eye is the +vast brown sweep of rising ground, suggestive of mysterious desolation +beyond, which we know to be the boundary of Dartmoor. Ascending, we find +ourselves at first on pleasant, breezy, though treeless heights, but +keep to beaten paths, and pursue our onward journey. At length the +moorland track over which we have passed seems to rise behind us and +shut out the world; and as we gaze around, we feel that all pictures +which we had framed to ourselves of wild deserted solitudes are +surpassed. "Like the fragments of an earlier world," is the comparison +that naturally rises to the lips. We are not unfamiliar with moorland +scenery--with Rombald's Moor, for instance, in Yorkshire, beautiful in +its variety of colour, from the tender green and softening greys and +browns of spring, to the purple heathery splendours of the autumn, +while the song of lark and linnet overhead, or the plaintive cry of +the lapwing, gives animation to the scene. But at Dartmoor is a new +experience of desolation. The stupendous mass of granite which here +crops up from hidden depths is covered on its broken surface with thick +peat, in whose depths the blackened trunks of trees occasionally give +evidence of a time when the range was clothed with wood, but which, +for the most part, bears only coarse grass and moss, with heather and +whortleberry in the most favoured localities. Broad spaces are covered +by morass and bog, dangerous to the unaccustomed pedestrian. Scanty +streams break from the heights, and hurry in all directions down to +the valley, swollen to wild fury after a storm. The "tor," or +shapeless masses of rock, which stand out from the peaty surface in +all directions, are but, as it were, the jagged projections from the +interior rock-skeleton. Some may be readily ascended; Yes Tor (probably +East Tor, pronounced Devonshire fashion) being the highest, and on many +accounts the best worth climbing. + +[Illustration: 0141] + +The prospect of the moor from this or any other commanding point can +only be described as awful in its grim, monotonous, silent desolation, +the only beauty being that of swelling distant outline, or frequently +that of colour, when the atmosphere is clear between the frequent +showers, and the rays of the sun light up the heather and the moss, +diversifying the dark shadows of the tors with the various hues of +green, with the ruddy gleam of withered fern, and rushes in many a +morass. But let not the traveller be too hopeful of sunshine and clear +air! For as the local rhyme says: + + The south wind blows, and brings wet weather; + The north gives wet and cold together; + The west wind comes brimful of rain, + The east wind drives it back again. + Then, if the sun in red should set, + We know the morrow must be wet; + And if the eve is clad in grey, + The next is sure a rainy day." + +[Illustration: 9142] + +Still, the slopes by which Dartmoor descends to the lowlands around are +beautiful. In fact, the mighty granite mass is girdled by an investiture +of fair glens and smiling villages, which make the circuit of it a +succession of some of the brightest pictures that England can anywhere +present in the same compass. The drive from Oke-hampton to Chagford, +or to Moreton Hampstead, for instance, is of wonderful charm. Near the +former village, the river Teign descends over rocks and boulders in a +richly-wooded glen, as beautiful in parts as Dovedale. + +[Illustration: 8142] + +The rivers, indeed, which come down on all sides from Dartmoor, are the +glory of Devonshire. Beside the Teign, there is the Dart itself, one +head-stream of which rises near the well-known prison at Prince Town, +with the Taw, Tavy, Avon, Erme, Plym, and streamlets innumerable. + +Travellers in favourable weather will do well to cross Dartmoor by the +coach-road, from Moreton Hampstead to Tavistock, past the big, gloomy +prison, appropriately placed in the very wildest and most desolate +part of the whole region. Or, as we did, making Okehampton their +headquarters, they may pass on by train by way of Lidford. The railway +is carried in places at a great height, on the open edge of the moor, +which it curiously fringes: it seems essentially a holiday line; there +is no hurry, and the traveller, as he passes along, may leisurely survey +the frowning heights above, or the fair valley below, according to his +choice. + +[Illustration: 0143] + +Lidford station being reached, we left the train, and found ourselves +in an unfinished-looking spot, with little outwardly to attract. Having, +however, received directions how to proceed, we crossed a farmyard, +where some cattle with stupendous horns looked and lowed at us in a +manner trying to the nerves, then, emerging near a river bank, made +our way for less than a mile up the stream, on a grassy path beneath +overhanging woods, when at a sudden turn up a glen that opened to the +main stream, the gleam of waters caught the eye, at the first glance +like some tall spirit of the dell, glimmering through the foliage that +enshrouded it. A more beautiful cascade is hardly to be seen in England, +when Dartmoor has had abundance of rain. At other times they say a +friendly miller can turn on a supply of water, else thriftily economised +for his needs. Happily, no such artificial arrangement was needful on +the occasion of our visit; and we remained long admiring the lovely +picture. + +[Illustration: 0144] + +Retracing our steps, we climbed to the village, crossing on our way a +commonplace-looking bridge, of a single arch, at a clip in the road, +with the sound of a great rush of waters beneath. + +[Illustration: 0145] + +We looked over the parapet, but could discern nothing, owing to the mass +of thick shrubs and foliage which overarched the stream, and made +our way uphill to the village. Here the traveller is directed to the +churchyard, to see a curious epitaph on a watchmaker, in which some +rather obvious allusions to human life are borrowed from his craft. +Students of mortuary inscriptions are thankful often for small mercies +in the way of wit, and are not always careful to note where the humour +degenerates into irreverence or worse. We were more sadly interested in +the contrast, which we have also observed in other churchyards, between +the old style and the new; the simple piety of our fathers and the +mimic popery of some of their descendants. Both are very observable at +Lidford. One ancient tombstone bore some pathetic lines, beginning,-- + + "Praise to our God, whose faithful love + Hath called another to His rest." + +But the modern fashion was evidently to put up a flimsy cross, with the +letters R.I.P., _Requiescat in pace!_ a prayer for the dead, who are +beyond our reach, safe in the endless rest, or in a darkness whither +our prayers cannot avail them. We left the scene with the feeling deeper +than ever, that there are growing up errors among us, against which it +becomes all true men earnestly to strive. + +[Illustration: 9146] + +Meanwhile we had learned something about the bridge that we had crossed +just before, and the rush of waters below. Returning, therefore, and +making application at the house close by, we were conducted down into a +rocky gorge, through which rushes the Lid, one of the Dartmoor streams, +a tributary of the Tamar. The cliffs, irregular and castellated, are +seventy feet high; a narrow, dangerous path is carried along one side +of the rock, and the wild foaming waters in the dark, narrow glen carry +back the traveller's mind to Switzerland. Certainly there is nothing +like "Lidford Bridge" elsewhere in England; the Strid in Bolton Woods +may equal it in its rush of waters; but the rocks there lie in the open +woodland, and the stream is but a few feet below their summit: here the +beetling precipices almost meet above, as at the "Devil's Bridge" in +Cardiganshire, and there are weird stories at both places of travellers +on horseback who have leaped the bridge unconsciously by night, when +broken down, only discovering their peril and their escape on the +following day. + +From Lidford to Tavistock was an easy ride, and we found this pleasant +town a place every way suitable for a Lord's Day rest. Outwardly, the +great charm of the locality is the meeting-place between the wildness of +Dartmoor and the rich cultivation of the valley; while some walks by the +river are of a tranquil and serene beauty, only as it seems to us to +be found in England, and to be enjoyed on the day of rest. Perhaps our +feeling is in a great measure due to association; but if so, we have to +thank association for one of the happiest evenings we have known. Next +morning we explored the remains of the Abbey--now put to heterogeneous +uses--a public library, a Unitarian Chapel, and a hotel, with sundry +ruins in the vicarage garden; then a short railway journey carried us +across the Cornish border to Launceston, where a short climb through +pretty pleasure grounds to the keep of the old castle on the knoll that +rises steeply from the town gave us a fine view, from the bulky range of +Dartmoor on the one side, to the craggy outline of the Cornish hills on +the other. + +[Illustration: 0147] + +Our object, however, was now to reach the coast; and, as a good test of +our pedestrian powers, already pretty well exercised in the course +of this charming: tour, we determined to walk over the hills in the +direction of the sea, knowing that even if our powers failed, some +passing "van" would take us up, and convey us in a primitive fashion to +the nearest town. But we persevered, and, when we had accomplished nine +or ten miles of an undulating, monotonous road, were rewarded by the +first glimpse of the Atlantic, with the cloud shadows lying afar upon +the untroubled sapphire; while, though no breeze stirred, there was +a sense of freshness in the air that encouraged us to press on to our +journey's end. At length we reached it, in a village to name which is +to raise in the minds of those who have visited it memories most +delightful; while to the multitude it is and will probably remain +unknown. We will not call it Trelyon, after the fashion of a popular +novelist, who has given us some of the most charming word-pictures of +this scenery which our literature contains. Nor is it unkindness to +the happy few who already know Boscastle, and one delightful homelike +retreat from the world which it contains, to raise the veil a little +farther. That it is several miles distant from a railway station, that +there is no public conveyance to it but the "vans" already referred +to, that gas is a luxury unknown, are points in its favour to those who +think, like the Frenchman: + + "How sweet, how passing sweet, is solitude! + But give me just one friend in my retreat, + To whom to whisper, 'Solitude is sweet.'" + +For society may be found at Boscastle--the society of the chosen few. +The place itself is unique. Through tiny meadows a streamlet flows +swiftly towards the sea, entering a fissure where the hills, swelling +upward on either hand, rise to towering cliffs, inclosing a harbour, up +which the tide surges restlessly to meet the stream, then as restlessly +subsides. Behind the cliff on the western side, up a broad cleft from +the brink of the rivulet to the hill-summit, runs the village, inhabited +by a hardy, independent, self-contained race of Cornish people, proud +of their scenery, as well they may be. The slate cliffs, in endless +diversity of craggy pointed form, skirt the sea, which ever chafes +against their bases; here and there a little inlet far below shows +a surface of smooth white sand, inaccessible from the land, or to be +reached only by the surefooted climber, familiar with every step. Broad +grassy slopes crown the cliffs, and every turn discloses magnificent +views of sea and shore. Our walk along the cliffs to Tintagel, starting +from Willapark Point, the headland that rises so grandly to the west of +the little bay, was of an interest which perhaps no other coast scene +in England can fully match. First, Forrabury Church was passed, with +its silent tower; the bells once destined for it lying, according +to tradition, close by, at the bottom of the Atlantic. The ship that +conveyed them was nearing the port. "Thank God for a fair voyage," said +the pilot. "Nay," replied the captain, "thank the ship, the canvas, and +the fair wind." It was in vain that the pilot remonstrated; but even +while the ship was rounding the point a sudden storm gathered, the +vessel was dashed upon the rocky coast, all perished save the pilot, +and the bells sinking to the deep tolled solemnly, as if for the fate of +those who would not acknowledge God. Still, it is said, when the storm +rises high-- + + "'Those bells, that sullen surges hide, + 'Peal their deep notes beneath the tide: + 'Come to thy God in time!'--thus saith the ocean chime: + 'Storm, billow, whirlwind past, come to thy God at last.'" + +[Illustration: 0150] + +Such is a specimen of the tales told at many a Cornish fireside. As we +pass on we feel more and more that we are in the country of legend and +song. The rolling uplands that stretch inland, with the deep vales and +furzy hollows that intersect them, are renowned as the realm of King +Arthur, the hero of British history and fable. Here, on the shore of +the Atlantic, he may have gathered his good knights around him, to stand +with them against the heathen invader; or it may be that here he was +born, according to the legend; while "the great battle of the west," in +which the hero disappeared, is said to have been fought at Camelford, in +the neighbourhood. Local legends are full of this royal name; and if, +as some will have it, King Arthur never existed, the universality of the +tradition is all the more remarkable. The impress of his memory and +life is everywhere. Of a little cottage maiden who guided us, we ask her +name. "Jinnifer," was the reply--an unconscious perpetuation of the name +of Guinevere, Arthur's Oueen. + +A lovely wooded glen breaks the cliff halfway to Tintagel, at the heal +of which the explorer will find a waterfall, in a wild forest ravine, +both on a somewhat miniature scale; but in the accessories of rock-hewn +walks, with clinging shrubs and mountain spring-flowers, watered by the +dashing spray, the dell was perfect. St. Nighton's Keive, or basin, as +this romantic nook is called, is a sudden and welcome change from the +wild sublimity of the rocks above, and the ceaseless thunder of the +Atlantic. But we must reascend; and soon, from our turfy path upon the +height we come into full view of a stupendous rock, standing a little +way out to sea, the home of myriads of seabirds that circle the rock +with weird cries, or, descending in flocks, skim the surface of the +waves. They have evidently learned to fear the gun, and to distrust +mankind. + +Tintagel, now approached, is an irregular village, following the lines +and descents of the cliff. The church is on a wind-swept headland to the +west, and in its stormiest corner we found the grave and monument of Mr. +Douglas Cooke, the first editor of the _Saturday Review_. It was curious +to be reminded of the conflicts of literature at this meeting-place of +storms. + +Tintagel Castle itself we approached by a path that looked perilous, +but was safe enough, descending from the cliff and rising steeply to a +promontory or peninsula of slaty rock, on which the ruins stand. +These are jagged, time-worn; little plan or order can be traced; such +fragments of building as still exist are no doubt of much more recent +origin than Arthur's time: the outward glory of the scene is all in the +majestic sweep and serried outline of the stupendous cliffs, with the +long roll of the sea breaking ceaselessly into billows at their base. +The stillness is unbroken, save for this ocean music, with the hoarse +cry of sea-birds, and the occasional bleating of the few sheep who +pasture here. The sense of isolation becomes at last oppressive, and we +gladly retrace our steps to the mainland. + +Boscastle remains for a time our home: it is a never-ceasing delight +to climb to some nook of the cliffs, east and west, which inclose the +little harbour, or to stroll down to the little pier--a trying walk at +certain seasons, because of a chemical manure manufactory on the way--or +to ramble over the grassy slopes, inhaling the pure breezes of the +Atlantic. The Sunday spent in the neighbourhood was one of peculiar +delight. Wandering inland, we found a church, in the depths of a wood; +the congregation seemed to emerge, we knew not how, from deep bowery +lanes and by-paths among the trees; the service was none the less +impressive for the singing of birds without and the fragrance of +spring blossoms stealing through the open windows. The sermon, too, was +appropriate, a tender, practical exhortation to "delight ourselves in +God." In the evening of the same day, in the hush of twilight, taking +our accustomed path over the cliffs, we came upon a group of people, old +and young, who had evidently come thither after an early evening service +at one of the chapels: they were holding a prayer-meeting in the rocky +nook--singing a hymn as we approached, the burden of which was "Over +there," while wistful eyes gazed across the now purple sea, to the +splendours which lingered in the west after sunset, as though reminded +by those tints of heavenly glory of the land that is very far off. It +was good for the stranger to pause by the way, to join in that touching +strain, and add his Amen to that Sabbath evening prayer. + +[Illustration: 9153] + +Boscastle was so attractive that the rest of a long journey had to be +performed in haste. Bodmin, Truro, Redruth, were all rapidly passed, and +after climbing Carnbrea, near the latter town, and hearing some of the +marvellous stories connected with that giant hill, we took rail for +Penzance, anxious at least to visit St. Michael's Mount, the Logan Rock +and the Land's End. But what impressed us most, when we reached that +last and prettiest of Cornish towns, was the climate. We had believed +it spring; but here it was already summer! The last struggle with wintry +frosts was over, and the woods and fields were decked with all their +wealth of verdure; the air had lost its sharpness, and the rich +colouring of every part of the scene, from the golden furze upon the +hills to the ruddy lichen on the rocks, seemed to reflect the genial +glow. Mount's Bay, still and blue, was wonderful in its contrast with +the Atlantic surges that we had just left on the opposite shore. We +thought of the words with which Emerson begins one of his lectures: "In +this refulgent summer it has been a luxury to live." + +St. Michael's Mount, that extraordinary combination, geologically +speaking, of granite and clay-slate, remarkable, too, in its +correspondence with the much larger Mont St. Michel on the shore of +Normandy, is as interesting a place to visit as it is beautiful to look +upon. The views from its summit over sea and land are of surpassing +loveliness, and to enjoy them to the full it is not necessary to make +the hazardous attempt to sit in "St. Michael's Chair," the half, it is +said, of an old stone lantern, but overhanging the precipice in a +very perilous way. The villagers round the bay will tell you that the +archangel himself appears in this "chair" when a storm is raging, and +firmly believe that he is the guardian spirit of these seas. + +[Illustration: 0153] + +The Logan Rock, to which we next directed our steps, was disappointing +in more ways than one: the finest part of the cliff-scenery being the +great granite headland, which visitors are apt to pass unnoticed, in +searching for the natural curiosity, and in recalling the story of its +fall and reinstatement. There are, in fact, many "logan" or logging +rocks in granite districts, locally called Tolmens; one formerly in the +parish of Constantine, between Penrhyn and Helston, being larger than +this on the coast, though without its magnificent accessories. Their +peculiar position is caused by the influence of air and moisture, +wearing a fissure in the rock, until a detached upper portion rests only +on a small central base. The wonder is in the bigness of the rock thus +balanced, and in the evenness of the process of disintegration all +around: the vast majority of boulders worn away by such agencies being +of course over balanced, so as to fall on one side. + +[Illustration: 0154] + +The mechanical restoration of this Logan Rock to its position, and the +appliances necessary to keep it in balance, give an artifical air to the +whole, and we were glad to turn away to the stupendous cliff scenery, +pursuing a path along the rocks to the Land's End, where every point has +its old Cornish name, and where the combinations of form and outline, +if less imposing than on the northern shore, are still very fine. The +granite of which this southern line of coast is composed is more rugged +and massive, if less variously picturesque, and the admirer of coast +scenery who has explored the two districts--from Boscastle to Tintagel, +and from the Logan Rock to the Land's End--has little' more to see or to +learn. + +The great western promontory has been so often described that we +need but refer to our artist's delineation. The low descending +promontory, from the great cliff rampart behind, the narrowness of the +"neck of land" between "two unbounded seas,"--to adopt the phrase of +Charles Wesley's well-known hymn, here written,--the rocky islands near, +on which the lighthouse stands, and the ever-chafing restless surge, +make up a picture which fills the imagination in many after days. + +[Illustration: 8155] + +From this point "the vast expanse of ocean is at all times a grand +spectacle; it is terrible when a fierce westerly gale levels before it +the whole flow of the sea, driving forward one blinding sheet of foam, +even to the summit of the Land's End precipice; but it is yet more +solemn in its quieter mood, when, with little wind stirring, the vast +billows, propagated from some centre of storms far in the Atlantic, come +slowly to break on the rocks in measured cadences of thunder, the very +types of enormous power in repose." + +But it was now time to turn our thoughts and our course homeward. + +Very reluctantly, we left the south of Cornwall unvisited--the Lizard +Point, Kynance Cove, and the magnificent harbour of Falmouth, with its +flanking castles of Pen-dennis and St. Mawes. + +[Illustration: 9155] + +Then there were the great southern towns of Devonshire, with their +beauties manifold,--Plymouth and Torquay, with the lovely little +watering-places of Teignmouth and Dawlish, and stately Exeter itself. On +previous occasions we had visited them all, had spent long dreamy hours +in Anstey's Cove, then comparatively unvisited by excursionists, had +tenanted humble lodgings at Babbicombe Bay, before the villas were +built, and had sailed down the lovely winding Dart to Dartmouth, with +its harbour among the hills. The natural beauties are still there, +though art has done much of its best or its worst with them since those +days. But we must now pass them all by, only in imagination breathing +their soft southern airs, or casting hasty glances at one or other of +them from the carriage windows of the romantic South Devon Railway. For +we have tarried amid the attractions of the far west until the latest +possible moment. At six in the morning we leave Penzance; at six in the +evening we are in London. + +[Illustration: 0156] + +[Illustration: 0158] + + + + +THE ENGLISH LAKES + +[Illustration: 0159] + +|ONE great attraction of the Lake district of Cumberland and +Westmoreland lies in its singular compactness. Equal beauties, and +greater sublimity, may be found elsewhere, but nowhere surely has such +immense variety of natural charms been gathered within the same space. +A good pedestrian might pass from the north of the district to the +south--from Keswick to Windermere--in a single day; or in even less time +might make his way from east to west--from Patterdale to the foot of +Wastwater. True, in so hurried a journey he would lose much; for weeks +may delightfully be spent among the mountains, in exploring their hidden +nooks and wonders. But all that is most beautiful is within the compass +of a short tour; and an observation which Mr. Ruskin has somewhere made +about Switzerland is as true of this enchanting country. He says that +the loveliest and sublimest scenes are to be witnessed from beaten roads +and spots easy of access; that things as wonderful are open to the +view of the traveller who cannot leave his carriage as to the Alpine +mountaineer. There is no doubt an exhilaration of mountain air only +to be enjoyed on the heights; and for the view of billowy uplands all +around the spectator, like a Titanic ocean stricken into stillness, the +visitor to the Lakes ought to ascend Helvellyn; but the views from +the valleys, or from the roads that encircle the lower slopes of the +mountains, are incomparable. Familiar as is the road from Ambleside to +Grasmere, or, in another style of beauty, the drive to Red-bank and High +Close, or, in yet another, the ascent to the Castle Hill at Keswick, +they never lose their charm even to those who prefer to leave these easy +ways for the toilsome walk over the Stake or Sty Head Pass, or up the +shaley steeps of Scafell or the tremendous grassy slopes of Skiddaw. The +glories of this district are, in a word, for all who have eyes to see +and hearts to feel. + +[Illustration: 0160] + +First impressions have great effect, especially in the approach to +beautiful scenery; and there are at least three ways to the Lake +district from the south which compete one with another in their +interest. The first is by rail, northwards from Lancaster to Penrith, +passing by the outside or eastern edge of the fells which bound the +mountain region. This journey throughout is of wonderful beauty, +especially where the broad grassy fells rise steeply on one side of the +line, and on the other the hill abruptly descends to the river Lune, +here little more than a mountain streamlet, eddying and sparkling +through wooded dells. From Penrith, a branch line to Keswick passes in +the latter part of its course through an exquisite glen, watered by the +streams that come down from the great Blencathara ridge, with many +a glimpse of picturesque crags clothed with fern, shrubs and flowers +jutting from the mountain's base. All this well prepares the traveller +for the glorious view that greets him when he emerges from the station +at Keswick, and looks forth upon the amphitheatre of mountains. + +Another method of approach is by leaving the Lancaster and Carlisle +Railway at the junction for Kendal, so proceeding to the Windermere +terminus, situated on a height commanding a magnificent view of +the upper part of the lake. The suddenness with which this scene is +disclosed, as well as the completeness of its beauty, makes it to many +the favourite mode of access. It is also perhaps the most convenient, +conveyances to every part of the district being ready as the trains come +in. The traveller, however, should it be his first visit, will do well +to go up to Orrest' Head, behind the hotel, from which the whole of +Windermere, with its islands and the mountains beyond, form a truly +enchanting prospect, suggesting to the delighted spectator the wonders +beyond. + +[Illustration: 0161] + +But there is another way of entering this fairy region, by which its +beauties are not suddenly disclosed, but grow one by one upon the sight. +Still, perhaps, the unique and impressive character of the approach +gives this method of access the advantage over every other. So we say to +every reader who has not as yet visited the Lakes, Go by the over-land +railway along the edge of Morecambe Bay: and to those who have visited +it by other routes, Go again by this! The line crosses two estuaries, +of the Kent and of the Leven. When the tide is up, the effect of +passing through a wide expanse of sea rising to within a few feet of the +embankment on both sides is wonderfully striking; and at low water the +great reaches of sand are scarcely less impressive. Morecambe Bay, with +its curving shore and many inlets, is at all times beautiful, and the +mountain ranges are seen dimly in outline across its waters. At several +points the railway embankment seems to have effected a change in the +sea-level; fields now fertile being fringed on the side farthest from +the bay by low cliffs, the bases of which were evidently at no remote +period washed by the waters. A vast additional area might, one would +think, be still reclaimed by engineering skill without any serious cost. +But we pass on to Ulverston, where we change carriages, rather than +proceed at present to Furness* and Coniston; the direct entrance to the +district being by a short recently-constructed railway along the shore +of the Leven up to the foot of Windermere. We pass through a pretty +wooded valley beside the bright, swiftly-descending stream, and at the +terminus, on the brink of the lake, find a little steamer ready to pass +upward. At first the charms of Windermere resemble those of some fair +broad river, flowing between ranges of low wood-crowned hills; but the +lake soon opens, and after we have passed Belle Isle, opposite Bowness, +any disappointment we may have felt at first yields to unbounded +admiration. The mountains at the head of the lake disclose their grand +outlines, appearing to change their relative positions at every turn of +the steamer; and some persons acquainted with mountain scenery in many +lands pronounce the view of these heights a little before sunset in +summer time to be unsurpassed in beauty. Wansfell Pike on the right, +Fairfield in front, and the Langdale Pikes in the distance on the left, +with the broken lines and broad uplands of Loughrigg Fells between, all +invested with the shadowy tints of evening, form a picture which in its +tender aerial loveliness seems ready to vanish while we gaze. + + * There is another way of entering the district, by the + Furness Railway, and along the west coast, as far as the + station at Seascales or Drigg: thence to Wastwater, and + Wastdale Head. The traveller will thus plunge at once into + the wildest and most desolate part of the Lake country, + emerging into fairer scenes. + +[Illustration: 0162] + +If the ways of entering this fair district are manifold, so are the +method and order in which its attractions may be viewed. These must be +studied in the guide books, and every traveller will shape his route for +himself. In this, much will depend on the time at command. We have spent +three days among the Lakes, and again a week, again a month; and while +the shorter period enabled us to see much, the longer did but prove to +us that the beauties were inexhaustible. Some visitors take Ambleside +as their headquarters, some Grasmere, some Keswick; others, happier in +their decision, have no headquarters at all, but range from place to +place. As a centre, we should prefer Grasmere; but every one will have +his own preference. It may almost be said that the Lake country has +its controversies and sects, with as many divisions of opinion on the +question which part is the fairest, as on more important matters. +Some give the palm to Ullswater among the lakes, an equal number to +Denventwater, a minority to Windermere, while there are those who prefer +the silent and gloomy Wastwater. Then who shall say whether the view +from Helvellyn, Skiddaw, or Scafell is the most marvellous in its +beauty? Our advice is to join none of the sects, to take no part in +the controversy, to climb all three of the mountains, and to visit, if +possible, all the lakes! After this our advice may be thought to savour +of partisanship, when we say that the visitor who wishes to know the +full and perfect beauty of this region, whether he enter from the north, +or west, or south, must on no account neglect to visit Keswick and +Skiddaw. + +[Illustration: 0163] + +The lovely lake of Derwentwater is so near to the little town, there are +so many points, as Friar's Crag, Castle Crag, and Latrigg, accessible by +the most moderate walking, and the days' excursions from the place are +so various and delightful, that none will feel our counsel to be out of +place. Not to mention that, in the by no means rare or improbable event +of a rainy day, there are the pencil factories and the models of +the Lake district. The latter should be seen alike by those who have +traversed the region, and by those who have not; the former will be +interested in recognising the places that they have visited, and the +latter, in making out their intended tours. + +The great excursion from Keswick is one which is made by multitudes on +foot or in carriages; and for variety of charm within a comparatively +short compass its equal is hardly to be found. First the road leads +between the lake and an almost perpendicular crag, wooded to the summit. +Barrow Falls, in the pleasure-grounds of a mansion, may be visited on +the way; and few will omit to see Lodore, at the other end of the lake. +The charm here is that of a steep and rocky glen: rarely indeed does +the "water come down," at least in the summer-time, after the fashion +described in Southey's famous lines. + +[Illustration: 9164] + +Then the grandeurs of Borrowdale unfold themselves, and Rossthwaite, in +the heart of this valley, is the very ideal of sequestered loveliness. +The road, turning to the right at Seatoller, climbs a long steep hill +beside a dashing torrent. A little way beyond the summit is Honister +Crag, most magnificent of inland cliffs; and so, amid wild rock-scenery +on either hand, we descend to Buttermere. The drive now discloses +a grand amphitheatre of mountains, whose summits form a rugged +ever-changing line against the sky. Soon the little inn is reached; +but we would advise no tourist so to occupy himself with the welcome +refreshment, though flavoured with that "best sauce," a sharp-set +appetite, or even with the ever-amusing "Visitors' Book," as to neglect +rowing across Crummock Water, when a walk of about a mile will take him +to Scale Force, in its deep rocky glen, the loftiest and noblest, as +well as the most secluded of the lake waterfalls. The drive back from +Buttermere to Keswick, by the Newland Valley, or the Vale of Lorton, +with its old yew tree, is full of interest, from the bold mountain +forms ever in view, but has not the wonderfully varied beauty of the +Borrowdale and Seatoller route. + +Everybody, as we have said, takes this drive: but there is an excursion +known to comparatively few, not a very long one, but "beautiful +exceedingly." + +Should a morning at Keswick be unemployed, or if the question should +arise in the interval of wider explorations: "What shall I do to-day?" +our advice is to go up to Watendlath. This is a narrow upland valley, +extending from the head of the stream that supplies Barrow Fall, to that +which comes down at Lodore, then up by the latter to the tarn from which +it flows. It may be reached by one of two or three routes from below, +and after a short ascent the traveller finds himself, as it were, in +the very heart of the hills; a still and lovely world, above the beaten +ways, with nature's fragrance and music all around. We have suggested "a +morning" for the excursion, but it is still better to proceed leisurely; +resting on some turfy bank beside the path, in happy talk with congenial +friends; or, if alone, in quiet communion with our own souls and with +Him who has made the world so beautiful. In the earlier parts of the +walk the occasional views over Derwentwater, and down to Bassenthwaite, +with Skiddaw towering grandly in one direction, and the Borrowdale +Mountains in another, are magnificent; but in the heart of the glen, +leading up beside the Lodore torrent, these are gradually left behind. +When the hamlet, and the tarn with its bright rippling waters, at length +are reached, and the torrent has been crossed by a little rustic bridge, +Ross-thwaite is descried below, and may be reached by a steep descent; +or the stout pedestrian may strike boldly over Armboth Fall for +Thirlmere at the foot of Helvellyn, or if he please may climb still +higher by the side of the Lodore stream until he reaches Blea Tarn, high +up among the fells. + +Which of the three great mountains of the Lake district to choose in +preference for an ascent, it would be hard to say. On the whole, our +own associations would lead us to select Skiddaw; but if Helvellyn and +Scafell can also be ascended, so much the better. The distant views +from Skiddaw of the Solway Firth and the Scottish hills are very fine +in clear weather; but undoubtedly the wild magnificence of the mountain +groups as seen from Helvellyn is incomparable. The majesty of Scafell is +the majesty of desolation. Carlyle says:-- + +"From this centre of the mountain region, beautiful and solemn is the +aspect to the traveller. He beholds a world of mountains, a hundred +savage peaks--like giant spirits of the wilderness; there in their +silence, in their solitude, even as on the night when Noah's deluge +first dried." * + + * _Sartor Resartus._ + +But of all mountain scenes, that which most abides in our memory is +that which was suddenly outspread before us one summer evening, a little +before sunset, in descending Skiddaw. The afternoon had brought swirling +blinding mists about our upward path; we had reached the summit with +difficulty, only to find ourselves enveloped on all sides in a white +chilly sea of cloud. Passing breezes and sweeping sheets of vapour had +created the hope that the mists would soon pass away; but it seemed in +vain to wait, and we began descending. Then as we reached a little knoll +on the mountain's side, the mist parted before us, and in an instant +had rolled far back on either side. Through its vast shadowy portal, +it was as if Paradise were unveiled! The atmosphere below was perfectly +transparent and still; the rays of the sun were reflected in crimson +glory from the lake, so as in an instant to bring to the mind of every +member of our party the Apocalyptic vision of the "sea of glass mingled +with fire." The splendour lighted up every mountain side where it fell, +their crags were gold and purple, the verdure of the upland slopes and +thick woods, with the living green of the woods and meadows, gleamed +with a more than tropical brilliancy; and the long dark shadows which +everywhere lay athwart the scene only set in brighter contrast the +surrounding glory. The mists fleeted, vanishing as they ascended the +mountain side; the magnificence of colouring soon subsided into quiet +loveliness, then into a sober grey; the vision had faded, leaving deep +suggestions of those possibilities of beauty everywhere latent in this +fair creation, perhaps to be fully disclosed when the new heavens and +earth shall appear. + +Space fails us now to speak of the rival beauties of Ullswater, where +the surrounding mountains are closer and grander than in any other part +of the district. Every competent pedestrian we would advise to walk +to this lake, from the border of Thirlmere, and over the summit of +Helvellyn. Should this be too great a tax on the tourist's powers, he +will find the way by Griesdale, a pass between Fairfield and Helvellyn, +a very practicable walk amid grand scenery. And when Ullswater is +reached, what more charming nook can there be than Patterdale, deep set +among the hills? After a little time spent there, we pant perhaps for +more open scenery and a more stimulating atmosphere; and there is the +climb over Kirkstone Pass to meet our desire, and to carry us back to +beautiful Windermere, our first love and our last, in all this haunted +realm! + +We have pursued for the most part a beaten track, verily believing, as +we said at the outset, that here the choicest beauties are to be found. +But there is many a hidden little-visited nook where the superadded +charm of solitude seems to enhance all the rest; and we shall be +indignantly told by many that we have left the loveliest spots without +a mention. What can be more perfectly beautiful than the view's from the +hill-sides above the head of Coniston Water? What valley can vie, in its +combination of lofty cliff, green slopes, richly varied woodland, and +gleam of rushing waters, with the approach from Coniston to Little +Langdale? The few who in another part of the district follow the Liza +down to Ennerdale will have it that there is a wild beauty in this glen +which gives it a charm beyond all others. And so is it on the other +side, with the scarcely larger band of visitors to secluded Mardale and +wild and lonely Haweswater. Then, as to mountain passes, the climber +sneers at Griesdale, calls Kirkstone a "Turn-pike-road," thinks there is +nothing worth an effort but the Stake, between Langdale and Borrowdale, +Sty Head, between Langdale and Wastdale, or Black Sail and Scarf Gap, +from Wastdale to Buttermere. And even these passes are not Alpine. Go +in a fault-finding mood, and you will discover that the torrents are +without volume, that the mountains lack elevation, that the lakes are +insignificant in size. But the man whose eye and heart are open to the +impression of beauty will be indifferent to these comparisons, will +rather rejoice in the limitations which permit every element of grandeur +and loveliness to be gathered into so small a space; and for ourselves +we may say that we have never appreciated the charm of the English Lakes +so truly as when we have visited them after a tour amid the mightier +wonders of Switzerland. + +[Illustration: 0167] + +At Ambleside there is many a pleasant resting-place in which to recall +the pleasures and sum up the impressions of the journey, and to dwell, +as many love to do, upon the associations of one and another great name +by turns with almost every part of the district. First and foremost is +Wordsworth, the poet of nature;--the great "Lake Poet," only because +nature here is at her loveliest,--who from his home at Grasmere, and +afterwards at Rydal Mount, gave utterance, more richly, truly, deeply, +than any writer of his generation, of man's delight in the Creator +s work. The association of his name with his beloved lake country +is imperishable. Many years ago De Quincey wrote, with reference +to Wordsworth's earlier poems, "The very names of the ancient +hills--Fairfield, Seat Sandal, Helvellyn, Blen-cathara, Glaramara; the +names of the sequestered glens--such as Borrowdale, Martindale, Mardale, +Wastdale, and Ennerdale; but, above all, the shy pastoral recesses, +not garishly in the world's eye, like Windermere or Der-wentwater, +but lurking half unknown to the traveller of that day--Grasmere, for +instance, the lovely abode of the poet himself, solitary, and yet +sowed, as it were, with a thin diffusion of humble dwellings--here a +scattering, and there a clustering, as in the starry heavens--sufficient +to afford, at every turn and angle, human remembrances and memorials of +time-honoured affections, or of passions (as the 'Churchyard amongst +the Mountains' will amply demonstrate), not wanting even in scenic and +tragical interest--these were so many local spells upon me, equally +poetic and elevating with the Miltonic names of Valdarno and +Vallombrosa." * + + * Works, vol. ii. p. 124. + +[Illustration: 9168] + +The spell remains, though some of the aspects of the scenery have +changed. Grasmere, for instance, is no longer a "shy pastoral recess," +but the stream of life that daily pours through the valley cannot impair +its beauty. This of all the lakes possesses, when the wind is still, +the supreme charm of perfect stillness and transparency. We have seen +it when it was absolutely impossible to distinguish its richly-wooded +banks, or the island near its centre, from their reflection in the +unrippled water. The unclouded blue of the heavens was mirrored, as in +fathomless depths. It was a "sea of glass like unto crystal." It may be +hoped that this loveliness will be uninvaded by anything which would mar +its perfection. We know that Wordsworth pathetically protested against +the invasion of the railway; but on the height which the Windermere +station occupies, at the very portal of this beautiful land, it in no +degree interferes with the enjoyment of the scenery, while facilitating +the access of multitudes who could not otherwise share the delight. The +railway station at the foot of the lake, that on the border of Coniston, +and even that at Keswick, are, so to speak, outside the magic circle; +but we can fully sympathise with Mr. Ruskin and others who have employed +such strenuous efforts to resist every threatened or possible inroad. +The very compactness of the region, and the ease with which, when once +reached, it may be traversed throughout, might lead the most impatient +traveller to be satisfied with the existing means of swift access. When +the border is gained, let him proceed leisurely, and enjoy. If young, +the stagecoach travelling, which is here so common, may yield him an +unfamiliar, though old-fashioned kind of delight. To judge from our +own youthful recollections, as well as from the literature of a past +generation, there was, in favourable circumstances of scenery and +weather, an exhilaration in such journeys which never is or can be known +in the rapid rush through railway cuttings, and over high embankments, +behind the "Erebus" or "Phlegethon," at the rate of fifty miles an hour! +And many an elderly or middle-aged man almost unconsciously exults in +the renewal of his youth in that grand coach-drive from Windermere over +Dunmail Raise to Keswick. + +[Illustration: 0169] + +But we return for a moment to the personal associations of this region. +Southey has often been classed with Wordsworth as belonging to a school +of "Lake Poets." Nothing could be more erroneous, as De Quincey pointed +out long ago. It is true that these poets both lived by the lakes; +but there is no sense in which they can be described as of the same +"school." In fact, they are curiously unlike in many of their chief +characteristics; although they esteemed each other truly; and very +noble are the lines which Wordsworth has dedicated to the memory of his +friend: + + "Wide were his aims; yet in no human breast + Could private feelings find a holier nest. + His joys, his griefs, have vanished like a cloud + From Skiddaw's top; but he to heaven was vowed, + Through a life long and pure, and Christian faith + Calmed in his soul the fear of change and death." * + + * From the Epitaph on Southey, by Wordsworth, in Crosthwaite + Church, Keswick. + +[Illustration: 0170] + +Other names arise to mind. Close under Orrest Head was Elleray, once +the beautiful home of Professor Wilson, the "Christopher North" whose +"recreations" were to describe, in language of a rich and gorgeous +luxuriance which the present generation is scarcely able to enjoy, but +which the readers of a past age dwelt upon with rapture, the glories of +mountain, lake, and sky. Fox How and the Knoll, between Windermere +and Rydal Water, bring to mind two very different names, each of great +influence in their generation. At the former, Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, +passed his happy vacations; in the latter, Miss Harriet Martineau +endeavoured--with what success we attempt not here to judge--to work out +her theory of life. The name of Coleridge also connects itself with this +region; not of the philosophic teacher and wonderful talker, though we +have known the mistake to be made by people well informed. Samuel Taylor +Coleridge, as Carlyle says, "sat on Highgate Hill having left the lakes +for the great city, never to return." It was his son Hartley whose +brilliant gifts, in their fitful and broken splendour, have caused the +name of Coleridge to be remembered, and repeated with pitying affection, +all through the Grasmere Vale. + +[Illustration: 0171] + +We turn reluctantly from this world of beauty, happy in the remembrance +of what we have seen and felt, happier perhaps that so much remains +unvisited in a region where every by-way and secluded dell has its own +peculiar loveliness, and that we may hope to return again and yet again +to explore its wonders. For the mountain climber, are there not Great +Gable, Bowfell, Fairfield, Pillar Mountain in Ennerdale, steepest of +all, Blen-cathara, otherwise Saddleback, with its unequalled view of +Derwentwater, and Coniston Old Man, with its grand prospects over land +and sea? These six are scarcely inferior in height to the imperial +three,* whose names and forms are most familiar. Then the Langdales +should be climbed; one or both, as a position below the loftiest in a +mountain land affords the best point of view from which to apprehend the +grandeur of the surrounding hills. And after the greater lakes have been +duly visited, what wealth of hidden beauty is there in those retired +valleys, where rivulets suddenly expand into fair still sheets of +water, reflecting the mountains at whose base they lie; and what lonely +grandeur in the tarns high among the hills, rarely visited by human +foot, and, like Scales Tarn on Blencathara, so surrounded by wild crags +as hardly ever to admit the sunlight! Excursion after excursion may be +made, not only by the angler, but by those who have no taste for such +sport, to these lofty miniature lakes. + +[Illustration: 9171] + +Or, if the tourist delights in waterfalls, let him seek out Dungeon +Ghyll in Langdale, or go up behind the inn at Ambleside to Stock Ghyll, +or stop on his way through the valley to admire the two picturesque +Falls at Rydal, or ramble through Gowbarrow Park, near Ullswater, as far +as Airey or Ara Force, which "by Lyulph's Tower speaks from the woody +glen," or let him make a special excursion to Eskdale to see Stanley +Ghyll, described by some tourists as the most beautiful of all. The +beauty of these cascades, and of others less famed, arises not from the +volume of water, but from the picturesqueness of the glens in which they +lie; these being, in almost every case, deep and narrow fissures in the +rock, covered with ferns, mosses and shrubs in the utmost luxuriance. +The varied tints of the rocks and of the foliage by which they are +clothed give richness of colouring to the picture; and when the sunlight +falls upon the dashing spray, and rainbow tints hang over the fall, the +surpassing loveliness of the scene is even enhanced by the smallness of +its scale. + +It would hardly be possible to omit, in any notice of the Lake district, +however incomplete, a reference to the great uncertainty of the weather. +In the deeper valleys, especially, as Wastdale and Buttermere, the +traveller is often sorely disappointed by incessant rain. Yet even +this has its compensation in the increased translucency of the air, +the beauty of the mountain streams and cascades, with the incomparable +splendours of the parting clouds, when the sunlight has smitten them +apart, and their white trains vanishing up the mountain-side are as the +robes of angels. When the summer airs elsewhere are stifling, and the +ground is parched, the effect of the frequent mists and showers is fully +seen. For then the whole lake country is as green as an emerald; and, +except in the deepest valleys, the wearied brain and limbs are refreshed +by stimulating mountain airs. Such seasons perhaps are the best for a +visit to the Lakes; but they are beautiful in winter too, when the snows +linger on the heights, and in the early spring, when the greensward is +carpeted with wild flowers, and in the autumn, when the purple, gold, +and crimson clothe the woods in a royal array, while the withered Reaves +elsewhere strew all the ground. "Those only know our country," say the +dwellers among the lakes, "who live here all the year round." Be it +so. It is good to carry in memory, into the busy, more prosaic walks of +life, the glimpse, if it be no more, of all this beauty; and, after +all, it is the "still sad music of humanity" that thrills the soul more +deeply than the music of the whispering woods, or of the torrent down +the mountain side. It was the Poet of the Lakes and Mountains who closed +one of the noblest of his odes by the words: + + "Thanks to the human heart by which we live, + Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, its fears; + To me, the meanest flower that blows can give + Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." + +[Illustration: 0174] + + + + +THE EASTERN COUNTIES + +[Illustration: 0175] + +|John Foster quaintly says that "the characteristic of genius is, that +it can light its own fire:" he might have added that it can provide its +own fuel. Mere talent is mainly dependent upon adventitious aids and +favourable circumstances, whilst genius can work with the clumsiest +tools and the most intractable materials. The magnificent scenery of +Switzerland and the Scotch Highlands has produced no artist or poet of +the first rank. The featureless landscape of Holland or of East +Anglia sufficed for Cuyp or Hobbema, or Ruysdael, for Gainsborough +or Constable, or Old: Crome. The quiet loveliness of Warwickshire was +enough for Shakspere's genius. Milton had seen the glories of the Alps +and Apennines, but Buckinghamshire furnished the subject-matter of +_L'Allegro_ and _Il Penseroso_. The dreary flats of Bedfordshire and +Huntingdonshire cease to be dull and prosaic in Cowper s verse. + +The themes of Tennyson's earlier poems were drawn from the fens and +meres and melancholy swamps of Lincolnshire. The truth is, that the eye +makes its own pictures, and sees just what it has the power of seeing. + + "O Lady! we receive but what we give, + And in our life alone does nature live: + Ours is her wedding-garment, ours her shroud! + And would we aught behold, of higher worth, + Than that inanimate cold world allowed + To the poor, loveless, ever-anxious crowd, + Ah! from the soul itself must issue forth + A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud + Enveloping the Earth-- + And from the soul itself must there be sent + A sweet and potent voice, of its own birth, + Of all sweet sounds the life and element."* + + * Coleridge's Sybilline Leaves. + +[Illustration: 0176] + +It must, however, be confessed that it would be difficult at the present +day to find poetry or beauty in the Fen country. The meres have been +drained, the swamps have been reclaimed. The profusion of aquatic plants +and wild-fowl has disappeared. Whittlesea Mere and Ramsey-Mere have been +brought under the plough. Even the picturesque old windmills have given +place to the hideous chimney-shafts of pumping stations worked by steam. +We may almost parody the famous chapter of Olaus Magnus on "Snakes in +Iceland," and say--there are no fens in the fen country. If we would +know what the fens were once like, we must, read some of Tennyson's +earlier poems, or better still perhaps, one of Kingsley's prose Idylls: + +"A certain sadness is pardonable to one who watches the destruction of a +grand natural phenomenon, even though its destruction bring blessings to +the human race. Reason and conscience tell us, that it is right and good +that the Great Fen should have become, instead of a waste and howling +wilderness, a garden of the Lord, where + + 'All the land in flowery squares, + Beneath a broad and equal-blowing wind, + Smell of the coming summer.' + +And yet the fancy may linger, without blame, over the shining meres, +the golden reed-beds, the countless water-fowl, the strange and gaudy +insects, the wild nature, the mystery, the majesty--for mystery and +majesty there were--which haunted the deep fens for many a hundred +years. Little thinks the Scotsman, whirled down by the Great Northern +Railway from Peterborough to Huntingdon, what a grand place, even twenty +years ago, was that Holme and Whittlesea which is now but a black, +unsightly, steaming flat, from which the meres and reed-beds of the old +world are gone, while the corn and roots of the new world have not as +yet taken their place. + +[Illustration: 0177] + +"But grand enough it was, that black ugly place, when backed by Caistor +Hanglands and Holme Wood, and the patches of the primeval forest; while +dark-green alders, and pale-green reeds, stretched for miles round the +broad lagoon, where the coot clanked, and the bittern boomed, and the +sedge-bird, not content with its own sweet song, mocked the notes of all +the birds around; while high overhead hung motionless hawk beyond hawk, +buzzard beyond buzzard, kite beyond kite, as far as the eye could see. +Far off, upon the silver mere, would rise a puff of smoke from a punt, +invisible from its flatness and its white paint. Then down the wind came +the boom of the great stanchion-gun; and after that sound another sound, +louder as it neared; a cry as of all the bells of Cambridge, and all +the hounds of Cottesmore; and overhead rushed and whirled the skein of +terrified wildfowl, screaming, piping, clacking, croaking, filling the +air with the hoarse rattle of their wings, while clear above all sounded +the wild whistle of the curlew, and the trumpet note of the great wild +swan. + +[Illustration: 9178] + +"They are all gone now. No longer do the ruffs trample the sedge into a +hard floor in their fighting-rings, while the sober reeves stand round +admiring the tournament of their lovers, gay with ears and tippets, +no two of them alike. Gone are ruffs and reeves, spoonbills, bitterns, +avosets; the very snipe, one hears, disdains to breed. Gone, too, not +only from Whittlesea but from the whole world, is that most exquisite +of English butterflies, _Lycaena dispar_--the great copper; and many a +curious insect more. Ah, well, at least we shall have wheat and mutton +instead, and no more typhus and ague; and, it is to be hoped, no more +brandy-drinking and opium-eating; and children will live and not die. +For it was a hard place to live in, the old Fen; a place wherein one +heard of 'unexampled instances of longevity,' for the same reason that +one hears of them in savage tribes--that few lived to old age at all, +save those iron constitutions which nothing could break down." * + + * Prose Idylls, New and Old, by Rev. Charles Kingsley. + +One of the most characteristic walks in the Fen country is that from +Peakirk (St. Pega Kirk), a station on the Peterborough and Spalding +line, to Crowland. The road runs along the top of a high bank, raised so +as to be above the reach of the inundations. On either hand a flat and +dreary plain stretches to the horizon. It is intersected by ditches +filled with black stagnant water and fringed by aquatic plants, amongst +which the yellow iris is prominent. Here and there a farm-house, +approached by an avenue of pollard-willows, and surrounded by a few +acres of well-cultivated land, breaks in upon the monotony of the scene. +Elsewhere the vegetation is rank and coarse but abundant, upon which +droves of horses and cattle thrive. A perpetual chorus of croaking from +innumerable frogs in the marshes accompanies the pedestrian on his way, +to which the sweet notes of the sedge-warbler and other small birds form +an exquisite accompaniment. + +[Illustration: 0180] + +In the winter, when the fens are flooded and frozen over, the scene is +one of rare interest and excitement. The clear sharp ring of the skates +on the ice, the merry shouts of the skaters, the stir and bustle of a +district usually so dull and stagnant, the feats of agility and skill +displayed by a peasantry to skate a mile in two minutes, but without +success, though he is said to have only exceeded the two minutes by two +seconds. + +[Illustration: 8181] + +The ordinary pace of a fast skater is one mile in three and a half +or four minutes." He who is so fortunate as to see one of the great +skating-revels of these eastern counties under the glowing light of +a sunrise or a sunset will not easily forget it--for the sunrises and +sunsets of the Fen country are of incomparable splendour. It is an error +to suppose that the dry pure atmosphere of Southern Europe is favourable +to these magnificent effects of colour. Some of the finest sunsets I +have ever seen have been when walking westward along Oxford Street on a +frosty evening. The clouds of smoke and mist hanging over the great city +have become suffused with a glory of crimson and purple and amber with +which no Italian sky can compare. So in the Fen country, the clouds and +fogs driven inland from the sea, and the humid vapours exhaled from the +soil, glow with all imaginable hues in the light of the setting sun. The +cold colourless landscape reflects the radiance and is tinged with the +colours of the sky; the skaters as they glide swiftly past through the +golden haze seem like actors in some fairy spectacle. + +[Illustration: 0182] + +Before the reclamation of the fens, the swamps and meres which covered +so large a portion of the soil were the haunt of innumerable wild fowl, +which were the source of considerable profit to the fensmen. Of late +years their numbers have greatly diminished, but the London market is +still largely supplied from this district. Flat-bottomed boats screened +by reeds so as to resemble floating islands are fitted with heavy +duck-guns, from a single discharge of which dozens of birds sometimes +fall. One of the best duck-decoys remaining in East Anglia lies at a +short distance from the road midway between Peakirk and Crowland. A +small mere a few acres in extent forms the scene of operations. From +this run eight ditches, or "pipes," as they are locally called, ten +or twelve feet wide at the entrance, and about a hundred feet long, +diminishing to a narrow gutter at the end. They curve round so that only +a small part of the whole is visible from any point. They are inclosed +by walls of matted reeds and roofed over by nets. Tame ducks are trained +to lead the way into the mouths of the pipes, and are followed by +the wild fowl. Little dogs, of a white or red colour, enter the pipes +through holes made in the reed screens, gambol about inside for a minute +or two, come out again, and again show themselves a little higher up +the pipe. The wild fowl, though easily alarmed, are very curious and +inquisitive. They swim or fly forward to investigate this strange +phenomenon till they have gone too far to recede, when the net closes +upon them, and the whole flock is taken. + +[Illustration: 0183] + +In the days of yore, when this district resembled a great lake studded +with numerous islands fringed with willow groves, it was the seat +of numerous ecclesiastical establishments of great wealth and +influence--Peterborough, Crowland, Ely, Thorney, Spalding, Ramsey and +others. The insulated sites were favourable to the seclusion of the +cloister, the patches of land were exceedingly fertile, and the water +abounded with fish and wild fowl. On one of these Fen islands rose the +great Abbey of Crowland, the ruins of which come into view some miles +before we reach it. Its foundation goes back to Saxon times, and it was +repeatedly sacked by the Danes. Turketul, grandson of King Alfred, who +through four successive reigns had rendered important services to the +nation by his valour in the field and his wisdom in counsel, returning +from a journey to the North, found the abbey a ruin. Of the once +flourishing community only three monks remained to tell the story of +the massacre of their brethren and the destruction of their abbey by +the invaders. They accommodated their illustrious visitor to the best +of their ability amongst the fire-scathed walls of the church, and +entreated his intercession with the king for assistance. The interview +made a deep impression on his mind, and, reaching home, he astonished +his royal master by avowing his intention to become a monk. Accordingly +he caused proclamation to be made by public crier that he was anxious +to discharge his debts, and if he had wronged any man would restore +fourfold. Resigning all his offices, Turketul repaired to the Fens, +devoted himself to the rebuilding of the abbey and the restoration of +its fallen fortunes, became abbot, and there spent the remainder of his +days. + +[Illustration: 9184] + +A curious structure, known as Crowland Bridge, which stands in the +centre of the town, has greatly perplexed archaeologists, and given rise +to various legends. It consists of three semi-arches whose bases stand +equi-dis-tant from each other in the circumference of a circle and unite +in the centre. At the foot of one of the arches is a mutilated statue, +apparently holding an orb in the right hand. Local tradition declares +that three rivers ran through the three arches into an immense pit dug +to receive them, and that the statue represents Oliver Cromwell with a +penny roll in his hand! The most probable explanation of the remarkable +structure is that it was a high cross built to form a trysting-place for +the fens-men, who, when the Fens were flooded, might bring hither their +produce for sale in boats, and that the figure is St. Guthlac, the +founder and patron of the abbey. + +If East Anglia possesses little natural beauty, it is rich in historical +associations. Reference has already been made to the many noble ruins +of ancient ecclesiastical buildings throughout the Fen country. Their +traditional reputation has been handed down in an old rhyming legend: + + "Ramsey, the rich of gold and of fee, + Thorney, the flower of many a fair tree, + Crowland, the courteous of their meat and drink, + Spalding, the gluttons, as all men do think, + Peterborough the proud, as all men do say, + Sawtrey, by the way, that old abbey, + Gave more alms in one day than all they." + +[Illustration: 0185] + +It maybe doubted whether in any part of the world four such cathedrals +can be found in the same compass as Lincoln, Peterborough, Ely, and +Norwich. And it is certain that with the single and doubtful exception +of Oxford, no such magnificent collection of collegiate edifices exists +as those of Cambridge. "That long street which, beginning from the +Trumpington Road, skirts the magnificent Fitzwilliam Museum and the Pitt +Press; which passes by ancient Peterhouse and quaint St. Catherine on +one side; which is there known as King's Road and fronts the glories of +King's College, the Senate House, the Library, and Caius College; which +then in a darkening and narrow street, almost a very gorge, skirts the +old historic gateways of Trinity and St. John's, and afterwards emerges +past the chapel which is the latest architectural glory of Cambridge, +opposite the venerable round church and near the new buildings of the +Union--certainly in its long broken wavering line, this street may enter +into formidable competition with the High Street of Oxford or any of the +streets of the world. + +[Illustration: 0186] + +There are, moreover, several distinct features in which Cambridge is +unsurpassable. The wide silent old court of Trinity, with its babbling +fountain; the glorious structure of King's College; above all, that +exquisite scenery, a composition made up of many varying beauties known +as the "backs of the colleges are separate features to which Oxford can +hardly offer a parallel. As an Oxford poet has said:-- + + "Ah me! were ever river banks so fair, + Gardens so fit for nightingales as these? + Were ever haunts so meet for summer breeze, + Or pensive walk in evening's golden air? + Was ever town so rich in court and tower + To woo and win stray moonlight every hour?" * + + * From Oxford and Cambridge, their Memories and + Associations. Religious Tract Society. + +[Illustration: 0188] + +Among the cities of East Anglia, Norwich claims special mention. Though +a local couplet declares that-- + + "Caistor was a city when Norwich was none. + And Norwich was builded with Caistor stone." + +[Illustration: 8189] + +Yet the _parvenu_ upstart goes back to the time of the Roman occupation +of the island. It was the capital of the Saxon kingdom of East Anglia, +and for many centuries afterwards it held a prominent place in our +history. So early as the reign of Edward III. it was one of the great +centres of our manufacturing industry; the Flemish settlers having +here introduced or developed the woollen trade. In pre-reformation days +it was a stronghold of the Wyckliffites or Lollards, many of whom here +sealed their testimony with their blood. In 1531, Thomas Bilney was +added to the list of worthies who make up the Norwich Martyrology. +Probably no other provincial town in England has given so many eminent +names to the literature, science, and art of our country, from +Sir Thomas Browne, author of the _Religio Medici_, down to Harriet +Martineau. Even apart from these interesting associations, Norwich +itself deserves and will well repay a visit. + +[Illustration: 9189] + +Surrounded by wooded slopes and pleasant meadows and winding streams, +its streets full of quaint picturesque architecture, and dominated by +its noble castle and cathedral, few or none of our English cities offer +a more pleasing combination of urban and rural beauty. + +The tourist in search of the picturesque in East Anglia will do well to +include Yarmouth among his wanderings. + +Its surroundings indeed are as flat and uninteresting as possible. The +readers of David Copperfield will remember his description: "As we drew +a little nearer and saw the whole adjacent prospect lying in a straight +line under the sky, I hinted to Peggotty that a mound or so might have +improved it; and also that if the land had been a little more separated +from the sea, and that the town and the tide had not been quite so mixed +up like toast and water, it would have been nicer. But Peggotty said +with greater emphasis than usual, that we must take things as we found +them; and that for her part she was proud to call herself a Yarmouth +Bloater." + +[Illustration: 0190] + +But the town is a curious combination of English bustle and Dutch +quaintness. Its quay reminds the traveller of the Boomptjies of +Rotterdam; its "rows," only a few feet wide, with a narrow riband of +sky overhead, recall the narrow streets of Genoa; its vast fleet of +herring-boats discharging their silvery "harvest of the sea" at the +wharves, offer a spectacle almost unique in the world. Unlike Norwich +and many other neighbouring towns, Yarmouth has been the scene of no +important event in our history, nor has it contributed any illustrious +name to our list of worthies. A stained glass window in the parish +church, however, perpetuates the earthly memory of one whom Scripture +declares shall be "had in everlasting remembrance"--Sarah Martin, the +prison visitor. She was a poor dressmaker, without wealth or social +position, earning with difficulty a scanty subsistence by her needle, +yet doing a work comparable to that of John Howard or of Elizabeth +Fry. The great lesson of her life has been admirably inculcated by an +eloquent American preacher: + +[Illustration: 8191] + +"Here, on a lowly bed, in an English village by the sea,--fades out the +earthly life of one of God's humblest but noblest servants. Worn with +the patient care of deserted prisoners and malefactors in the town gaol +for twenty-four years of unthanked service, earning her bread with +her hands, and putting songs of worship on the lips of these penitent +criminals,--Bible and Prayer-book in his feeble hand, saying, at the +end, 'I have been the happiest of men, yet I feel that death will be +gain to me, through Christ who died for me.' + +[Illustration: 9191] + +"Blessed be God for the manifold features of triumphant faith!--that He +suffers His children to walk toward Him through ways so various in their +outward look--Sarah Martin; from her cottage bed, Earl Spencer from his +gorgeous couch, little children in their innocence, unpretending women +in the quiet ministrations of faithful love, strong and useful and +honoured men, whom suffering households and institutions and churches +mourn. All bending their faces towards the Everlasting Light, in one +faith, one cheering hope, called by one Lord, who has overcome the +world, and dieth no more! The sun sets; the autumn fades; life hastens +with us all. But we stand yet in our Master's vineyard. All the days of +our appointed time let us labour righteously, and pray and wait, till +our change come, that we may change only from virtue to virtue, from +faith to faith, and thus from glory to glory!" + +[Illustration: 0192] + +[Illustration: 0194] + + + + +ROUND ABOUT SOME INDUSTRIAL, CENTRES. + +[Illustration: 0195] + +|IT is not to the manufacturing districts of England that the traveller +in search of the picturesque would most naturally repair. To him they +are often a region of tall chimneys and squalid-looking habitations, +with a canopy of smoke above and black refuse of coal and iron on the +banks of polluted rivers below. Something of this impression is due to +the economy of railway companies, which, for the most part, have chosen +to enter great towns by their least attractive suburbs, where land is +cheapest. Hence, it is not from the carriage-windows of the train that +Leeds or Sheffield, Wolverhampton, Birmingham, or Manchester should be +judged. The traveller who will alight and explore may find a wealth of +natural beauty which would astonish him. + +Nowhere, perhaps, is the contrast--due chiefly, no doubt, to geological +structure--more apparent than on the edge of the "Black Country" +in Staffordshire. From Dudley Castle the views are more curiously +contrasted than in almost any other part of England. By night the whole +country is lighted up on one side by the flames from the furnaces, which +cover the country for many miles. By day the din of hammers and +the clank of wheels, the roar of traffic and the shriek of the +steam-whistles surge up, through the pall of smoke, upon the ear. +Descend, and between the ironworks and coalpits the ground is unsightly +with refuse heaps, while its frequent inequalities, and the bending, +tottering buildings, show it to be honeycombed with mines. Vegetation +is rare; what there is, is blackened and stunted; black also are the +outsides of churches, chapels, schools. For inhabitants of such a +district to gain any sense of natural beauty, they must be able at +frequent intervals to escape; and, happily, to do this is within the +reach of most. Railway communication with every part of England is +constant and easy; and to know the difference that a few miles' journey +will make in the scene, one has only to reascend to Dudley Castle, where +it lies in the midst of its fair wooded domain.. Look from it to the +north, east, or south, and all is smoke and flame; but turn to the west, +and though the traces of unresting labour are still discernible, they +soon give way to a country of richly diversified charm: glimpses are +obtained of the beautiful valley of the Severn, the Wrekin towers +grandly not many miles away, and the Malvern hills are dim and blue in +the distance. + +In other manufacturing centres, if the contrast is not so marked, yet +there is a similar accessibility to many a sequestered and lovely scene. +The nearness of the wildest and grandest Derbyshire scenery to busy, +unromantic Manchester has been pointed out in a previous chapter; and +the neighbourhood of the great Yorkshire centres of industry is full of +picturesque beauty. A little way out of Leeds, for instance, where the +Liverpool Canal passes over an embankment near to the river Aire, may +be found the scene of one of Turner's most charming sketches; and though +the locality bears evident marks of the great industrial invasion, much +of the beauty still remains. In the same valley, not far off, are the +stately ruins of Kirkstall Abbey, while the broad reach of river that +encloses it, and the green meadows on the bank, with the low wooded +heights on either side of the valley, suggest the memories of a day when +the surroundings of the old ecclesiastical building were such as the +monks most dearly loved; while Esholt Hall, some few miles higher up +the river, at the extremity of a noble avenue of elm trees, was, in +its time, a nunnery on low-lying ground, circled by an amphitheatre of +hills, in a vale even now rich and beautiful, and which once must have +seemed the very abode of tranquillity and peace. + +It is, indeed, no small boon to the artizans of Leeds, Bradford, and +many other crowded hives of industry in this part of England, that they +are within so easy a distance of scenes which, in natural beauty, may +vie with almost any in the land. Ivirkstall, as we have said, is close +by the former town; and its grounds are thronged on every holiday by +busy workers, who, whether intent or not on learning the appropriate +lesson from the mouldering walls and tower, are at least fully alive to +the advantages of fresh air, and of wide scope and range for healthful +amusement. The like may be said of other places, lying only a little +further off. There is Roundhay Park, for instance, one of the most +splendid domains in England, now, through the wise liberality of the +Leeds Corporation, the property of the people; while the public parks +of many other towns, as Bradford, Halifax, Barnsley, with Manchester, +Liverpool, Blackburn, gratify not only the instinct for recreation, but +the desire for beauty. + +[Illustration: 0197] + +Or again, our traveller, in his pause at Leeds, may take the opportunity +of visiting Ilkley, with its fine open moorland, where the brain-wearied +worker may range at will. Then, a little way beyond Ilkley, lie the fair +woods and noble heights encircling Bolton Abbey, where the Wharfe comes +down, as yet unpolluted, from the moorland beyond; while the form of the +White Doe of Rylstone, or the memory of the ill-fated heir of Egremont, +seems yet to haunt the scene. + +A little further again, our astonished friend comes upon a _Clapham +Junction_, but it is amid the silence of the hills! Ingleborough, with +its marvellous caves, too little known, with its companion heights, +Pen-y-gant and Whernside, rise from the valley: and every path is full +of beauty, especially that which leads into the heart of Craven, where +bold limestone scars, deep glens, and upland moors, with one deep, +lonely tarn, dear alike to dreamers and to anglers, yield a succession +of pictures, of which, among their many charms, not the least is their +easy accessibility from the neighbourhood of clanking mills and inky +streams. For Ilkley, Bolton, Harrogate, Craven, Clapham may all be +reached by the busy worker of Leeds or Bradford, and much of their +beauty enjoyed, in the leisure of a summer Saturday afternoon, or on a +"Bank holiday." He who would be free from excursionists, with their loud +talk, their demonstrative ways, their baskets and their bottles, must go +another time; but even in those holiday-hours there is much to interest. +The "trippers" may be an interruption to the dreamer, an annoyance to +the sensitive; but it is good that people whose lives are usually so +hard-pressed and monotonous should have the means of ennobling enjoyment +within easy reach; and though occasionally there may be an element of +roughness or even intemperance in the recreation, we should be unjust +were we not to record our impression, from what we have often seen, +that there is a decided improvement in these respects, and that the free +access to hill and moor, to fine scenery and pure air, has its part in +checking those vices which spring up like evil weeds in the unwholesome +dwellings of a crowded population. + +[Illustration: 0198] + +The "Excursion Season," no doubt, has its drawbacks in Lancashire, +Yorkshire, London, and everywhere else. There are holidays that depress +rather than invigorate: the spirit of self-indulgence may adopt the +pretext of needed recreation, and the Lord's day is too often heedlessly +or wilfully disregarded; but on the whole it is good that God's fair +world should be thrown open to all who can enjoy its beauties; and that, +as we have seen, some of its richest beauties should lie at the very +threshold of the hardest workers in the most unromantic scenes. + +[Illustration: 8199] + +The topic is almost inexhaustible; and the selection of places to be +visited in reasonable time, from these "centres of industry," would be +invidious to make. A little way beyond Leeds, as every one knows, lies +Harrogate, the high table-land where medicinal waters have for long +generations given to the place the fame of a true "city of Hygeia," +while we ourselves would still give the chief credit to the +invigorating, stimulating air, and to the almost inexhaustible interest +of the neighbourhood, occupying the mind of the visitor with a round of +healthful delights. The visit to Studley Park and Fountains Abbey +will probably rank among the chief of these. Again, as in the cases of +Kirkstall and Bolton, reverting to the past, we admire the taste and +wisdom shown by the cowled brotherhoods in mediaeval times, in their +choice of dwelling-places. Something, indeed, of the beauty which we now +see may have been the result of their assiduous culture. It was part +of their work to "make the wilderness to smile;" but they had a rare +faculty for lighting upon scenes which, if not already beautiful, +possessed an evident capability for becoming so. At Fountains +both nature and art seem to vie with each other; and in the modern +arrangement of the domain, the art may occasionally be the more +apparent. The artistic yields to the artificial; the ruins have been +maintained at the due stage of picturesqueness by careful oversight and +repair; and the carefully prepared "surprise," which awaits the visitor +at one stage of his progress through the grounds, is too theatrical to +permit even one of the fairest of pictures to have its full effect. But, +perhaps, all this is hypercritical, and, with every deduction, this old +Cistercian abbey is one of the most beautiful, as it is one of the most +complete mediaeval monastic buildings in England. The tower, unlike that +of its sister abbey at Kirkstall, is little impaired by the ravages +of time, the plan of the edifice is easy to be traced; and the light +pillars and lofty arches of the Ladye Chapel give to the whole a +finishing touch of stateliness and grace. Then how pleasant to wander +through the noble avenues of Studley, to gaze upwards to the gigantic +spruce firs, or to climb the mound where linger the decaying forms of +the rugged yew trees--remnants, it is said, of the "seven sisters" that +spread their shade over the founders of the abbey, more than six hundred +years ago! + +[Illustration: 9200] + +Still pursuing our way northwards, we reach the country of the Yorkshire +Dales, where the Swale, passing by Richmond, the Tees, on the edge of +Durham, and many smaller streams, descend from the eastern slope of the +Westmoreland moors. Both abound in wild and charming scenery: the upper +Tees-dale especially is singularly impressive. The river runs in +its deep rocky bed through alpine-looking green meadows, with clean +whitewashed cottages scattered here and there. Trees there are few or +none, except a small kind of fir; and in place of hedges, low stone +walls mark the boundaries of the fields. About five or six miles +below its source, there forms the striking waterfall "High Force," +tumbling over a black basaltic precipice, fifty feet high; while yet +higher up the stream, where it issues from a gloomy tarn on the edge +of the Westmoreland moors, descending for some two hundred feet over a +steep, irregular staircase, so to speak, of basalt, the weird wildness +of the scene, in the midst of its hilly amphitheatre, approaches +sublimity. Caldron Snout is the quaint name of this unique rapid, and +the curious in geology, as well as the lover of the picturesque, will be +well repaid by a visit. + +But by this time we have wandered some distance from our manufacturing +centres. If, however, we have left the Yorkshire district behind, we are +approaching the yet more black and busy coal districts. + +[Illustration: 0201] + +Teesdale itself has two sets of associations, and the same stream, whose +rocks and dales are so romantic in its earlier course, becomes, by +the time it reaches Stockton, a broad and inky flood, and so passes +by Middlesborough--that wonderfully progressive seat of the iron +manufacture--to the sea. We now pass on from town to town along the +coast, each busier, blacker than the last, but with glimpses of rich +beauty between, while the city of Durham, as seen from the rail, is one +of the noblest views of rock and river, cathedral, castle, and town, on +which the traveller's eye has ever rested. This river is the Weir; +then the Tyne is reached, and Newcastle, the "capital of the north," is +entered over its splendid High-Level Bridge. + +We can imagine no better route for a pedestrian excursion than the way +from Denton Hall to Thirlwall Castle--about thirty-four miles; or, if +the tourist wishes to see the whole, let him put Dr. Bruce's Condensed +Guide and an Ordnance map into his knapsack, devote a week to the +exploration, and proceed by leisurely stages from Wallsend, on the Tyne, +to Bowness, on the Solway, a distance of seventy-three miles and a half. + +But our chief object in visiting these great centres of industry is to +explore their neighbourhoods. Few towns in England are better worth a +prolonged visit than Newcastle-upon-Tyne; but its attraction to us now +is, that we can, at so short a distance from its busy streets, place +ourselves amid rural scenes of surpassing interest, as well on their own +account as for their historical associations. + +[Illustration: 0202] + +First and foremost, of course, there is the Roman Wall, with its long +line of remains, still magnificent, and so varied from place to place, +while the scenery that surrounds them is so striking, that sea to sea +classic ground. + +[Illustration: 0203] + +A stranger might suppose that, after the lapse of long centuries, all +these works, granting their existence once, must have disappeared. It is +not so: save in the western portion, there is scarcely an acre without +distinct traces; in many places all the lines sweep on together, parts +in wondrous preservation; while many of the recent excavations present +structures several feet high, giving one the idea of works in progress, +so fresh that we are tempted to think of the builders as away but for an +hour, perhaps to the noonday meal. To traverse the line of the wall is +to pass along one continuous platform, whence the visitor revels in a +succession of glorious panoramas. + +Returning to the busy east coast, very charming is the transition from +the Tyne to the Coquet, loveliest of Northumbrian streams, as it flows +down, interesting glimpses into the past opened up at every stage. Few +persons, indeed, who have not visited the scene, have any notion of the +variety and value of the remains which have withstood the wear and tear +of sixteen centuries, during a great part of which period the wall was +used as a quarry by the dwellers in the district. + +[Illustration: 8203] + +In many places the traveller, especially if aided by some competent +guide, may discern the whole outline of the structure. It consisted +of seven parts, viz., the Roman Wall proper, comprising ditch on the +extreme northern side; (1) the military road; then the earthwork, +consisting of (2) a wall; then (3) a space more or less wide from +thirty feet to half-a-mile, middle of vallum, along of (4) a mound, or +rampart, the largest of three; (5) a second ditch; (6) another mound, +the smallest; and (7) yet another mound. The following section exhibits +all in one view. Nor is this all, at every three or four miles we have +fortified camps of several acres each, at every mile a castle, and +between the castles watch-towers. Moreover, there are roads and bridges, +traces of villas, gardens, and burial-places, making almost every inch +from Thirlmoor, on the verge of the Cheviots, at the foot of heathery +hills and through richly wooded vales, to Rothbury--already a famous +place of resort from the district, and evidently destined to become +more frequented from its surpassing beauty of situation, encircled by +romantic hills, with the bright river running swiftly between. + +[Illustration: 0204] + +Thence the Coquet descends in many a winding by scenes of the richest +sylvan loveliness to Warkworth, renowned for its hermitage, which is +still, as the old Percy ballad describes it, "deep hewn within a craggy +cliff, and overhung with wood." And so we reach the sea, where Coquet +Island, with its lighthouse, lies amid the gleaming waters, scarcely +suggesting, as we gaze upon it in the fair sunshine, how terribly the +storm sometimes there rages, or how those dark rocks are chafed by the +angry billows! + +But for the full splendour of cliff and ocean scenery we journey still +a little northward, and come to Dunstanborough Castle. Here a dark ridge +of basalt rises in pillared form sheer from the sea, and in the words of +Alarmion, "the whitening breakers," surging with ceaseless thunder into +the caves which pierce the cliffs, "sound near," + + "As boiling through the rocks they roar + On Dunstanborough's caverned shore." + +[Illustration: 0205] + +The view from the "Lilburn's Tower" in this ruined castle, commanding +landwards the broad purple moors, extending in many an undulation to the +rounded Cheviots, glimmering blue in the distance, and looking seawards +over the restless ocean, beating ever at the foot of the black columns, +while sea-birds are ceaselessly wheeling in mid air with shrill +outcries, not unfairly vies with the wild magnificence of Tintagel, as +described in our earlier pages. + +The two coast scenes are, perhaps, unequalled in the British Islands: +the difference is that, while the Cornish scene lies in far-away +seclusion, this of Northumberland is close by one of the chief lines of +traffic, and within accessible distance of crowded populations. Yet even +Cornwall is a great industrial centre. Its mining industries are never +far away from us. Its wildest cliffs are pierced by shafts and adits +leading down, as in the Botallack Mine, to labyrinthine passages far +under the bed of the sea, where the miners can hear overhead the rush of +the waves and the grinding together of the huge boulders. + +We have now reached the limit of our purpose, which was to show how near +to the doors of the million is some of the most striking scenery of +our land. Else from Dunstanborough Castle we could have pursued our way +northwards at least as far as Bamborough Castle, not so much for the +sake of admiring its noble ramparts and towers--once a fortress, now a +temple of charity--or of gazing again upon the glories of cliff and sea, +as of looking out across the waters to those rocky isles which, in our +own time, have witnessed one of those deeds of unconscious heroism which +do honour to our nature. For it was from one of those sea-beaten crags +that, on the 5th of September, 1838, Grace Darling set forth upon her +errand of mercy amid the raging waters, to rescue the survivors of the +shipwrecked Forfarshire. "Her musical name," it has been said, "is the +burden of a beautiful story of that love of man which is the love of +Christ translated into human language and deeds." Four years after that +great exploit the brave and gentle maiden died of consumption, brought +on, it is said, by a visit to her brother, keeper of the lighthouse on +Coquet Island: but she has left among our island race an imperishable +name. Let us conclude these random rovings by a visit to her monument +in Bamborough churchyard. Her figure lies as it were in slumber, an oar +upon her shoulder, beneath a Gothic canopy, within sight and hearing of +the waves. On the bright day of our visit the waves were murmuring and +sparkling far below: the craggy islets in the distance were touched with +sunlight, and we turned away, reminded less of the heroism that braved +the storm, than of the heavenly home and the everlasting rest. "I saw +a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth +were passed away; and there was no more sea." + +[Illustration: 0206] + + + + +SNOWDONIA AND SOUTH WALES. + +|Some of the holiday excursions which live most pleasantly in memory, +are those short "runs" of three or four days, to the mountain or the +sea, which, it may be, some unexpected holiday has enabled us to take, +or some "happy thought" has suggested as likely to be beneficial to mind +and body. The amount of enjoyment that can be compressed into so brief +a space of time is quite wonderful, provided only the place of visit be +wisely chosen, the days long, and the weather suitable. + +In one such little tour, so full of interest that it is hard to believe +it to have extended only from Tuesday morning to Friday afternoon, we, +some years ago, made our first acquaintance with Snowdon. Starting from +Caernarvon before breakfast, we walked to Llanberis, by a road leading +gradually upwards beside a wild mountain torrent, till the lake from +which it issues was reached, and the impression of the mountain grandeur +first fully felt. + +The ascent of Snowdon has been so often described, that we need only say +it was unexpectedly easy. The beauty of the path with which it began, up +the bank of a mountain torrent ending in a strange and lovely waterfall, +beguiled the first portion of the way, and the latter part opened up +continually such glorious views, that the fatigue was lightened, if the +progress was a little impeded, by long pauses of admiration. At length +we reached Moel-y-Wyddfa, "the far-seen summit," and were upon the +highest spot in England and Wales. + +[Illustration: 0208] + +[Illustration: 0209] + +Of the near prospect the chief wonder, to us, was the number of lakes, +or llyns, visible. For this we were unprepared, and the endlessly +diversified outline of these gleaming pools contrasted strikingly with +the dark mountain masses amid which they lay. The distant views were at +first very clear--Skiddaw (so said our guide) in the north, the Isle of +Man in the west, appearing like a shadow on a sunlit sea, Cader Idris +and Plinlimmon in the south, with the valleys lying green among the +hills, and here and there the line of some sparkling stream, while the +habitations of man were dwarfed to insignificance, or indicated only by +dim patches, as of smoke hanging in the air. Suddenly a chilling breeze +passed across the mountain top, and we were glad to find shelter in one +of the little huts which crown--we will not say adorn--the peak. As +the mists now began to gather, it was judged time to descend. The path, +little more than eight feet wide, lay along one of the narrowest spurs +of the mountain, while on both sides are tremendous precipices. To walk +over this path in clear, calm weather would be a trial to the nerves; +but now the mists were seething and whirling below, ever and anon +rapidly parting, so as to disclose glimpses of bare rocks apparently +rising out of an ocean of cloud, or miniature meadows of sunny green +at unknown depths, or, strangest of all, leaden-coloured lakelets, each +enclosed by its bank of fog. It was a weird scene, and though the path +itself was tolerably free from mist, the sight of these abysses on +either hand, suggesting the consequences of a slip, kept us all very +quiet, very wary in our steps; and we were thankful when we reached the +point where the mountain spur expands into a broad, safe, though steep +and rugged, hill. Here we descended swiftly, and soon found ourselves +upon the turnpike road to Beddgelert, our destination. + +This level dell, set in the midst of mountains, which rise on all sides, +clothed at their base with rich woods, and then towering upwards, +bare and rugged against the sky, surpassed all our expectations by the +magnificence of its environment. The faithful hound, so well known in +the stories of many lands, has here a tomb, in the very midst of the +valley, overhung by a group of willows. Perhaps the legend is but a +myth; it exists, we are told, in Persian, and in the dialects of India. +The story as it stands is not only affecting, but contains a noble +lesson; and it was in no sceptical spirit that we read Southey's fine +ballad over again, at the traditionary scene of the incident. We ended +the day by a stroll up to Pont Aberglaslyn, that most romantic of +defiles, the only defect of which is, that it is too short. The road +leads on one side by the "blue torrent," which dashes through the pass +with headlong, tremendous force; on the other by towering mountain +sides, clothed with lichen and a scanty covering of mosses and shrubs. A +marked feature in these rocks is the evident trace of glacier action, +to which Dr. Buckland has called attention by a memorandum in his +own handwriting, framed and glazed, in the hotel. The bridge at the +extremity of the pass, carrying the old road to Tan-y-bwlch, has been +thus described by Miss Costello: "There, forty feet above the river, +hangs in air apparently, just touching the two mountains, a one-arched +bridge, clothed with a robe of ivy, whose festoons wave to and fro, as +if the action of her leap had disturbed the drapery of some nymph, whose +form had hardened into stone as she performed the wondrous feat. Below, +beyond, around, the waters rave and foam and rush, and here for the +first time I recognised the beautiful colour, familiar to my eye in the +Pyrenees, which has given the name of the 'Blue Pool' to this lovely +spot." The scene was one in which to rest and muse after the exertions +and excitements of the morning; the only disturbance of the quiet being +the pertinacity of the little sellers of spar and rock fragments, or +these failing, of woollen socks, with equal readiness to sing us a +song, if no purchasers could be found for their other wares! It must in +fairness be added that the song was "sweet and low," and harmonised well +with the now gathering twilight, and the sound of rushing waters. + +[Illustration: 0211] + +The next day's expedition must be more briefly narrated. Somewhat tired +by the mountain climbing, we were content with a quiet walk up Nant +Gwynant, descending by the eastern half of the Pass of Llanberis to +Cape! Curig, and thence, beside the river Lugwy, to Bettws-y-Coed. Two +lakes, passed soon after leaving Beddgelert, are of the most exquisite +beauty, and the views of Snowdon, opened up a little beyond them, are of +splendour unsurpassed. + +Reaching Pen-y-gwryd a little below the head of the Llanberis Pass, we +pursued a route of a totally different character to Capel Curig. For the +luxuriant beauty of Nant Gwynant we had now the sublimity of bare rock +and crag; but there was something, we must suppose, uncongenial with our +mood in the bleakness of the scene; at any rate, this part of the pass +disappointed us. We have since found that the true grandeur of the +defile is in the other, or western part, between Pen-y-gwryd and +Llanberis. The rest at Capel Curig was specially welcome, and thence +there was no want of interest in the route, on the bank of the romantic +Lugwy. The Swallow waterfall must by all means be visited, repelled as +is the true lover of nature by all those little arrangements that make +the place a show--the urchin who points out the locked gate, for fear +it should be missed, the keen-eyed dame with the keys, the guide to the +torrent s brink, apparently solicitous lest any visitor should discover +for himself the chief points of view, the miscellaneous guard of +children, with a general expectancy of coppers. + +[Illustration: 0214] + +All this we did not like; and yet nothing could well be finer than the +plunge of the river, with roar and foam, over the vast mass of rocks, +slanting in rugged, picturesque confusion from the summit to the foot +of the fall, and breaking the stream in its descent into numberless +cascades and tiny rapids. The picture is one of marvellous diversity, +and when the river is swollen by rain the rush and roar are tremendous. + +Our day's journey was nearly over, and another hours walk, or a little +mure, brought us to that "paradise of painters," the Royal Oak at Bettws +y-Coed. Happily there was room for us, though the inn seemed crowded by +artists--many of them men of world-wide reputation--who come again and +again to this fair valley, always to find something new in form or +colour, light or shade. The next day was spent in rambling about the +neighbourhood; and almost everywhere we found artists at work with easel +and umbrella. Pont-y-pair was to us as an old friend, so often had we +seen its semblance in exhibition-rooms and books of "landscape scenery." +Few subjects, indeed, could be more adapted to the painter. + +[Illustration: 0215] + +But if this bridge, with its many lovely points of view, struck us with +a sense of familiarity, we were startled, as well as delighted, by the +exceeding beauty of the Fairies' Glen. A tributary stream here comes +down to the Lugwy between high wooded banks, and over mossy rocks, which +at many points can easily be crossed; the course of the rapid crystal +stream for a long distance is almost straight, and the perspective from +below is singularly fine. + +The holiday, rich as it had been in delights, was now almost over, and +the last day was mainly spent in a water excursion, which a railway, +since constructed, has rendered less familiar, but which even yet we +venture to commend. The pretty little town of Llanrwst being passed, we +pursued a pleasant road between the river Conway on one side and bosky +cliffs on the other, as far as Trefriw, where a small steamer was +waiting the turn of the tide to proceed down the river to Conway town. +The sail on a fine day is one of the most charming of excursions, the +scenery on both sides being of much interest, and the quiet rest on +board the steamer being very agreeable after three days' walking and +climbing. + +[Illustration: 0216] + +From Trefriw, we were told, a very short excursion, up to Llyn +Geirionydd, would have brought us to one of the very finest points of +view in all North Wales, the range of Snowdon, and the scarcely less +imposing Moel Siabod, being thence seen in all their majesty. But it is +always at once a regret and an alleviation, in leaving beautiful scenes, +that much is left unvisited--regret that so many fair scenes have been +missed, alleviation, because the very fact may form so good a reason +some day for revisiting the place! As it was, with some time at our +disposal after reaching Conway, we visited the splendid ruins of the +castle, then went by rail to Llandudno, and after a hasty glance at the +promenade by the bay, finished the memorable four days' visit to Wales +by a bracing walk of six miles, round the Great Orme's Head on the path +overlooking the sea. + +The holiday had been so successful, that on the next similar opportunity +it occurred to us to spend the few days at command in South Wales. We +are bound, however, to confess that the charm was felt to be inferior. + +Possibly we expected another Snowdonia, and so deserved to be +disappointed. Nature does not repeat herself, and though the heights +of Plinlimmon are commanding when attained, we do not recommend the +traveller whose time is precious to traverse the intolerably circuitous +path, amid bogs and morasses, which leads him wearily at last to the +summit. The fresh breeze, and the wide prospect from the mountain's +top are, to some extent, a compensation for the toil; while it is +interesting to explore the sources of some of the many rivers which +descend from the mighty store of waters embosomed in this hill--the +Severn and the Wye being chief. But the longing for the beautiful was +unsatisfied until we reached Pont-y-Mynach, the Monk's P>ridge; better +known, perhaps, as "the Devil's Bridge." The former name denotes the +fact that the monks of Strata Florida Abbey constructed the bridge: +the latter, we suppose, expresses the simple wonder of the rustics, who +could not conceive the daring work as wrought by any power less than +supernatural. Why should they have taken for granted that the power was +evil? We presume that the explanation is to be found in the sense of +terror excited by the fury and the roar of the torrent. There is an awe +akin to joy: a solemn yet glad uplifting of the soul, as at the sight +of the starry heavens; and who could attribute the splendours of the +firmament to any but a beneficent Creator? But amid the wilder scenes +of this earth, there is not only the mere feeling of danger, but a dread +which oppresses the spirit--a "fear that hath torment,"--an instinctive +sense of sin, which has led men in such localities to imagine a +_malignant_ spirit at work. + +A little way beyond the bridge are the falls of the Rheidol--a series +of cascades, perhaps the most picturesque in Wales, not from the mass of +water so much as from the magnificence of the narrow, rocky ravine, with +its wealth of foliage. Perhaps the charms of this fair glen, with the +comforts of the splendidly-placed hotel above, were heightened by the +recollection of the long morning among the morasses of Plinlimmon; but +our feeling as we sat at eventide watching the sunset, and listening +to the roar of waters, was to surrender all the rest of our brief +excursion, and to give ourselves there to the _dolce far niente_ of +three long summer days! + +South Wales is so conveniently intersected with railways, that it +is almost too easy for the tourist to pass from point to point. The +preceding day, on a south-easterly slope of Plinlimmon, we had stood at +the source of the Wye, and the desire possessed us to trace the progress +of that river for awhile, to see if in its early meanderings it had +the beauty which we knew so well to belong to it in its later and more +familiar course. The excursion was not a disappointing one. It leads +through some of the most primitive of Welsh districts: Builth, which in +due time we reached, appeared quaint and attractive, and Talgarth, +where our long walk was finished, might have tempted us, under other +circumstances, to a longer stay, to explore the "Black Mountains," a +wonderfully fine range of hills, girt with woods, pierced by lovely +glens, and extending in ranges of lofty moorland for many miles. + +[Illustration: 8218] + +A short railway journey now brought us to Brecon, so nobly placed in the +midst of its mountain amphitheatre as to invite a longer stay: but we +had to hurry on, anxious to reach the far-famed Vale of Neath. A very +wild walk led upwards for many weary miles, as it seemed, from Brecon to +Maen Llia, the "Llia Stone," near which is the source of the Llia, one +of the streams whose confluence form the Neath. Descending rapidly, we +soon came to the point where the Llia is joined from the north-east by +the Dringarth, another confluent. + +[Illustration: 9218] + +At Y-strad-fellte, a little further on, the glory of the mountain vale +began to open out. We passed under the shadow of the crags to the +east, as far as to the spot where, at a break in the rocky rampart, the +Hepste, another tributary, hurries to meet the stream, forming a fine +waterfall. At Crag-y-Dinas, a huge limestone rock, commanding from its +summit both the upper glen and the lower valley as far as Swansea Bay, +the beauty of the scene is at its height. Hardly any combination +of scenery could be richer in its exquisite variety. The road +now lay between these united streams and the Neath proper, which soon +is joined from the western side by the Pyrrdin, up whose rocky glen we +turned for the sake of its two charming cascades, the "Lady's" and the +"Crooked" Fall. + +[Illustration: 8219] + +In fact, the whole neighbourhood teems with cataracts, many of exceeding +beauty, and a day might well be spent in exploring the rocky dingles, +through which the hurrying streams descend, until at Pont-Nedd-fechan, +"the Little Bridge of Neath," they meet and mingle in one. + +The bridge is of one arch, thrown across the ravine near the point of +confluence; it is festooned with drooping ivy, which almost reaches the +surface of the stream, and in its secluded loveliness this little Welsh +Lauterbrunnen, a village of many waters among the hills, may fairly +compare with many scenes far better known to fame. + +The route down the valley to the town of Neath and the port of Briton +Ferry, is rich in varied beauty. The river runs between the high +road and the railway, with, in some part of its course, a canal. The +surrounding hills are lovely in outline and richly wooded; and until +we reach the seats of industry near the port, the water, lying in long +reaches, or hurrying over its rocky bed, is crystal-clear. At a former +time Briton Ferry was lovely beyond almost any other seaside resort. +The river, here expanded to a noble breadth, flowed between lofty wooded +cliffs to an open bay. The surrounding hills were crowned with noble +oaks, and the romantic little village, protected from the north and +east, had all the attractions not only of its own exceeding beauty, but +of a mild climate, and of air exceptionally pure. All this is changed! + +[Illustration: 0220] + +Coal, copper, iron dominate the scene. The cliffs and the climate are +there, and Swansea Bay is beautiful in calm or storm: but the oaks have +fallen, the nooks and elens in the hills have become squalid in their +bareness, the streams are polluted, the air is murky; but the docks are +admirable, and the place is "rising rapidly." There is a divineness in +man's industry, as well as in nature's beauty. + + "The old order yieldeth, giving place to new, + And God fulfils Himself in many ways." + +We hurry away from the coalfields to where Carmarthen stands high on +Towy bank, grandly overlooking the course of the river to the sea. +Of the bay named from this ancient capital, the most beautiful part, +perhaps, is where Tenby, from its rocky promontory, overlooks the sea. +As we terminated our little tour in North Wales at Llandudno, so here +at Tenby we bade farewell to the southern part of the Principality. But +before leaving there was time for one little excursion along the coast, +superb beyond all our expectation, especially for the first few miles, +where the mountain limestone fronts the sea with bold, cave-pierced +cliff. Our ramble terminated at Manor-beer Castle, one of the most +extensive and complete of feudal fortresses in Great Britain. Perhaps +there is no ruin of the kind in which the arrangements for residence as +well as for defence can be so clearly traced, and certainly there are +few which more nobly command the shore below. + +But our brief excursion was over. Some of the most picturesque parts +of South Wales were, perforce, left unvisited--especially Tintern, that +loveliest of British abbeys. Yet much had been seen to quicken the sense +of beauty; while the glimpse of busy industry given us along the south +coast, had quickened our desire to learn something more of the great +population gathered by its docks and ports, its mines and furnaces. For +it is the human interest which, wherever we may travel, must gradually +become supreme, and nowhere more truly than in South Wales. The heroism +often manifested in the midst of lowliest toil was never more strikingly +illustrated than in a recent incident which has made the name of +Pontypridd a household word in England. All know the story of the +imprisoned miners, and the men who bravely volunteered to rescue them, +daring the peril of compressed air, inflammable gas, and the pent-up +floods of water. "Four men"--let the tale never be forgotten at British +firesides!--"from one o'clock in the afternoon of Thursday the 19th +of April, 1877, until three o'clock in the afternoon of the next day, +worked on amid all these accumulated dangers until the rescue of their +comrades was complete. Twenty-two others were only second to those four +men--eleven in taking an actual share in the work of cutting through +the barrier of coal, and eleven others in constant presence and +superintendence. It was an intense exercise of self-devotion, patience, +and deliberate courage--a concentration, as it were, of qualities which +could only be acquired by the habitual exercise of these qualities in +every-day life, and perhaps their cultivation through many generations." +Happily they were successful, and the nation feels it to be but a worthy +recognition of such heroism, that a new order of merit, instituted to do +honour to gallantry in saving life on land, has been inaugurated by the +gift of "the Albert Medal" to those Welsh colliers. Never has decoration +been better earned! "Not the least satisfaction, however, of those who +receive it ought to be, that they have been the means of drawing public +attention and public honour to the whole class of brave and unselfish +deeds of which they have furnished one of the most conspicuous of +instances. There are no signs that the struggle of civilisation with +nature will cease to demand its victims. The progress of mankind still +depends, and must long depend, upon the bravery and unselfishness with +which unknown perils are encountered; and, perhaps, as science opens up +further fields of experiment and investigation, still bolder adventures +may be demanded. It was but right that the stamp of national honour +should be formally placed upon all such deeds; and the Welsh miners +deserve the thanks, not merely of their comrades, but of their country, +for having established in public esteem a new and permanent order of +merit." * + + * _The Times_, August 8, 1877. + +[Illustration: 0222] + + + + +THE ISLE OF WIGHT. + +[Illustration: 0224] + +[Illustration: 0225] + +|SIR Walter Scott somewhere speaks of the Isle of Wight as a "beautiful +island, which he who once sees never forgets, through whatever part of +the wide world his future path may lead him." Whether this description +be over-coloured or no, it is certain that there is hardly any spot of +English ground so well adapted for a ramble of three or four days. There +cannot be a more charming excursion than a cruise round "the Island," +as inhabitants of the neighbouring counties fondly call it, when the +atmosphere is clear, and light breezes stir the water, without raising +it to roughness. The Solent, with its richly varied shores, and its +flotilla of white-sailed yachts, is first traversed: then round the +Needles we meet the open sea, gazing as we pass by at the quaint, almost +grotesque, forms of those pointed chalk pillars, the evident relics of +cliffs worn away by the action of the sea. Scratchell's Bay, with its +chalk precipices, is passed; and other bays, with their richly coloured, +variegated sands, excite new interest and wonder. Then the Chines, +or ravines in the cliff, diversify the outline; and so we reach the +Undercliffe, that line of coast, whose perfect protection from the +winter's cold, with the fresh purity of the sea-breeze, render it almost +unique as a residence for the consumptive. Niton at one extremity, +and Ventnor and Bonchurch at the other, with the five miles between, +offering a succession of views unsurpassed in beauty. "The beautiful +places," writes Lord Jeffrey, "are either where the cliffs sink deep +into bays and valleys, opening like a theatre to the sun and the sea, or +where there has been a terrace of low land formed at their feet, which +stretches under the shelter of that enormous wall like a rich garden +plot, all roughened over with masses of rock fallen in distant ages, and +overshadowed with thickets of myrtle and rose and geranium, which all +grow wild here in great luxuriance and profusion." + +[Illustration: 0226] + +After leaving Bonchurch, Shanklin Chine, Sandown Bay, terminated on +the north by the magnificent chalk headland called Culver Cliff, or +the Cliff of the White Dove, terminate the most beautiful part of this +little voyage. After rounding one or two more headlands, Ryde comes into +sight, and loyal travellers begin to look out for Whipping-ham church +tower, and the woods and palace of Osborne; soon after passing which +Cowes is reached, and the excursion is over. + +[Illustration: 9226] + +The interior of the island has many points of interest, but three or +four days are sufficient for their exploration. A most interesting +excursion is that to Newport and Carisbrooke Castle, so closely +connected with the annals of Charles I. The visitor to Blackgang Chine +will probably come to the conclusion that this and similar fissures +in the chalk cliffs have been extolled beyond their deserts. There are +combes in Devonshire, unknown to fame, far superior to either Blackgang +or Shanklin, and at the latter especially, the elaborate artificiality +of the whole scene is a little repellant, while the celebrated waterfall +is commonly but a trickling rill. Blackgang is finer as a chasm, but the +cascade is equally insignificant. The charm of "the Island" is, after +all, in the climate, the colouring, and the glorious sea. + +[Illustration: 0227] + +Few walks of richer or more luxuriant beauty can be found within the +same compass than that from Blackgang Chine to Ventnor. First we reach +the Sandrock Spring, a chalybeate fountain in a cliff; the water, it +is said, contains alum and iron in an unexampled proportion. There is a +cottage, hard by, displaying a few tumblers, but customers do not seem +to be many. As a spa, Sandrock is too plainly a failure; and for real +invigoration to health and spirits, we would rather try the pure ozone +on the summit of St. Catherine's Cliff, than imbibe any quantity of +the chalybeate. Let the visitor stay long and inhale the glorious +sea-breeze. He will indeed have pure air below, that is, unless the +breezes, as is their wont sometimes, are stirring the chalk in dust +clouds--a kind of white simoom! + +[Illustration: 9228] + +But at the best, the air of the Undercliffe is soft and languid, +suggestive to the robust of delicate lungs; while yet those who are thus +afflicted cannot be too thankful for a shelter where the atmosphere is +as mild as it is pure, and the scene at every point, by land and sea, +most beautiful. + +We descend from St. Catherine's down to Niton, and thence pursue our way +by Puckaster and Mirables Lawrence, where the church was once accounted +the smallest in England (twelve by twenty feet in the interior), but is +now enlarged by the addition of a chancel. + +"Improvement" has been direfully at work since first we visited this +little village and drank of the cool waters of "St. Lawrence's Well." +The white, well-kept road is more level than the old picturesque path; +instead of ivied cottages there are now shining villas with green +blinds, walls for hedgerows, and, worst of all, the gushing spring flows +somewhere in an inclosure to which there seems no access. It is a pity +to have thus modernised so rustic and lovely a spot. But the flowers are +still there, perfuming the air; and the myrtles and the fuchsias are not +shrubs, but trees, and the luxuriance of southern climes surrounds us. +As we walk along we speculate on the convulsions of nature that have +prepared for us this little paradise. The undulating ground at our feet +is evidently formed of vast masses of chalk and clay, which, at former +periods, have broken bodily from the face of the cliff, slipped forward, +and sunk down. The surface, disintegrated by aqueous and atmospheric +action, has formed a kind of irregular terrace, the soil of which is +most favourable to vegetation. The ground is now firm, the process +of disintegration from above seems almost arrested; but there are even +yet memories of landslips on a large scale, of which the traces are +still visible. + +[Illustration: 0229] + +There is one walk in the island which no tolerable pedestrian should +omit--that from Newport to Freshwater, or Alum Bay. Leaving the main +road at Carisbrooke, a footpath leads upwards through fields richly +cultivated and gay with wild flowers. The open down which forms the +backbone of the island is soon reached. Keeping along the ridge the +tourist will for some miles enjoy a scene almost unique in its beauty. +The soft delicate curves and undulations which characterise the chalk +downs, and which the unobservant traveller so often overlooks, may be +seen in perfection. Nestling in many a sheltered nook are farm-houses, +hamlets, and churches, embosomed in trees. Patches of fern, gorse, and +heather diversify the landscape. And far below, on either side, is the +sea--on the right hand the Solent, on the left the English Channel. +After a while Freshwater comes into view, with its | line of cliffs +rising sheer from the waves, and about half-a-mile inland the sheltered +nook which has been made a classic spot as the home of the Poet +Laureate. His description of it will be familiar to many readers. + + "Where, far from smoke and noise of town, + I watch the twilight falling brown + All round a careless ordered garden. + Close to the ridge of a noble down. + You'll have no scandal while you dine, + But honest talk and wholesome wine, + And only hear the magpie gossip + Garrulous under a roof of pine. + For groves of pine on either hand, + To break the blast of winter, stand; + And further on, the hoary Channel + Tumbles a breaker on chalk and sand." + +A couple of miles more and we reach Alum Bay and the Needles, spoken of +on a preceding page. + +[Illustration: 9230] + +Half a century ago few contributions to our religious literature were +more widely and deservedly popular than Legh Richmond's "short and +simple annals of the poor." Though of late years they have lost +something of their popularity, yet many visitors to the island make +a pilgrimage to Brading, with which the name of the devout author is +inseparably connected. The grave of little Jane, the Young Cottager, +is in the churchyard here: that of the "Dairyman's Daughter," Elizabeth +Vallbridge, is at Arreton, three or four miles away towards the +interior. + +Here for the present our rambles must end. + +[Illustration: 8230] + +It is impossible to retrace them without feeling how very beautiful +England is. Some of her beauties are little known. Others are not +appreciated as they deserve. Many an obscure and unvisited nook has a +loveliness or a grandeur or a picturesqueness beyond that of the most +famous show-places. But the glory of our island is that so many of its +loveliest spots are associated with the memory of great names and noble +deeds. The glory of England is in its people; but its people may well, +in turn, exult and give thanks to God that He has given them so fair and +splendid a home. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's English Pictures, by Samuel Manning and S. G. Green + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH PICTURES *** + +***** This file should be named 45065.txt or 45065.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/4/5/0/6/45065/ + +Produced by David Widger from page images generously +provided by The Internet Archive + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at + www.gutenberg.org/license. + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at 809 +North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email +contact links and up to date contact information can be found at the +Foundation's web site and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For forty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + |