Chronicle of the Coach. Charing Cross to Ilfracombe ... Illustrated by E. L. Chichester

Front matter

OF THE CTiARLNTGr CROSS TO IMRACOWBE John Denison Champlin Jr. fjcijTfjggpiJMi.wiHin) mic EDWARD L CHICHESTER Charles Scribneirs Sons New Yop.k I 8S6 Copyright, i886, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. Press of J. J. Little & Co. Astor Place, New York. TO MY FRIEND ANDREW CARNEGIE, TO WHOSE KINDNESS AND COURTESY I AM INDEBTED FOR ONE OF THE MOST ENJOYABLE " OUTINGS " OF MY LIFE, THIS CHRONICLE IS DEDICATED BY Miles from London. MONDAY, JUNE o, Charing Cross to Guildford — via Putney, Kingston-on -Thames , Esher, Cobham 2g TUESDAY, Guildford to Winchester — via the Hog' s 'Back, Farnham, Alton, New Alresford 64 WEDNESDAY, Winchester to Salisbury — via Hursley, Romsey, Sher field-English , Alderbury 82 THURSDAY, Excursion to Old Sarum and Stonehenge. FRIDAY, Salisbury to Sherborne — via Wilton, Burcombe, Compton-Chamberlain , Fovant, Sutton-Mandeville, Shaftesbury, Gillingham, Milborne-Port , Sherborne Park 117 SATURDAY, At Sherborne.

SUNDAY, At Sherborne. MONDAY, Sherborne to Axminster— via Yeovil, West Coker, East Cbinnock, Crewkerne, Ford Abbey Itinerary. VI Miles from London. TUESDAY, Axminster to Exeter— via Wilmington, Honiton, Fairmile 173 WEDNESDAY, Exeter to Okehampton— via Moreton-Hampstead, Dartmoor, South Tawton, Sticklepath. / 95 THURSDA Y, Okehampton to Bideford— via Hatherleigh, Meeth, Merton, Little Torrington, Ware-Gifford 222 FRIDA Y, Bideford to Westward Ho— via Clovelly, Abbot sham 243 SATURDAY, JUNE 21, Westward Ho to Ilfracombe — via Northam, Bideford, Fremington, Bickington, Barnstaple ox €jjpty64Xl-e$

Chapter I

Charing Cross to Cobham. PAGE The Centre of the World — Mæcenas at home — American Four-in-hand — London Weather — Piccadilly on a. Bank Holiday — St. James's Street — Historic Memories — Headless Wellington — Putney Heath — Esher and Cardinal Wolsey — Claremont and Royalty I

Chapter II

Cobham to Guildford. Pains Hill — Seer de Cobham — Coach is gone, sir — A Stern Chase — Dramatis Personal — Reminiscences of Battle of Dorking — Discovery of a Roman Camp — Antiquo on Castra — Balloon Story — Feast at the White Lion ... ..... 16

Chapter III

Guildford. Earl Godwin and the Atheling — Guildford Castle — Philosophy of Shopping — Trespassers will be Prose- Contents. VIII PAGE 75 cuted — Polite Reception — The ancient Keep — Pepys at the Red Lion — Inn Nomenclature — Lions and Boars — Welcome Interruption . . . -3°

Chapter IV

Guildford to Winchester. The Hog's Back — Moor Park and Jonathan Swift — Waverley Abbey — Cæsar's Camp— Hop Gardens of England — Farnham Castle — William Cobbett — Propitiation of Bacchus — Eighty-three last .Michaelmas — A renowned Martialist — Tichborne or Orton — Family Legends — Ancient Hostel . . . -43

Chapter V

Winchester. A City with a History — Alfred the Great — Domesday Book — Cathedral of a Thousand Years — St. Swithin --Greedy Bishop Walkelyn — William of Wykeham — Cardinal Beaufort — Tomb of William Rufus — Royal Bones — Massacre of the Innocents — Tidal Myth — Izaak Walton ... . 39

Chapter VI

Winchester to Hursley. Wykeham's College — Trusty Servant — Wooden Trenchers and Black Jacks — Scholars and Commoners — Wolvesey Castle — Palace of Charles H. — King Arthur's Round Table — Holy Cross Beer — West Gate — Keble and the Christian Year — Tombs of the Cromwells .

Chapter VII

Romsey to Salisbury . Romsey Abbey — Good Queen Maud — Under Barley Ricks — Banks of the Test —American Pertinacity Contents. IX PAGE 88 — Ancient Crucifix —Salisbury Cathedral — Tomb of William Longespee — Boy Bishop — Soldier of Bos worth Field — St. Osmund — Sidney's Sister, Pem broke's Mother — Philosophy of Democritus, Jr.

Chapter VIII

New and Old Sarum. Salisbury Streets — Constable '_ Picture — Chippendale and Bric-d-brac — Old Sarum — Cobbett's Description -The Conqueror's Review — Value of Expeditious Prayers — Sword and Gown — A Rotten Borough — Arthur and Merlin — Queen Guinevere — Beggar's Opera — Vespasian's Ca7np ..... roj

Chapter IX

Stonehenge. Salisbury Plain — A Shepherd thereof — Them's the Stones — Disappointment — Emerson and Carlyle — Discoveries of the Poets — When Doctors Disagree — Stukeley and his Druids — Cemetery and Temple — Hengist a?id Aurelius Ambrosius — As it was and as ii is — An Insolvable Problem ..... 120

Chapter X

Salisbury to Sherborne. Terrors of the Camera — Cat-o .line-tails — Wilton Carpets — The Arcadia — Demon in the Wood — Gipsy Wagons — Descendant of King Lear — Canute at Edwardstowe — Author of Pharronida — Vale of Blackmore — Waterproof Coat — Acre of Rabbits— Dining Out under Adverse Circumstances . . . IJ3 Contents. X PAGE 167

Chapter XI

Sherborne. Mournful Procession — Generous Loan — Sherborne Abbey — In a Shower — Laborer's Home — New Arrivals — Gooseberry Tart and Clouted Cream — Sherborne Castle — Soldier and Saint — Osmund' s Curse — Raleigh and the Virgin Queen — The New Castle — Story that Ends in Smoke . . . . . . . . ijo

Chapter XII

Sherborne to Axminster. Yeovil — Donkeys — Cahpuz — Dorset Dialect — A modern Theocritus — Feat of Legerdemain — Ginger Beer vs. Champagne — Crewkerne — More Farewells — Ford Abbey — Axminster — Carpet Manufacture

Chapter XIII

Axminster to Fairmile. Ideal Coaching — A May Wreath — Wilmington Hill — Wealth of Wild Flowers — The true Mayflower— Ox-eye Daisy — Oxford's Coaching Lesson — Vale of Honiton — Honiton Lace — Queen Victoria's Wedding-dress — Beastly Inn Signs — Fairmile— Feast of Larks Tyro at Trout-fishing ...... 180

Chapter XIV

Exeter. Exeter Towers — Women afield — The Rougemont Castle Hill — Guildhall — Cathedral — An Organ out of Place — Prescriptive Rights — Ancient Clock— Montaigne's Wisdom — Secrets of Edinburgh Castle — Mary Stuart — Who was James It . ■ . , iq-j Contents. XI PAGE 213 228

Chapter XV

Exeter to Okehampton. Umbrellas and Water-proofs — Exeter Names — Devonian Rocks — Devonshire Lanes — Disgusted Tramps — Wild Scenery —Moreton-Hampstead — Epitaphs — Dartmoor Prison — The Tors — Lady Well — South Tawton — John Oxenham — Okehampton

Chapter XVI

Okehampton to Bideford. Charles Kingsley's Grudge — Military Occupation — Jolly Soldiers — A Nightcap — Okehampton Castle — Hatherleigh — John 0' Gaunt' s Gift — Lunch al Merton — Interviewing a Farmer — Sheep-shearing ■A bad Dream — Valley of the Torridge

Chapter XVII

Bideford. Bideford and Charles Kingsley — England's Heroic Age — Grenville' s Last Fight — Raleigh and America — Mary Sexton's Tomb — Bides ord' s Cynosure — Celestial Bridges — English and American Languages — .Monosyllabic Reform 241

Chapter XVIII

Bideford to Clovelly. Lost Twain — The Hobby —View of Clovelly — Enoch Arden — Clovelly High Street — Bristol Channel — Salvation Yeo — Coast-guard's Lookout — Limekiln — Clovelly Pool — Wide-awake Sailor — Drifting for Fish — Fuchsias Contents. XII

Chapter XIX

Westward Ho to Ilfracombe. PAGE Westward Ho — The Burrows— Bideford Bay — Home of Amy as Leigh — Quaint Inns — Hubba the Dane — Barum — English Euphony — Arkansaw or Arkansas — Family Names — Clumsy Carriages — Flock of Bicycles — The Coming Man — Farewell to the Coach. 272

Chapter XX

Ilfracombe. End of the World — Doing Ilfracombe — The Honest Penn — I he Tors — Capstone Hill — Becket's Murderer — Lantern Hill — Dinner sans Mæcenas — Musical Interruption — Salvation Army — Notable Conversion — Fourteen Red-letter Days — Abder-Rahman and his Coach ........ PACE z Statue of Charles I. — Charing Cross . \ 2 The Hobby Drive— Clovelly ... V Title-Page. 3 Ilfracombe — Coast view . . . . ) 4 Itinerary ......... v 3 Table of Contents ....... vii 6 List of Illustrations ....... xiii 7 Initial Letter. The Lion of the Percys— from Punch r 8 St. fames's Palace ....... g 0 A Headless Wellington— from Punch . . . ii io Putney Heath on a Bank Holiday . . . . ij ii Initial Letter — poor substitute for a Coach . . 16 12 Home of the Seer ....... iS I J A Stem Chase ........ 20 14 Initial Letter — trespassing forbidden . . . jo 1 j Guilds ord — High Street and Town Hall . . . 31 16 Guildford Castle — the ancient Keep ■ ■ ■ 37 ij Initial Letter — indispensable for coaching . . 43 18 Eighty-three last Michaelmas . ... 31 10 Winchester City Cross ...... 3/ 20 Initial Letter — Domesday Book . ... 39 21 Tomb of William Rufus . . ... 68 22 Mortuary Chests — Winchester Cathedral . . jo 23 Tomb of Izaak Walton ...... 24 Initial Letter — King Arthur's Round Table . . 73 23 Gate-way -f Winchester College . . . .76 List of Illustrations.

XIV PAGE 26 The Trusty Servant 77 2-j West Gate — Winchester ..... .84 28 Initial Letter — Tomb of William Longespee, 1226 88 2Q Romsey Abbey 92 30 Romsey Abbey — The Nun's Door . ... 93 31 Salisbury— distant view ...... 04 32 Initial Letter — Tomb of William Longespee, 1230 103 33 Close Gate — High Street, Salisbury .... 106 34 Old Sarum — distant view ..... 113 33 Old Sarum — ground-plan ...... 113 36 Old Sarum — cross-section ..... 113 37 Initial Letter — Druid Stones ..... 120 38 Shepherd of Salisbury Plain ..... 121 39 Stonehenge — elevation ...... 124 40 Stonehenge — ground-plan ..... T30 41 Initial letter — the enemy that everybody faces . 133 42 The White Hart Inn — Salisbury .... 134 43 Fools ! a-pickin' weeds I ...... . 139 44 Bonden Hall ........ 148 43 Initial Letter— first prize at the Fisheries . . 130 46 Sherborne — Digby Arms and Abbey . . . 133 47 Sherborne Castle ....... 163 48 Initial Letter — the omnipresent Donkey. . . 167 49 A Load of Cabbages ....... 168 30 Ford Abbey ......... iyj 31 Initial Letter — Honiton Lace, 1614 . . . 180 32 Wilmington Hill ....... 182 33 A very Tyro !

Ig4 34 Initial Letter — the head that wears a Crown . 192 33 Exeter — distant view ...... List of Illustrations. XV 36 Exeter — the Guildhall ...... 201 37 Initial Letter — a sudden shower .... 213 38 Disgusted Tramps . . . . . . .216 39 Devonshire Mutton ....... 217 60 Initial Letter — did not ktiow its mother . . 228 61 Okehampton Castle— from Turner's sketch . . 231 62 A Bad Dream 238 63 Initial Letter — Man-of- War, 16th Century . . 241 64 Mary Sexton's Tomb ...... 243 63 Bideford Bridge ....... 247 66 Initial Letter — Donkey with pannier . . . 234 67 Clovelly — the Lookout 262 68 Clovelly — the Limekiln ..... 263 69 Initial Letter — Westward Ho ! .... 272 70 A Flock of Bicyclers ...... 281 71 Ilfracombe Hotel 283 72 Initial Letter . . . . . . . . 284 73 Ilfracombe — The Tors ...... 287 74 Ilfracombe — Capstone Hill 288 73 Finis

Chapter I

Charing Cross to Cobham. The Centre of the World — Mæcenas at home — American Four-in-hand — London Weather — Piccadilly on a Bank Holiday — St. James's Street — Historic Memories — Headless Wellington — Putney Heath — Esher and Cardinal Wolsey — Claremont and Royalty. HARING CROSS is the centre of the world. London — de spite the claim of the Amer ican Athens — is the great ter restrial nerve-nucleus from which radiate to every part of the globe influences affecting, directly or indirectly, men of every speech and clime. And is there a conscientious London cabby, full of the fear of God and of respect for his own ancient calling, who will deny that Charing Cross is the very centre of that nucleus? You may stand within the shadow of Charles the " Martyr's " effigy, on the site of Queen Eleanor's last memorial, and look, as it were, upon the intellectual, the commercial, the social, the art, and the money centre of the world's great capital ; and if it be a busy hour you will be led to exclaim with Dr. Johnson that "the full tide of human existence is at Charing Cross."

Charing Cross is, then, of all places on earth the best place to start from, for in whatever direction one advances the movement must necessarily be from centre to periphery. When, therefore, Mæce nas asked a favored few to meet him at this time honored site to participate in the pleasures of a drive with his coach and four, all the invited ap proved his choice; and when he announced that the advance was to be in a due westerly direction, his wisdom was universally applauded, for even the most thoughtless were struck with the fact — which had doubtless induced that choice — that the provi dential configuration of the right tight little island would prevent our going on, like the Poet Laureate's brook, " for ever." It was on Whit-Monday, in the year of grace one thousand eight hundred and eighty-four, when we gathered, a party of a dozen or more, in our host's apartments in the Grand Hotel.

The windows com manded a fine view of Trafalgar Square, but its ever moving panorama had no attractions for the coaching-party, nor for those who had come to speed their departure. The rooms were alive with the hum of preparation, and several brows, both masculine and feminine, wore traces of anxiety as if not quite sure of the result of so important an undertaking. If the reporter of the Pall Mall Gazette had looked in then — instead of after the return, as he did — he would have been convinced that to start a coaching party successfully requires nearly as much seaman ship as to get under way an ordinary man-of-war. A tyro would inevitably botch such an enterprise ; but our host's exceptional experience was a sufficient guaranty to all who knew him that the chaos which met our eyes was only apparent, and that the ap pointed hour would see all resolved into order and system.

The arrival of guests and the introduction of the few strangers, the mutual congratulations of those who were to go and regrets of those whom circumstances forced to remain behind, the hurrying to and fro of servants, the giving of last orders and com missions, the posting of letters and despatching of final telegrams filled the brief space before luncheon was announced. It is a maxim of every true philosopher that all important undertakings should be begun on a full stomach, and as there can be no more important thing in life than a coaching trip (to those invited), it is absolutely essential to its success that a suitable quantity of the substantials — supplemented, of course, by the delicacies of the season — should be provided for the discussion and fortification of those about to adventure life and limb.

Nothing else in the world so stimulates digestion as the air breathed on the top of a coach; and he who does not provide beforehand for an extraordinary run on his physical bank will surely rue his neglect before the next inn be reached. " Luncheon at one and the coach __t two o'clock," was the order, for it is a long drive to Guildford, our projected resting-place for the night ; but delays are proverbial, even in the best regulated coaching families, and so it happened that our first dejeuner en familie was necessarily more hurried than the delightful al fresco entertainments of the succeeding days. Brief as it was, it served the good purpose of wearing off the little restraint which usually at tends a first meeting. The Brotherhood of the Coach recognizes no strangers after assembling around the social mahogany.

Like the Arab, who swears eternal friendship with those who break bread with him beneath his tent, each member is bound to the rest by the most sacred of ties and registers a mental oath to stand by the coach and all upon it while a trace holds or a wheel is left to turn upon. It was a little before the appointed hour when the coach and four drew up at the great entrance of the Grand Hotel, on the rite of old Northumberland House, on the summit of which the blue lion of the Percys roared with anguish (see Punch's picture re produced at the beginning of this chapter) when Landseer's parvenus took up their position around the base of the Nelson Column below. The coach — the now famous "American Four-in-Hand in Bri tain " — is much lighter than the ordinary English coach, and therefore far better adapted for a long journey.

It had been put in thorough repair, and looked as spick and span as if just from the maker's hands. The horses, bays and blacks, appeared well fitted for the work in hand, two of them indeed having belonged to the team which made the eight hundred mile drive to Inverness. Jackson, in blue coat and buckskins, with whip in hand and an eye that never wandered from the near leader, sat on the box as erect and as apparently unconscious of everything sublunary as a Horse-Guardsman in front of Whitehall; but Pierce, a mere tyro in coaching compared with the veteran of the whip, could not repress a smile of satisfaction as he stood beside the coach, the centre of a group of admiring street boys. To stow the luggage was a work of but a few minutes ; a few more saw the guests in their allotted seats, and at sharp two, amid the merry notes of the horn, Jackson touched his leaders and we were off, followed by the good-byes of the little knot of friends whom all were sorry to leave behind.

It was a charming day, for, though the heavens were over cast at first, the sun soon broke merrily through the clouds and shone as bright (almost) as under more genial transatlantic skies. It is considered by most writers the proper " thing " to carp at London weather, and to illustrate with stereotyped jokes about pea-soup fogs and ever drizzling clouds; but the chronicler is fain to acknowledge — and he does so on his honor as a truth ful man — that he has seen days in London when it did not rain. A childlike confidence in the reports of travellers led to an investment in the Briton's vade mecum — an umbrella — soon after his arrival, and, though he tempted Jupiter Pluvius on many occasions, he actually carried that "Martin" three weeks before seeing its interior. He sometimes shudders to think, however, what might have hap pened if he had not been thus provident : so that, after all, such an outlay may be regarded by him who trusts the skies of " perfidious Albion " in the light of an insurance upon one's life.

Our route lay past the tall column on the summit of which England's great sailor stands " like a rat on a pole,!' as Taine says, and which the dynamiteurs had threatened with their bombs only a few nights before — though probably not from any antipathy to its artistic shortcomings such as actuated the spite ful remark of the irreverent Frenchman — through the Haymarket and down Piccadilly. It was a bank holiday, which means in London as general a suspension of business as on a Sunday, though the streets wear a holiday appearance in lieu of the traditional solemnity which every French man declares to be characteristic of the British ob servance of the first day of the week. Piccadilly, the artery through which surges a never-ending tide of humanity, presented a still more varied and crowded appearance, if possible, than on ordinary occasions.

One could readily imagine that all Lon don's human* substrata — its lower classes and middle classes, its artisans and shopkeepers, the sons and daughters of toil, to whom a holiday is a real blessing — had debouched into the streets and moved with a common impulse toward a common centre in search of a breath of fresh air ; and to appreciate what this means to some of the population of the "Great Wen," as Cobbett called it, one must test with lungs and nose some of the crowded lanes of the old city where are walled in the concentrated smells of a thousand years. Fortunate is it for the people of the world's metropolis that she is pro vided with so many lungs in her parks, where all who list may take in a fresh supply of vitality at will. To them perhaps is attributable, at least in part, London's low death-rate, compared with that of the great continental cities.

Piccadilly is by no means a handsome street, judged by New World standards, but there is some thing impressive in its dingy palaces, especially when taken in connection with the associations which cluster around them. By rare good fortune one of the guests upon the coach was an authority in such matters — a kind of walking encyclopædia, or rather a Murray and a Baedeker combined — and as we rolled along he was kind enough to call our at tention to the places which he deemed would be most interesting, descanting on their history with true antiquarian fervor. He found an appreciative and a grateful audience, for if he sometimes tried the credulity of his transatlantic cousins by drawing an abnormally long bow, he was pardoned in con sideration of his contribution to the common stock of amusement.

His efforts occasionally drew a sharp thrust from Mæcenas or a merry rejoinder from some of the ladies, who were by no means dis posed to take all his statements without an appro priate measure of salt. Antiquo, as he was dubbed from the start, pointed out to us the Albany, noted for its bachelor cham bers — the home of many a prince of the literary guild — where Byron lived before his marriage and where Macaulay wrote much of his history ; and, further on, Burlington House, distinguished for associations with all that is great in English history from the time of the second Charles down to a score of years ago, when it became the established home of art and sci ence. He told us of the glories of St. James's Street, famous for its clubs, the haunt of all the distinguished men of Europe for more than two centuries, and the western limit of the court district of London, according to Theodore Hook, who used to bound the capital proper on the north by Picca dilly, on the south by Pall Mall, on the east by the Haymarket, and on the west by St. James's Street.

St. James's Street, of classic fame ! The finest people throng it ! St. James's Street ? I know the name ! I think I've passed along it ! Why, that's where Sacharissa sighed, Where Waller read his ditty ; Where Byron lived, and Gibbon died, And Alvanley was witt)*. " Down at its foot lies the dingy, dilapidated row of tenements called by euphuism St. James's Palace, whose external appearance, at least, is little calcu lated to impress the foreigner with any great degree of respect for the Court which takes its name from it. This proud title, strange to say, is derived from a hospital for " leprous maidens," founded on the site by a worthy citizen of London before the Conquest. The property passed to the crown in the reign of Henry VIII., who transformed it into a palace for Anne Boleyn. From the burning of White hall to 1 761, when Buckingham House was bought and made over into a palace for George III. and Queen Caroline, St. James's was the only London residence of the kings of England, whose housing was probably the least palatial of any monarch's in Christendom.

" Her poor to palaces Britannia brings, St. James's Hospital may serve for kings. Mæcenas, whose cynical republicanism is prover bial, could not repress a somewhat malignant jest to the effect that the poet was undoubtedly correct in his estimate of the comparative value of the two estates, adding that the crowned heads would have cost less and have done the country more good if they had always been kept in hospitals. Antiquo, ignoring this aggressive remark, save by a quiet smile, recalled briefly a few of the memories which cluster around the historic pile. Within its walls died Bloody Mary, and there Elizabeth lived when Philip sent the Armada against us : there was born Charles II., and there the first Charles passed his last night on earth, marching thence, on that fateful morning in 1649, to the scaffold before Whitehall.

We passed on our right Devonshire House, now the town residence of the Marquis of Hartington, late of Gladstone's cabinet, where once reigned Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, friend of Fox, whose charming face and form have been perpetu ated by Gainsborough and by Reynolds ; and on our left, the Green Park, famous in olden times for so called affairs of honor. Looking backward across its lawns we caught glimpses of Stafford and Bridge water Houses, the city homes respectively of the Duke of Sutherland and of the Earl of Ellesmere, still better known to art lovers as the repositories of some of the pictorial treasures of the world — relics of the great gallery of the Regent Due d'Orleans. Further on, among the trees, rose the chimneys of Buckingham Palace, the neglected town residence of royalty, and almost as ugly architecturally as our own White House.

In that house lived the author of " Evelina ;" in this, La Belle Hamilton, whose bewitching face looks out from so many of Romney's canvases ; there resided the author of " Vathek," and there, in the Marquis of Queensbury's house, Byron passed most of his brief married life. This is old Hertford House, once the Pulteney Hotel, where Alexander of Russia stayed during his visit in 1814 ; that is Gloucester House, residence of the Duke of Cambridge, and that Apsley House, home of the Iron Duke, whose unfortu nate statue long stood on the op posite space — the subject of the gibes of foreign ers and the mor tification of Eng lishmen. Workmen were engaged in removing the monstrosity as we passed, and its headless trunk closely re sembled the picture of it given in the current number of Punch. Skirting Hyde Park along Knightsbridge past the Albert Gate, we soon turned into the Brompton Road, and passing the South Kensington Museum, drove on through Chelsea, where Carlyle lived in modest Cheyne Row, via the Fulham Road, and across the Thames by Fulham Bridge, the start ing-point in the yearly race between Cambridge and Oxford, to Putney.

Thence our route lay across Putney Heath, leaving Richmond Park on our right and Wimbledon Common on our left, to King ston, cutting off the long bend which the Thames makes here around by Richmond and Twicken ham. Putney Heath, one of the greater lungs of London, was formerly a barren heath, noted as a haunt of " gentlemen of the road," and later as a convenient place for duels, reviews and sham fights. In its transformation into a park much of its ancient wildness has been carefully preserved, though it is crossed in many directions by the excellent roads so characteristic of England. There are few trees of size, but its undulating surface of coarse grass is dotted with black patches of gorse and stunted shrubs. As far as we could see, its slopes were alive with people in holiday costume, some passing to and fro, others gathered in groups near the wagon or cart — with the accompanying horse or donkey tethered hard by — in which they had come from the city.

Many kinds of out-of-door amusements were going on : shooting at archery butts by men and women together, cricket and bowls by men alone, and Aunt Sally, quoits, and other rural games by the younger ones. Here and there tents were pitched, some for the accommodation of family picnics, some for the use of tradesmen, who displayed a tempting variety of eatables and potables to the passers-by. The liquid refreshments had proved too attractive to two of the Queen's guardians who, resplendent in scarlet coats and gold-laced caps set jauntily over their right eyebrows, in the most approved military style, were reeling along the road, cutting off imaginary heads with the little rattan switches which every man of war in England seems to deem it his duty or privi lege to carry. At Kingston we again approached the Thames, catching frequent glimpses of its waters, spanned there by a fine stone bridge of several arches.

We could only take a flying look at the coronation stone of the Saxon kings, as we passed, and not even the most sceptical among us thought of ques tioning its authenticity. After skirting the river a mile or more, almost in sight of Hampton Court Palace on the opposite bank, passing en route the engine-houses of the London Water-works, where the Thames water is pumped up into great reservoirs to be filtered for the city's use, we again turned inland and drove to Esher, noted in time past as the place of retirement of Cardinal Wolsey, when he lost favor with the King. ' Hear the King's pleasure, Cardinal ; who commands you To render up the great seal presently Into our hands ; and to confine yourself To Esher House — my lord of Winchester's." Beyond it, on the right of the road, is Claremont, whose famous grounds were laid out by Kent for its original -owner, Thomas Holies Pelham, Earl of Clare, afterwards Duke of Newcastle, " Where Kent and nature strove for Pelham's love."