Before leaving Birmingham, it will be convenient to say something about
Warwick, Leamington, Kenilworth, and Stratford on Avon, of which the one is
the assize town, another the watering place, and the third and fourth the
antiquarian or rather romantic lions of the county in which Birmingham stands
first, for wealth, population, manufacturing, and political importance.
Warwick, in spite of its parliamentary, municipal, and assize honours, would
soon be as much forgotten as a hundred other dull little country towns,
without local trade or local attractions, if it were not for the castle, the
church, and the river, which, in connection with striking epochs in England's
history, will ever render it a favourite pilgrimage.
After being destroyed by the Danes, Warwick was restored by Ethelfreda, the
daughter of Alfred the Great, who built a fort there, A.D. 913. At Domesday
Survey it was a borough, and contained 261 houses, of which 126 belonged to
the king. Members were sent to Parliament in the time of Edward I., when
also the paving of the town and the erection of a wall round it were
commenced. In the time of Philip and Mary, the first charter of
incorporation was granted.
The town stands on the west side of the river Avon,--Shakspeare's Avon, from
which it is separated by Warwick Castle and grounds. It was formerly a
little county metropolis, many of the families of rank and fortune had winter
residences there; the Warwick balls were frequented by a select and exclusive
set; a small theatre was well supported, and few races assembled more
distinguished company than used to throng the Warwick course once a year, in
family coaches and four-in-hands. All this grandeur has departed, Leamington
has absorbed the wealth and fashion of Warwick, the town mansions have fallen
into plebeian hands, the theatre has ceased to be a training school for the
London boards, the streets are silent except when a little temporary bustle
is produced by an influx of Birmingham attorneys, their clients, and
witnesses, at the assizes, of stout agriculturists and holiday labourers on
"fair days," or the annual "mop," when an ox is roasted whole, and lads and
lasses of rosy rural breed range themselves along the pavement to be hired,
or at the races twice a year, when, although the four horses with postilions
and outriders are seldom seen, railroads from a distance, and Leamington from
close at hand, pour a variegated stream of sightseers and gamblers on one of
the prettiest pieces of ground in England.
Warwick has no manufactures, but, being a borough very evenly balanced
between the two contending political parties, its inhabitants have enjoyed a
fuller share of the favours of Government than has fallen to the lot of towns
of more commercial importance.
Warwick stands on solid rock, in which the cellars are excavated; and this
circumstance, added to its position on the top of a hill, renders it
particularly dry and clean.
There are several excellent inns, supported by the surrounding' farmers,
which are much to be preferred to more fashionable hotels. The roast geese
to be found at the farmers' ordinaries on market days about Michaelmas time,
are worthy of commendation; and the farmers themselves, being of a jovial and
hospitable turn of mind, render these dinners pleasanter to a stranger who
can dine at an unfashionable hour, than the eternal "anything you please,
sir; steak or chop, sir," in a solitary box, which haunts us for our sins in
the coffee-rooms of English hotels.
Warwick deserves a long journey, if it were only for the sake of the fine
woodland scenery which surrounds it for ten miles, but the castle is the
especial object of attraction,--a castle which realizes almost more than any
other those romantic ideas of a feudal abode which were first put into
circulation by the "Castle of Otranto," and became part of the education of
our youth under the influence of the genius of Sir Walter Scott.
The castle rises upon the brink of the river, which foams past over the weir
of an ancient mill, where once the inhabitants of the borough were bound by
feudal service to grind all their corn. The best approach is from the
Leamington Lower Road, over a bridge of one arch, built by a late Earl of
Warwick. Caesar's and Guy's towers rise into sight from a surrounding grove.
The entrance is through an arched gateway, past a lodge, where the relics of
Earl Guy, the dun cow slayer, are preserved; and a winding avenue cut in
solid rock effects a sort of surprise, which, as the castle comes again
suddenly into view, is very pleasing. The exterior realizes a baronial abode
of the fourteenth or fifteenth century; the interior has been modernized
sufficiently to be made comfortable, still retaining many striking features
of its ancient state. A closely cropped green sward covers the quadrangle,
which was formerly the tilting ground.
The date of Caesar's tower, the oldest part of the building, is uncertain.
Guy's tower, of the latter part of the fourteenth century, is in fine
preservation.
The great entrance hall, a grand old room sixty-two feet by thirty-seven, is
adorned with armour and other appurtenances to feudal state. At a great
fire-place with fire dogs, room might be found for a cartload of faggots. A
suite of rooms, commanding views of delightful scenery, are adorned with
ancient tapestry, armour, and pictures by Rubens, Vandyke, Velasquez, and
other eminent painters. Among the portraits are Ignatius Loyola, the founder
of the Jesuits, Prince Rupert, and Charles I. on horseback, by Vandyke.
Hours may be profitably and agreeably spent in investigating the treasures of
Warwick Castle. The grounds, although not extensive, are picturesquely
arranged; in one of the greenhouses, the Warwick vase, an antique celebrated
for its size and beauty, will be found. The numerous copies in various
materials, but especially in metals, cast in Birmingham, have rendered the
form of this relic of classic art well known.
After the Castle, St. Mary's Church must be visited for its beautiful chapel
with altar tomb, on which lies prostrate in humble prayer the effigy of
Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, styled "the Good." This Beauchamp was
Regent of France in 1425, during the absence of the Duke of Bedford, and
carried on the war there with signal success. He was afterwards governor of
the infant king, Henry VI. While a second time ruling over France, he died
at Rouen on the 30th April, 1439. It was the daughter of the Good Earl who
married Richard Nevil, created, on succeeding to the Warwick estates through
his wife, Earl of Warwick, known as "the king maker;" a grand character in
Shakspeare's Henry VI., and the hero of Sir Bulwer Lytton's "Last of the
Barons."
Then there is Leicester Hospital, founded in the time of Richard II., as two
guilds, in honour of the Virgin and St. George the Martyr, which, after the
Reformation, was re-established under its present name by Queen Elizabeth's
favourite, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, as an almshouse for a master and
twelve brethren, "being impotent or infirm men." These last have been, in
consequence of the improved value of the trust-funds, increased to twenty,
and receive each an allowance of 80 pounds per annum: the master has 400
pounds. The buildings of this charity consist of a quadrangle, formed by the
brethren's lodgings and public kitchen, of a chapel of ancient architecture
over the west gate of the town, and an ancient hall.
Previous to the Reform Bill, the influence of the Warwick family returned two
members for the borough of Warwick: since that period they have as yet only
returned one; but, in the absence of the countervailing influence of any
manufactures, it seems likely that a popular Earl, of whatever politics,
would be able to resume the ancient influence of the house, and again return
two.
* * * * *
LEAMINGTON, about two miles distant, may be reached by two turnpike roads and
a pleasant footpath; the distance of all being about two miles.
Mineral waters, fashion, a clever physician, the Warwickshire hounds, the
surplus capital of Birmingham, speculative builders, and excellent sanitary
regulations have contributed to the rapid rise of this picturesque and
fashionable watering-place; in what proportions it would be difficult to say.
The waters, which resemble mild Epsom salts, first brought the village into
notice in 1794, although the existence of mineral springs at Leamington
Priory had been recorded by Camden and Dugdale. In 1794 people drank harder
than they do now, read less, played cards more, were altogether "faster," and
had more need of purifying waters and pump-room amusements. A long war shut
out our idlers from the Continent, and created an additional demand for our
native mineral produce. At a later period the talents of Dr. Jephson
attracted an army of invalids and would-be invalids; Sir Walter Scott's
novels brought Kenilworth and Warwick Castle into fashion, just as Garrick,
like a second Peter the Hermit, preached up a pilgrimage to Stratford-on-
Avon. So land-jobbers and builders rushed to prepare tempting abodes for the
armies of the sick, the sporting, and the romantic, who gathered round the
springs.
Although the beautiful stone which has made Bath the queen of watering-
places, was not to be had, the materials for Roman cement, then lately
invented, were plentiful. With these aids the town authorities had the good
sense to enforce cleanliness, and all manner of rules for making the streets
fit for the lounging promenades of the well-dressed. Water-carts and brooms
were kept in active employment; beggars and dust-heaps were under the eye of
a vigilant police.
The result was, that at the expense of many ruined builders and speculators,
Leamington grew from a pretty village into a fine town, peopled not only by
invalids in the water-drinking season, and sportsmen in the winter season,
but by a number of permanent residents of independent fortune, of all ranks
between retired manufacturers and Irish peers. Attached to the manufacturing
districts, it has become what Brighton is to the London Stock Exchange.
As hunting quarters, Leamington is convenient for men with few horses, as the
meets are near and the railways convenient. An ill-natured opinion prevails
that the scarlet coat is more worn there by fortune-hunters than fox-hunters,
and that the tailor is a person of more importance with the majority of the
field than the huntsman; but this story probably originates in the number of
carriages full of pretty faces to be found at the cover sides round
Leamington. The country cannot be compared with Northamptonshire or
Leicestershire, or even Oxfordshire. The farmers are better sportsmen than
agriculturists. Warwickshire landlords think more of the politics of their
tenants, than of their intelligence or capital. Great improvements have,
however, been effected within the last ten years, and we must not forget to
mention that the Birmingham Agricultural and Poultry Show, which is the
finest local exhibition in the kingdom, draws a great many of its exhibitors
from this county.
Leamington, long without direct railway communication, is now wrapped up
between the broad-gauge and the narrow-gauge, like a hare in a bottle-spit.
The opening of the line to Rugby affords a new short way to London. The
population will henceforward increase at the expense of its gentility, but
the police and sanitary arrangements before alluded to, will always make
Leamington a favourite with invalids, hypochondriacs, and flaneurs.
The multiplicity of these railroads compels us to abandon the plan of
describing, as we pass, the more celebrated towns, mansions, or castles,
because it would be impossible to follow out such a zig-zag of topography. It
is better to take it for granted that the traveller will stop at certain
places, and from them make excursions to everything worth seeing in the
neighbourhood.
In this manner, as Birmingham gave occasion for an examination into the
leading manufactures, we presume that Leamington will be the best central
encampment for a survey of everything within a circle of ten miles
interesting to the Antiquarian, the Historian, the Artist, the Poet, the
Agriculturist, and the happy beings who have a taste for all these pursuits.
The number of interesting places within an easy walk or drive of Leamington,
forms one of its great advantages as a watering place.
Either on foot or in a carriage (and Leamington is extremely well provided
with carriages for hire), Warwick Castle, or Stratford-on-Avon, or Guy's
Cliff, and Kenilworth, or Stoneleigh Abbey, may be visited in the course of a
day, or part of a day.
The detailed beauties of these places will be found fully set forth in county
histories and local guides. A brief reference, sufficient to enable a
traveller to make up a plan of campaign, will be all we shall attempt.
* * * * *
STONELEIGH ABBEY, the residence of Lord Leigh, is noticeable for its fine
woodland scenery,--splendid oaks adorn the Park, and as having been the
subject of a series of very extraordinary trials at the suit of claimants of
the estate and ancient title. The true heirs of this estate have never been
discovered; many claimants have successively appeared, and endeavoured to
prop up their claims by extraordinary fabrications of evidence. For
instance, a certain tombstone, bearing inscriptions of great importance, was
not only described and sworn to by a cloud of witnesses, as having been at a
certain year in Stoneleigh Church, but other witnesses, with equal
circumstantiality, related how, on a particular occasion, this said tombstone
was taken down and destroyed. And yet, it was clearly proved before the
House of Lords that no such tombstone ever existed.
The present family are now secure in the estates under the Statute of
Limitations, but the late Peer, up to a short period before the old title was
revived in his favour, occupied Stoneleigh as a trustee, as it were, for want
of a better claimant.
In the incidents of the Leigh Peerage, are the materials of half-a-dozen
romances.
* * * * *
GUY'S CLIFF--where Guy, Earl of Warwick, and slayer of the Dun Cow, lived and
died as a hermit, fed daily by his Countess, little knowing whom she fed--is
situated on the banks of the Avon, about a mile from Warwick, on the high
road to Kenilworth, and may also be approached by footpaths across the fields
leading to the same village. The pictures of Guy's Cliff have been
extravagantly praised, but the natural and artificial beauties of its gardens
and pleasure grounds constitute its chief attraction. For, says Dugdale, it
is "a place of so great delight in respect to the river gliding below the
rock, the dry wholesome situation, and the fair grove of lofty elms
overshadowing it, that to one who desireth a retired life, either for his
devotions or study, the like is hardly to be found."
What Dugdale said two hundred years ago may truly be repeated now, especially
in a warm autumn or summer evening, when the click of a water-mill adds sound
to the pleasure to be derived from the thick shade of the lofty trees
overhead, mossy turf under the feet, and the sight of flowing water. Henry
V. visited this hermitage; and Shakspeare, on what authority we know not, is
said to have frequented it.
* * * * *
KENILWORTH follows Guy's Cliff, once a retired country village of one street,
one church, and one inn, now vulgarized by being made the site of a railway
station. At the risk of offending the Kenilworthians, we strongly advise the
romantic youths and maidens inspired by Sir Walter Scott's romance not to
visit the ruins, which, although an excellent excuse and pleasant situation
for a picnic, have nothing romantic about them beyond grey walls. The woods
and waters which formed so important a part of the scenery during Queen
Elizabeth's visit, have disappeared, as well as all the stately buildings.
At the same time, imagination will go a long way, and it may not be a day ill
spent after reading Laleham's "Princely Pleasures of Kenilworth," in which he
describes what he himself saw when Queen Elizabeth visited the Earl of
Leicester there in 1575, to journey over, especially if accompanied by a cold
collation, including a salad of the Avon crawfish, and a little iced punch.
It would be still better for good pedestrians to walk the distance by the
fields and push on to the inn for refreshment, without which all tame scenery
is so very flat. In the sublimity of the Alps, the Pyrenees, or even the
great Highland hills, a man may forget his dinner; but, when within the verge
of the horizon church-towers and smoking chimneys of farm-houses continually
occur, visions of fat, brown, sucking pigs, rashers of ham and boiled fowls,
with foaming tankards, will intrude unbidden after an hour or two of
contemplation.
* * * * *
STRATFORD ON AVON, with SHOTTERY, where Ann Hathaway was courted by
Shakspeare and CHARLECOTE, the residence of the Sir Thomas Lucy whom the poet
immortalised as Justice Shallow, are all within ten miles of Leamington. On
all these so much has been written that we will not venture to "pile up the
agony" any higher. The best companion on the road to Stratford is Charles
Knight's Life of Shakspeare, which colours all the scenes of the poet's life
in Warwickshire with the atmosphere of the sixteenth century, and summons to
meet us in the streets of Stratford costumes and characters contemporary with
Falstaff, Shallow, and Dogberry so well, that we do not see the Clods in
corduroys, the commercial Gents in paletots, and the Police in trim blue,
whom we really meet.
[THE AVON VIADUCT: ill13.jpg]
SOHO.
WATT, BOULTON, MURDOCH.
On leaving Birmingham, the railway almost immediately passes from
Warwickshire into Staffordshire, through two parishes, Handsworth and Aston,
which, presenting nothing picturesque in natural scenery or remarkable in
ancient or modern buildings, with one exception, yet cannot be passed over
without notice, because they were residences of three remarkable men, to whom
we are largely indebted for our use of the inventions which have most
contributed to the civilisation and advance of social comfort in the
nineteenth century.
Two miles from old Birmingham, now part of the modern town, lies Soho, in the
suburb of Handsworth, which, in 1762, was a bleak and barren heath.
In that year Matthew Boulton, the son of a wealthy Birmingham hardwareman,
purchased Soho, and erected on it a mansion, with pleasure grounds, and a
series of workshops, for carrying on the then staple trades of the town, in
shoe buckles, buttons, and other articles included in the general title of
"toys." In 1774, Boulton entered into partnership with James Watt, and
commenced, in concert with him, the experiments in which Watt had been for
some years engaged for improving Savary's imperfect Steam-Pumping Engine.
After years of the concentrated labour of genius of the highest order, and
the expenditure of not less than 47,000 pounds, their success was complete,
and Watt's inventions, in the words of Lord Jeffrey, rendered the Steam
Engine "capable of being applied to the finest and most delicate
manufactures, and its power so increased, as to set weight and solidity at
defiance. By his admirable contrivances, it became a thing stupendous alike
for its force and its applicability, for the prodigious power it can exert,
and the ease and precision, and ductility with which that power can be
varied, distributed, and applied. The trunk of an elephant that can pick up
a pin or rend an oak, is as nothing to it. It can engrave a seal, and crush
masses of obdurate metal like wax before it; draw out, without breaking, a
thread as fine as gossamer, and lift a ship of war like a bauble in the air.
It can embroider muslin, and forge anchors, cut steel into ribands, and impel
loaded vessels against the fury of the winds and waves."
The march of death and time have removed all the men who were engaged in
assisting James Watt and Matthew Boulton in their great works. The numerous
mechanical trades in coining, plating, and other Birmingham manufactures, in
addition to the construction of steam engines, which first turned the waste
of Soho into the largest workshop in Europe, have passed into other hands,
and been transplanted. The manufactory of steam engines, removed to another
site, still exists under the name of the old firm; but within a very recent
period the pleasure grounds in which James Watt often walked, in earnest
converse with the partner to whose energetic and appreciative mind he owed so
much, have been invaded by the advances of the neighbouring town, and sliced
and divided into building lots. Aston Hall and Park must soon suffer the
same fate.
[ASTON VIADUCT: ill14.jpg]
Very soon there will be no vestiges of the homes of these great men, but they
need no monuments, no shrines for the reverence of admiring pilgrims. Every
manufactory in the town of Birmingham is a monument of the genius which first
fully expanded within the precincts of Soho. Thousands on thousands find
bread from inventions there first perfected or suggested.
When Watt explained to Smeaton, the architect of Eddystone Lighthouse and the
greatest engineer of the day, the plan of his steam engine, he doubted
whether mechanics could be found capable of executing the different parts
with sufficient precision; and, in fact, in 1769, when Watt produced, under
the patronage of Dr. Roebuck, his third model, with a cylinder of block tin
eighteen inches in diameter, there were only one or two men capable of giving
the requisite truth of workmanship to air-pump cylinders of two inches in
diameter. At the present day, as before observed in reference to Wolverton,
there are thousands of skilled workmen employed at weekly wages, to whom the
most difficult problems of Watt's early experiments are familiar handiwork.
At Handsworth, too, working for a long life in the Soho manufactories as the
servant, confidential assistant, and friend, lived another remarkable man,
William Murdoch, the inventor of illumination by gas, and the author of the
first locomotive steam engine, and of several important contributions to
practical science, to which justice has scarcely been done.
William Murdoch employed coal gas so early as 1792, for the purpose of
lighting his house and offices at Redruth, in Cornwall, when he was
superintending the pumping engines erected there by Messrs. Boulton and Watt;
for it was he who erected for them in that district the first Cornish pumping
engine, with separate condenser. He had at that time in regular use a
portable gas lantern, formed by filling a bladder with gas, and fixing to it
a jet, which was attached to the bottom of a glass lantern, which he used for
the purpose of lighting himself home at night across the moors from the
mining engines.
His locomotive engine, made upon the non-condensing principle (since adopted
in all engines for that purpose), was constructed, in consequence of a
lameness which confined him to the sofa, and set to work at Redruth in 1784.
It is still in existence in perfect working order, and was exhibited before a
meeting of the Mechanical Engineers at Birmingham, in the year 1850, when a
memoir of Mr. Murdoch was read, which has been kindly forwarded to us by the
President, John M'Connell, Esq., C.E.
It is among the traditions of Redruth, that one night William Murdoch,
wishing to try an experiment with his new invention, lighted the lamp under
the boiler, and set it a-going on a narrow, smooth, hard-rolled gravel walk
leading to the church, a mile distant. The little engine went off at a great
pace, whistling and hissing as it went, and the inventor followed as fast as
he could in chase. Soon he heard cries of alarm, horror, despair, and came
up to the worthy clergyman of the parish cowering up against the hedge,
almost in a fainting fit, under a strong impression that it was the Evil One
in person who just hissed past him in a fire-flaught.
Those of this generation who remember their first encounter with a locomotive
in a dark night, can realize the terror of a country clergyman on
encountering so strange an apparition in a night walk.
It speaks as highly for Messrs. Boulton and Watt, in whose service he passed
all the active years of his life, as for Mr. Murdoch, that on leaving
Cornwall, he refused 1000 pounds a-year, which was offered him by the mining
adventurers to remain in the county, in charge of the steam-pumping engines.
Liberal as the offer seems, it would have paid them well, for on his
departure the engines lost twenty-five per cent. of their working power.
Handsworth Church, near Soho, contains a marble statue of James Watt, by
Chantrey, a copy of that erected in Westminster Abbey.
The railway passes Aston Hall, where James Watt and his only surviving son
lived until his death a few years ago. The park contains some fine trees,
and the house is a good specimen of the domestic architecture of the time of
Elizabeth.
[ASTON HALL: ill15.jpg]
It was sold for a trifling sum, with an imperfect title, which time has
cured, to a speculating banker; and, after having been let to the late James
Watt on a long lease, is now likely to exchange mansion and park for a
congeries of cottages in rows, forming forty-shilling freeholders.
The passion which the mechanics of Birmingham have for investing in land has
rendered land near that town dearer than in parallel situations near London.
THE BLACK COUNTRY.
WALSALL, DUDLEY, WEDNESBURY, DARLASTON.
The first diverging railway after leaving Handsworth, on the road to the
north, is what, for want of a better name, is called the South Staffordshire,
which connects Birmingham with Dudley, Walsall, Lichfield, and Tamworth, thus
uniting the most purely agricultural with the most thoroughly manufacturing
districts, and especially with that part of the great coal-field which is
locally known as the "Black Country." In this Black Country, including West
Bromwich, Wednesbury, Dudley, and Darlaston, Bilston, Wolverhampton, and
several minor villages, a perpetual twilight reigns during the day, and
during the night fires on all sides light up the dark landscape with a fiery
glow. The pleasant green of pastures is almost unknown, the streams, in
which no fishes swim, are black and unwholesome; the natural dead flat is
often broken by huge hills of cinders and spoil from the mines; the few trees
are stunted and blasted; no birds are to be seen, except a few smoky
sparrows; and for miles on miles a black waste spreads around, where furnaces
continually smoke, steam-engines thud and hiss, and long chains clank, while
blind gin-horses walk their doleful round. From time to time you pass a
cluster of deserted roofless cottages of dingiest brick, half-swallowed up in
sinking pits or inclining to every point of the compass, while the timbers
point up like the ribs of a half-decayed corpse. The majority of the natives
of this Tartarian region are in full keeping with the scenery--savages,
without the grace of savages, coarsely clad in filthy garments, with no
change on week-days and Sundays, they converse in a language belarded with
fearful and disgusting oaths, which can scarcely be recognized as the same as
that of civilized England.
On working days few men are to be seen, they are in the pits or the
ironworks, but women are met on the high-road clad in men's once white
linsey-woolsey coats and felt hats, driving and cursing strings of donkeys
laden with coals or iron rods for the use of the nailers.
On certain rare holidays these people wash their faces, clothe themselves in
decent garments, and, since the opening of the South Staffordshire Railway,
take advantage of cheap excursion trains, go down to Birmingham to amuse
themselves and make purchases. It would be a useful lesson for any one who
is particularly well satisfied with the moral, educational, and religious
state of his countrymen, to make a little journey through this Black Country.
He will find that the amiable enthusiasts who meet every May at Exeter Hall
to consider on the best means of converting certain aboriginal tribes in
Africa, India, and the Islands of the Pacific, need not go so far to find
human beings more barbarous and yet much more easily reclaimed.
The people of this district are engaged in coal-mining, in ironworks, in
making nails, and many other articles, or parts of articles, for the
Birmingham trade. Their wages are, for the most part, good; fuel is cheap;
well supplied markets, and means of obtaining the best clothing are close at
hand. But, within sixty years a vast dense population has been collected
together in districts which were but thinly inhabited as long as the value
lay on the surface, instead of in the bowels of the earth. The people
gathered together and found neither churches, nor schools, nor laws, nor
customs, nor means for cleanliness at first, nor even an effective police to
keep order. And thus they became one of the most ignorant, brutal, depraved,
drunken, unhealthy populations in the kingdom, unless it be a set of people
in the same occupations in the neighbourhood of Manchester.
We shall never forget, some five-and-twenty years ago, passing near Bilston
on a summer's holiday, and seeing a great red, pied bull foaming, and
roaring, and marching round a ring in which he was chained, while a crowd of
men, each with a demoniacal-looking bulldog in his arms, and a number of
ragged women, with their hair about their ears, some of them also carrying
bull-dog pups, yelled about the baited bull. It gave us an awful fright, and
haunted our childish dreams for years after.
The first change forced upon the governing classes, by feelings of self-
protection was an organized police, and the "Black" people are now more
disgusting than dangerous. The cholera of 1832, which decimated Bilston and
Wednesbury, did something toward calling attention to the grievous social and
sanitary wants of this district. In that pestilence several clergymen and
medical men died, like heroes, in the discharge of their duties. Some
churches were built, some schools established; but an immense work remains to
be done. Bull-baiting has been put down, but no rational amusements have
been substituted for that brutal and exciting sport.
In the northern coal fields, near Newcastle-on-Tyne especially, we have
noticed that when the miner ascends from the pit in the evening, his first
care is to wash himself from head to foot, and then to put on a clean suit of
white flannel. As you pass along the one street of a pitman's village, you
will see the father reading a Chambers' Journal or a cheap religious magazine
at the door of his cottage while smoking a pipe, and nursing a child or two
on his knee; and through the open door, a neat four-post bed and an oak or
mahogany chest of drawers bear witness to his frugality.
In Wednesbury, Bilston, and all that district, when work is over you find the
men drinking in their dirty clothes and with grimy faces at the beer-shop of
the "Buttey," that is to say, the contractor or middleman under whom they
work, according to the system of the country, and the women hanging about the
doors of their dingy dwellings, gossiping or quarreling,--the old furies and
the young slatterns.
In the face of such savagery, so evidently the result of defective education,
two opposite and extreme parties in the State, the anti-church Mialls and the
pro-church Anthony Denisons, combine to oppose the multiplication of
education that teaches decency if it teaches nothing else.
One great step has been made by the Health of Town's Act, which is about to
be applied to some of these coal towns; and railways have rendered the whole
district so accessible that no foul spot can long remain unknown or
unnoticed.
* * * * *
WALSALL, eight miles from Birmingham, the first town in our way, which may be
reached directly by following the South Staffordshire, or by an omnibus,
travelling half-a-mile from Bescot Bridge, lies among green fields, out of
the bounds of the mining country, although upon the edge of the Warwickshire
and Staffordshire coalfield,--indeed the parliamentary borough includes part
of the rough population just described. It is very clean, without
antiquities or picturesque beauties, and contains nothing to attract visitors
except its manufactures, of which the best known is cheap saddlery for the
American, West Indian, and Australian markets. They make the leather and
wooden parts, as well as stirrups and bridles; also gunlocks, bits, spurs,
spades, hinges, screws, files, edge tools, and there is one steel-pen
manufactory, besides many articles connected with the Birmingham trade,
either finished or unfinished, the number of which is constantly increasing.
Walsall is celebrated for its pig-market, a celebrity which railroads have
not destroyed, as was expected, but rather increased. Special arrangements
for comfortably disembarking these, the most interesting strangers who visit
Walsall, have been made at the railway station.
The principal church, with a handsome spire, stands upon a hill, and forms a
landmark to the surrounding country. The ascent to it, by a number of steps,
has, according to popular prejudice, produced an effect upon the legs of the
inhabitants more strengthening than elegant, which has originated the
provincial phrase of "Walsall-legged." But this is, no doubt, a libel on the
understandings of the independent borough.
The houses are chiefly built of brick, but it seems as if some years ago the
inhabitants had been seized with an architectural disease, which has left its
marks in the shape of an eruption of stucco porticoes, and one or two
pretensious mansions, externally resembling jails or infirmaries, internally
boasting halls which bear the same proportion to the living rooms as
Falstaff's gallon of sack to his halfpennyworth of bread. No doubt there are
persons whom this style of house exactly suits, the portico represents their
pride, the parlour their economy. What was intended for the Walsall public
library consists of a thin closet behind a gigantic Ionic portico, now
tottering to its fall; and in like manner a perfectly dungeon-like effect has
been given to the principal hotel by another portico, which affords a much
better idea of the charges than of the accommodation to be found within.
As a general rule in travelling, we pass by all hotels with porticoes to take
refuge in more modest Green Dragons or Blue Boars.
Walsall has a municipal corporation of six aldermen and eighteen councillors.
The Reform Bill, to increase the troubles of this innocent borough, placed it
in schedule B, and gave it the privilege of making one M.P.
Fierce contests at every general election have been the result, in which some
blood, much money, and more beer, have been expended. But neither party has
thought it worth while to make the education of the savages of the Black
Country a piece of politics, and, if any one did, he would only be torn to
pieces between Church and Dissenters.
* * * * *
DUDLEY in Worcestershire, about six miles from Walsall by the South
Staffordshire Railway, has a castle and more than one legend for the
antiquarian, a cave, and limestone pits full of fossils for the geologist,
and especial interest for the historical economist, being the centre of the
district where the first successful attempts were made to smelt iron by
coal,--a process which has contributed, almost as much as our success in
textile manufactures, to give this small island a wealth and power which a
merely agricultural non-exporting community could never have attained.
Iron was manufactured with charcoal in England from the time of the Romans
till the middle of the eighteenth century, when the timber of many counties
had been entirely exhausted by the process. In 1558, in the reign of
Elizabeth, it was enacted that "no timber of the breadth of one foot square
at the stub, and growing within fourteen miles of the sea, or any part of the
river Thames or Severn, or any other river, creek, or stream, by the which
carriage is commonly used by boat or other vessel, to any part of the sea,
shall be converted to coal, or fuel for making iron;" {125a} and, in 1581, a
further Act was passed to prevent the destruction of timber. "For remedy
whereof it was enacted that no new iron works should be erected within
twenty-two miles of London nor within fourteen miles of the river Thames, nor
in the several parts of Sussex near the sea therein named. This Act not to
extend to the woods of Christopher Durrell, in the parish of Newdigate,
within the weald of Surrey, which woods have been coppiced by him for the use
of his iron works in those parts."
At the same period, we find from a letter in the Stradling Correspondence,
{125b} that, while iron was made in Surrey, Sussex, and Kent, where not a
pound is now manufactured, in Glamorganshire, at present a great seat of iron
manufacture, iron was so scarce that an anvil was leased out at the rent of
3s. 4d. a year, {126} a rent at which, taking the then value of money, a very
tolerable anvil could now be purchased.
When the woods of the kingdom began to be exhausted, attention was turned to
pit coal, which had long been in use for fuel in the counties where it was
plentifully found. A curious account of the first successful experiments is
to be found, told in very quaint language, in the Metallum Martis of Dudley
Dudley, son of Lord Edward Dudley (an ancestor of the late Earl Dudley and
Ward, and of the present Lord Ward, who now enjoys the very estates referred
to, and derives a princely income from the mineral treasures, the true value
of which was discovered by his unfortunate ancestor), published in the reign
of Charles II.
This Mr. Dudley was an early victim of the patent laws, which, to this day,
have proved to be for the benefit of lawyers and officials, and the
tantalization of true inventors and discoverers. The following extracts
contain his story, and enable us to compare the present with the then state
of iron manufacture:--
"Having former knowledge and delight in ironworks of my father's when I was
but a youth, afterwards, at twenty years old, was I fetched from Oxford, then
of Baliol College, anno 1619, to look after and manage three ironworks of my
father's, one furnace and two forges in the chace of Pensnel, in
Worcestershire; but wood and charcoal growing very scanty, and pit-coals in
great quantities abounding near the furnace, did induce me to alter my
furnace and to attempt by my new invention, the making of iron with pit-coal,
and found at my trial or blast, facere est addere inventioni. After I had
proved by a second blast and trial, the feasibility of making iron with pit-
coal and sea-coal, I found by my new invention the quality good and
profitable, but the quantity did not exceed above three tons a week."
After this, the inventor obtained a patent from King James I., for thirty-one
years in the nineteenth year of his reign. "But the year following the grant
there was so great a flood of rain,--to this day called the great May-day
flood,--that it ruined the author's ironworks and inventions, and at a market
town called Sturbridge, in comitatu Wigorniae, one resolute man was carried
from the bridge in the day time." "As soon as the author had repaired his
works, he was commanded to send all sorts of bar iron up to the Tower of
London, fit for making of muskets and carbines, {127} and the iron being so
tried by artists and smiths, that the ironmasters and ironmongers who had
complained that the author's iron was not merchantable, were silenced until
the twenty-first of King James." "At the then parliament all monopolies were
made null, and divers of the ironmeasters endeavoured to bring the invention
of making iron with pit-coal within the compass of a monopoly; but the Lord
Dudley and the author did prevail, yet the patent was limited to continue but
fourteen years."
This exception in the Statute of Monopolies, which incontestably proves the
claim of the Dudley family to the honour of having invented the art of
smelting iron with coal, runs in the following terms:--"Provided also that
this Act shall not extend to, or be prejudicial to, a graunt or priviledge
for the melting of iron ewer, and of maling the same into sea coals or pit
coals, by His Majesties letters Patent under the Great Seale of England, made
or graunted to Edward Lord Dudley."
After the passing of the Act, it seems that Dudley Dudley made "great store
of iron and sold it at 12 pounds a ton, and also cast-iron wares, as brewing
cisterns, pots, mortars;" but, being ousted of his works, he again set up a
furnace at "Himley, in the county of Stafford." Himley Hall is the present
residence of Lord Ward, the representative of the Dudley family. From that
time forward, the life of the unfortunate inventor was but one series of
misfortunes. Under Charles I. he got into law-suits, was the victim of riots
set on by the charcoal ironmasters, and was eventually lodged in prison in
the Compter. Then came the Great Rebellion, during which he had the
disadvantage of being a Royalist as well as an inventor, and of having
"Cromwell, with Major Wildman and many of his officers, as opponents in rival
experiments tried in the Forest of Dean, where they employed an ingenious
glassmaster, Edward Dagney, an Italian then living in Bristow," but they
failed. And so he was utterly ruined. On the accession of Charles II., he
petitioned, and eventually sent in the statement from which the preceding
extracts have been made, but apparently without any success. The king was
too busy making dukes and melting the louis d'ors of his French pension, to
think of anything so common as iron or so tiresome as gratitude.
The iron manufacture, for want of the art of smelting by coal, and of a
supply of wood, which the march of agriculture daily diminished, dwindled
away, until, in the middle of the eighteenth century, it was revived at
Colebrook Dale by the Darbys. In the intermediate period, we were dependent
on Russia, Spain, and Sweden for the chief part of the iron used in
manufactures.
But one of the most curious passages in Dudley's Metallum Martis, is the
following picture of the Dudley coal-field:--"Now let me show some reasons
that induced me to undertake these inventions. Well knowing that within ten
miles of Dudley Castle, there be near 20,000 smiths of all sorts, and many
ironworks within that circle decayed for want of wood (yet formerly a mighty
woodland country); secondly, Lord Dudley's woods and works decayed, but pit-
coal and iron stone or mines abounding upon his lands, but of little use;
thirdly, because most of the coal mines in these parts are coals ten, eleven,
and twelve yards thick; fourthly, under this great thickness of coal are very
many sorts of ironstone mines; fifthly, that one-third part of the coals
gotten under the ground are small, when the colliers are forced to sink pits
for getting of ten yards thick, and are of little use in an inland country,
unless it might be made use of by making iron therewith; sixthly, these
colliers must cast these coals and slack out of their ways, which, becoming
moist, heat naturally, and kindle in the middle of these great heaps, often
sets the coal works on fire and flaming out of the pits, and continue burning
like AEtna in Sicily or Hecla in the Indies." (sic.)
At present, for more than ten miles round Dudley Castle, iron works of one
kind or another are constantly at work; no remains of mighty woodland are to
be found. The value of the ten yard coal is fully appreciated, but the
available quantity is far from having been worked out. The untouched mineral
wealth of Lord Ward in this district was valued, ten years ago, at a million
sterling. The small coal is no longer wasted, but carefully raised from the
pits and conveyed by the numerous canals, tram-roads, and railroads, to iron
works, glass works, and chemical works. But still heaps of waste, moistened
by rain, do smoke by day, and flaming by night in conjunction with hundreds
of fiery furnaces and natural gases blazing, do produce, on a night's journey
from Dudley to Wolverhampton, not the effect of one AEtna or Hecla, but of a
broad "inferno," from which even Dante might have gathered some burning
notions.
The political croakers who are constantly predicting that the last inevitable
change, whether it be a Municipal Corporation Reform, a Tithe Commutation, or
a Corn Tax Repeal, will prove the ruin of England, should study the
geographical march of our manufactures, and mark how, on the whole
population, the rise of a new staple in one district, or the invention of a
new art, constantly creates a new demand for labour. The exhaustion of our
forests, instead of destroying, founded one great element of our world-wide
commercial influence.
We make no apology for this digression, knowing that, to many minds, facts
connected with the rise of the iron trade will have as much interest as notes
on the scene of a battle or the birthplace of a second-rate poet, besides, as
we omit to say what we do not know, it is necessary we should say what we do.
Besides mining and smelting iron ore, a considerable population in and around
Dudley is engaged in the manufacture of glass and of nails; the latter being
a domestic manufacture, at which men, women, and children all work at home.
The castle dates from a Saxon prince, Dodo, A.D. 700; but, like the bird of
the same name, the original building is extinct. But very interesting ruins
of a Norman gateway, tower, and keep, are in existence; and form, with the
caves, a show-place leased by the South Staffordshire as an attraction to
their excursion trains. The caves are lighted up on special occasions, and
were honoured by a visit from the geologists of the British Association when
last they met at Birmingham. A fossil, called the Dudley locust, is found in
great quantities and varieties in the limestone quarries, which form part of
the mineral wealth of the neighbourhood.
The broad gauge line through Birmingham and Oxford will shortly afford Dudley
a direct and rapid communication with London. To passengers this will be a
great convenience, but a mode of conveyance so unwieldy, clumsy, and costly,
is singularly ill fitted for a mineral district, as experience among the
narrow tram-ways of the north has amply proved.
Dudley returns one member to Parliament; whose politics must, it is supposed,
be those of the holder of the Ward estate.
Returning from Dudley through Walsall to Bescot Bridge, the rail pursues its
course through a mining country to Bilston and Wolverhampton. On the road we
pass in sight of the Birmingham canal, one of the finest works of the kind in
the kingdom. An enormous sum was spent in improving the navigation, in order
to prove that any railway was unnecessary. The proprietors, under the
influence of their officials, a snug family party, shut their eyes and spent
their money in opposing the inevitable progress of locomotive power to the
last possible moment. Even when the first London and Birmingham railway was
nearly open, a scheme for a new canal was industriously hawked round the
county; and, although there were not enough subscribers found to execute the
work, a small percentage was sufficient to furnish a surveyor's new house
very handsomely. Still, there is no probability of the canal ever ceasing to
be an important aid to the coal trade in heavy freights.
* * * * *
WEDNESBURY, {130} pronounced Wedgebury, and spelt Wednesberie in Domesday
Book, stands in the very heart of the coal and iron district, and is as like
Tipton, Darlaston, Bilston, and other towns where the inhabitants are
similarly employed, as one sweep is like another. Birmingham factors depend
largely on Wedgebury for various kinds of ironwork and "heavy steel toys."
The coal pits in the neighbourhood are of great value, and there is no better
place in the kingdom to buy a thoroughbred bull dog that will "kill or die on
it," but never turn tail. The name is supposed to incorporate that of the
Saxon god Woden, whose worship consisted in getting drunk and fighting, and,
to this day, that is the only kind of relaxation in which many of the
inhabitants ever indulge. The church stands upon a hill, where Ethelfleda,
Lady of Mercia, built a castle to resist the Danes, A.D. 914, about the time
that she erected similar bulwarks at Tamworth and other towns in the Midland
counties, but there are no antiquities worth the trouble of visiting.
Parties who take an interest in the progress of education in this kingdom
among those classes where it is most needed, that is to say, masses of miners
and mechanics residing in districts from which all the higher and most of the
middle classes have removed; where the clergy are few, hard worked, and ill
paid; where the virtues of a thinly peopled agricultural district have been
exchanged for the vices, without the refinements, of a crowded town
population, should traverse this part of Staffordshire on foot. They will
own that, in spite of the praiseworthy labours of both Church and Dissent,--in
spite of the progress of Temperance Societies and Savings' Banks,--a crowd of
children are daily growing up in a state of ignorance, dirt, and degradation
fearful to contemplate. To active philanthropists, not to seekers of the
picturesque, archaeologists, and antiquarians, do we address ourselves. Still
we ought to add that, in the iron works and rolling mills, there are studies
of half naked men in active motion at night, with effect of red firelight and
dark shade, in which the power of painting flesh and muscular development
might be more effectively displayed than in the perpetual repetition of model
Eves and sprawling nymphs.
* * * * *
WOLVERHAMPTON formerly lay away from railroads, at a convenient omnibus
distance; but competition has doubly pierced it through and through. One
line connects it with Shrewsbury; another, on the point of completion, will
connect it with Dudley, Birmingham, and Oxford, and another with
Worcester,--add to these means of communication the canals existing before
railroads commenced, extending to Hull, Liverpool, Chester, and London, and
it will be seen that Wolverhampton is most fortunately placed.
The great railway battle of the gauges commenced at Wolverhampton, and has
been carried on ever since at the cost of more than a million sterling in
legal and parliamentary expenses, beside the waste of capital in constructing
three railways where one would have been sufficient, and the extra cost of
land traversed where a price was paid, 1st, for the land; 2nd, for the
revenue; 3rd, for compulsion; 4th, for influence, and 5th, for vote, if the
landowner were a member of either House of Parliament.
At the end of the battle, a competing line to London has been established,
which will end shortly in a compromise; and, if one district has two
railways, others, much needing, have none. The shareholders on both sides
have lost their money, the engineers have reaped a harvest, and the lawyers
have realized a fortune.
The experience of water companies, gas companies, canal companies, and
railway companies, has distinctly been, that, between great monied
corporations with large capitals sunk in plant, competition is impossible and
must end in a compromise.
But these contests are profitable to lawyers, who must always win, whether
their clients do or not. It is no exaggeration to say that, as surely as
Spain and Portugal are priest-ridden, so surely is Great Britain lawyer-
ridden. No sooner does the science, the industry, and the enterprise of the
country carve out some new road to commercial prosperity, than the attorney
sets up a turnpike upon it and takes toll; and, if dispute arises as to the
right of road, however the contest be decided, it ends in two attornies
taking toll. In chancery, in the laws affecting patents of inventions, in
the law affecting canals, in railways, a standing army of lawyers are
constantly engaged in fighting battles, which end in our bearing the wounds
and their sharing the spoil. So it was in these battles of the gauges.
But to return to Wolverhampton, the name of which recalled battles wherein so
much useful money has been wasted, the town, although of rising importance in
a commercial point, offers no other attraction to the curious traveller than
its numerous manufactories of hardware, and machinery of various kinds,
including firearms, tinned ware, locks and keys, of extraordinary cheapness,
gun locks, files, screws, and japanned ware.
The tea trays, and other japanned ware of Wolverhampton, are equal in taste
and execution to anything produced in Birmingham; indeed, it was at the
manufactory of the Messrs. Walton that the plan of skilfully copying the
landscapes of our best artists on japan were originated. The first tea-tray
of the kind was copied from one of Turner's Rivers of France, by a gentleman
who has since taken up a very important position in applying the true
principles of art to British manufactures.
Wolverhampton, and all the towns and villages in the coal and iron district,
are only so many branch-Birminghams; in that hardware metropolis the greater
part of the goods made are ordered and sold.
The town is of great antiquity, although with as few remains as most
flourishing towns built of brick, where manufactures have chased away
mansions. The name is derived from Walfrana, a sister of King Edgar, who
founded a monastery there in A.D. 996, and collected a village round it named
Walfrana Hampton, which was eventually corrupted into Wolverhampton. In the
oldest Church, St. Peter's, there is a pulpit formed of a single stone,
elaborately sculptured, and a font, with curious bas-relief figures of
saints. The Church is collegiate, and the College consists of a dean, who
holds the prebend of Wolverhampton, which was annexed by Edward IV. to his
free chapel of St. George, within the Castle of Windsor.
A Free Grammar School, supported by endowments, affords a head master 400
pounds a-year; the second master 200 pounds; and a third master 120 pounds.
Some years ago these gentlemen had only seventy scholars to teach, but we
trust this is, or will be, amended.
Wolverhampton was made a Parliamentary borough by the Reform Act, returning
two members from boundaries which include the townships of Bilston,
Willenhall, Wednesfield, and the parish of Sedgeley. The population has
increased more than five fold in the last forty years.
Bird, the artist, Congreve, inventor of the rockets which bear his name, and
Abernethy, the eminent surgeon, were natives of Wolverhampton; Huskisson, who
began the commercial reforms which Peel finished, was born at Oxley Hall, in
the immediate neighbourhood.
Close to the town is a good racecourse, well frequented once a year, formerly
one of the most fashionable meetings in the country. The ladies' division of
the Grand Stand used to be a complete parterre of the gayest flowers; but
railroads, which have added to the quantity, have very much deteriorated the
quality of the frequenters of races, and unless a change takes place, a Grand
Stand will soon be as dark, as busy, and as dull as the Stock Exchange.
From Wolverhampton a line nineteen miles in length, through Albrighton (where
Staffordshire ends and Shropshire begins) and Shifnal to Wellington, shortens
the route to Shrewsbury by cutting off an angle; but as there is nothing to
be said about this route except that at Albrighton are the kennels of the
hunt of that name, (a hunt in which the greater or less luxury in horseflesh
of the young ironmasters affords a thermometer of the state of the iron
trade,) we shall on this occasion take the Stafford line.
Within an easy distance of Wolverhampton are a very large number of the
noblemen's and gentlemen's seats, in which Staffordshire is so rich; more
than one ancient and dilapidated family has been restored by the progress of
smoke-creating manufactures, which have added to the wealth even more than
they destroyed the picturesqueness of the country.
If we were conducting a foreigner over England with the view of showing him
the wealth, the power, and the beauties of our country, we should follow
exactly the course we have hitherto pursued, and after an exhausting
inspection of the manufactories of the coal country, should turn off the
rail, after leaving Wolverhampton on our road to Stafford, and visit some of
the beautiful mansions surrounded by that rich combination of nature and art
which so eminently distinguishes the "stately homes of England."
For instance, before reaching Penkridge we pass--on the right hand, Moseley
Court, where the ancestors of the proprietors, the Whitgreaves, concealed
Charles II. after the Battle of Worcester,--on the left, Wrottesley Hall, the
seat of the scientific nobleman of that name, and Chellington Park, the
residence of the ancient Roman Catholic family of the Giffords, where an
avenue of oaks, the growth of centuries, with a magnificent domain stocked
with deer and game, afford the admirers of English scenery delicious vistas
of wood, water, and rich undulating pasture.
The contrast between the murky atmosphere and continued roar of the
ironmaking country, and the silence of the deer-haunted green glades is most
striking, and most grateful to eye and ear.
As we rush along the valley of the Penk, too rapidly to drink in its full
beauties; on the right, Teddesley Hall, the mansion of Lord Hatherton, rising
above the tops of the trees, reminds us that the noble lord's farms are well
worth a visit from any one taking an interest in agriculture. Poor land has
been rendered comparatively fertile, and by a complete system of drainage,
mere marshy rush-growing meadows have been made capable of carrying capital
root and wheat crops, while the waste water has been carried to a head, and
then by a large overshot water wheel, working below the surface of the
ground, made useful for thrashing, chaff and root cutting, and other
operations of the farm.
At Penkridge, a rural village of considerable antiquity, ten miles from
Wolverhampton, adorned by a Gothic Church, and several picturesque houses of
the Elizabethan style of domestic architecture, it will be convenient to
descend, if an expedition is intended, over Cannock Chase to Beaudesert, the
seat of the Marquis of Anglesey.
[THE RAILWAY NEAR PENKRIDGE: ill17.jpg]
This Cannock Chase completes the singular variations of soil and occupation
to be found in Staffordshire. From the densely-populated iron districts, and
the model agriculture of disciples of the same school as Lord Hatherton, we
can turn our faces to a vast moorland, forty miles square, stretching from
where it is first seen on the banks of the railway to the banks of the Trent,
as wild as any part of Wales or Scotland, intersected by steep hills, by deep
valleys, covered with gorse and broom, dotted with peat marshes, tenanted by
wild deer and feathered game, and fed over by the famous "Kenk" sheep, nearly
as wild as deer, and in flavour rivalling the best mountain mutton. This
great waste was once covered with dense forests, in which the wolf, the bear,
the wild boar, and the wild bull were hunted by our Saxon Kings. It is not
among the least wonders effected by the locomotive that a short hour can
transport us from the midst of the busiest centres of manufactures to a
solitude as complete as is to be found in the prairies of America or
Australia, unless we by chance stumble upon a prying gamekeeper or an idle
rustic seeking whortle-berries or snaring hares.
On this chase, begged by his ancestors from an easy king as a kitchen garden,
the hero of the Light Cavalry at Waterloo annually takes his sport, mounted
on a perfect shooting cob, and with eighty years upon his shoulders, can
still manage to bring down his birds right and left.
Long may such blanks of solitude and wild nature remain amid the busy hum of
commerce to remind us of what all England once was, to afford, at a few
holidays in the year, a free breathing place to the hardworking multitude,
and to the poet and student that calm delight which the golden fragrance of a
gorse-covered moor can bestow.
Before we reach Stafford we leave on the right, although not in sight,
Shugborough, the deserted mansion of the Earl of Lichfield, a descendant of
the Lord Anson who "sailed round the world but was never in it."