SOUTHAMPTON WATER AND THE NEW FOREST
Bitterne is now a suburb of Southampton on the opposite side of the
Itchen, but it may claim to be the original town from which the Saxon
settlement arose. It is the site of the Roman Clausentium, an
important station between Porchester and Winchester, and when the
Saxons came up the water and landed upon the peninsula between the two
rivers they probably found a populous town on the older site. This
conjecture would account for the name given to the new colony--_Southhame
tune_--ultimately borne by the county-town and the origin of the shire
name. It is as the natural outlet for the trade of Winchester and Wessex,
standing at the head of one of the finest waterways in Europe, that
Southampton became the present thriving and important town.
To-day its commercial prestige, if not on a par with Liverpool, Hull
or Cardiff, is sufficiently great for the town to rank as a county
borough. The magnificent docks are capable of taking the largest
liners, and as the port of embarkation for South Africa its
consequence will increase still more as that great country develops.
On the banks of the Itchen many important industries have been
established during the last quarter of a century and, as a result of
this and the inevitable disorder of a great port, Southampton's
environs have suffered. But more than any other town in England of the
same size, have the powers that give yea or nay to such questions
conserved the relics of the past with which Southampton is so richly
endowed. The most famous of these is the Bargate (originally "Barred"
Gate), once the principal, or Winchester, entrance to the town. It
dates from about 1350, though its base is probably far older. The
upper portion, forming the Guildhall, bears on the south or town side
a quaint statue of George III in a toga, that replaced one of Queen
Anne in stiff corsets and voluminous gown. The various armorial
bearings displayed are those of noble families who have been connected
with the town in the past. Within the upper chamber are two ancient
paintings said to represent the legendary Sir Bevis, whose sword is
preserved at Arundel, and his squire Ascupart. Sections of the town
wall may be found in several places, but the most considerable portion
is on the north side of the Westgate, where, until the middle of the
last century, when Westernshore Road was made, high tides washed the
foot of the wall. The arcading of this portion is much admired, and
deservedly so. So far as the writer is aware, no other town in England
has medieval defences of quite this character remaining. The
picturesque Bridewell Gate is at the end of Winkle Street and not far
away is all that remains of "God's House" or the Hospital of St.
Julian, "improved" out of its ancient beauty. The chapel was given to
the Huguenot refugees by Queen Elizabeth; a portion of the original
chancel still exists and within the Anglican service continues to be
said in French. The house known as "King John's House," close to the
walls near St. Michael's Square, dates from the twelfth century and is
therefore one of the oldest in England. Another old building in Porter
Lane called "Canute's House" is declared by archaeologists to be of
the twelfth century, but Hamptonians, with some degree of probability,
claim that the lower walls are certainly Saxon, so that the
traditional name may be right after all. In that part of the town
nearest to the docks are several stone cellars of great age upon which
later dwellings have been erected, in some cases two buildings have
appeared on the same sturdy base. A particularly fine crypt is in
Simnel Street, with a window at its east end. At the corner of Bugle
Street is the "Woolhouse," said to belong to the fourteenth century;
very noticeable are the heavy buttresses that support this fine old
house on its west side. Another old dwelling in St. Michael's Square
may have been built in the fifteenth century. Tradition has it that
this was for a time the residence of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn.
[Illustration: THE ARCADES, SOUTHAMPTON.]
The reference to Canute's House brings to mind the tradition, stoutly
upheld by Hamptonians, that it was at "Canute's Point" at the mouth of
the Itchen, and not at Bosham or Lymington, that the king gave his
servile courtiers the historic rebuke chronicled by Camden. By him,
quoting Huntingdon, we are told that "causing his chair to be placed
on the shore as the tide was coming in, the king said to the latter,
'Thou art my subject, and the ground I sit on is mine, nor can any
resist me with impunity. I command, thee, therefore, not to come up on
my ground nor wet the soles of the feet of thy master.' But the sea,
immediately coming up, wetted his feet, and he, springing back, said,
'Let all the inhabitants of the earth know how weak and frivolous is
the power of princes; none deserves the name of king, but He whose
will heaven, earth, and sea obey by an eternal decree.' Nor would he
ever afterwards wear his crown, but placed it on the head of the
crucifix." There is little doubt that Southampton was one of the
principal royal residences during the reign of the great Northman, and
nearly a hundred years before, in Athelstan's days, it was of
sufficient importance to warrant the setting up of two mints.
The only medieval church remaining to Southampton is St. Michael's,
which has a lofty eighteenth-century spire on a low Norman tower. Here
is another of those black sculptured Tournai fonts one of which has
been noticed in Winchester. The interior must have presented a curious
appearance in the early years of Queen Victoria. During her
predecessor's reign the incumbent placed the pulpit and reading-desk
at the west end and reversed all the seats so that the congregation
sat with their backs to the altar. The purpose of this is beyond
conjecture. St. Mary's, designed by Street, was erected on the site of
the old town church in 1879 as a memorial to Bishop Wilberforce. All
Saints' in High Street is a classic building standing on the ground
occupied by a very ancient church. Isaac Watts was deacon of Above Bar
Chapel, noteworthy for the fact that the immortal hymn "Oh God, our
help in ages past" was first sung within its walls from manuscript
copies supplied to the congregation by the young poet. Among other
famous men who were natives of Southampton may be mentioned Dibdin and
Millais.
As might be expected from its geographical position and the many
centuries it has been a gate to central England, Southampton has had a
chequered and eventful history. Before the days of those supposedly
impregnable forts in Spithead which bar to all inimical visitors a
passage up the Water, the town was not immune from attack from the sea
and in 1338 an allied French, Genoese and Spanish fleet sailed up the
estuary and attacked the town to such good purpose that the burgesses
were forced to fly and from a safe distance saw their homes burned to
the ground. Another assault was made by the French in 1432, but
profiting by bitter experience, the citizens had by now constructed
such defences and armed them so well that this attack was an
ignominious failure.
The port was the scene of several great expeditions overseas before it
gave its quota to that greatest of all crusades in 1914. It saw the
start of Richard Lion-Heart's transports, filled with the chivalry of
England, on their way to challenge the power of Islam. The town
records show that 800 hogs were supplied by the citizens for feeding
the army _en route_. Perhaps the most famous of the sailings was that
of the twenty-one ships that carried the English army to the victory
of Creçy. Again seventy years later there was another great sallying
forth to the field of Agincourt, nearly frustrated by the machinations
of Richard, Earl of Cambridge. This scion of the Plantagenets and his
fellow conspirators were beheaded and afterwards buried, as recorded
on a tablet there, in the chapel of God's House. From Southampton the
_Mayflower_ and _Speedwell_ sailed in 1620: the latter being discarded
at Plymouth.
The modern aspect of Southampton's streets is that of the bustle and
activity of a midland town, and the narrow pavements of Below and
Above Bar have that metropolitan air which a crowd of well-dressed
people intent on business or pleasure gives to the better class
provincial city. It would seem that the inevitable accompaniment of
such prosperity is the meanness of poorly-built and squalidly-kept
suburbs. When the superb situation of Southampton is considered one
can but hope that some day, in the new England that we are told is on
the way, a great transformation will take place on the shores of
Itchen and Test.
The excursion that every visitor should take is down the Water to
Cowes. Few steamer trips in the south are as pleasant and interesting.
In consequence of the double tides with which Southampton is favoured,
the chance of having a long stretch of ill looking and worse smelling
mud flats in the foreground of the view is almost negligible. Unless a
very thorough knowledge of the shore is desired, the view from the
deck will give the stranger an adequate idea of the surrounding
country. The passing show of shipping, of all sorts, sizes and
nationalities, is not the least interesting item of the passage. The
writer's most vivid recollection of Southampton Water in the early
summer of 1918 is not of the beautiful shores shimmering in the June
sun, but of an extraordinary line of "dazzle ships" in the centre of
the waterway, moored bow to stern in a long perspective, or it would
be more correct to say, want of perspective, the brain and the eye
being so much at variance that the ends of the line could scarcely be
believed to consist of ships at all.
[Illustration: NETLEY RUINS.]
The ruins of Netley Abbey can best be seen by taking the pleasant
shore road from Woolston and Weston Grove. The distance is a little
over two miles from the Itchen ferry. The so-called Netley Castle was
once the gate-house of the Abbey, converted into a fort when Henry
VIII devised the elaborate scheme of coast defence that has dotted the
southern seaboard with a more scattered (and more picturesque) series
of Martello towers.
The ruins of the Cistercian Church which once graced this shore and
raised above the trees its lighthouse tower, a seamark by day and a
beacon by night, are among the loveliest in Wessex. Though perhaps
these relics of a former splendour, when they consist of more than a
few bits of broken masonry, should rather be said to be heartrending
in their reminder of what we have lost.
Not so beautiful is the great pile, a mile to the south, built during
the Crimean war for the invalid warriors and named after their Queen.
A short distance away is another great building, or series of
structures, erected during the Great War, to further our claim to the
empire of the air.
[Illustration: ON THE HAMBLE.]
The Hamble river is the only considerable stream before the barrier
spit of Calshot Castle is reached. This comes down from historic
Bishop's Waltham with its considerable remains of the "palace" of the
earlier Bishop of Winchester. After passing Botley, an ancient market
town, the river widens into an estuary haven altogether out of
proportion to the stream behind it, and at Bursledon, where it is
crossed by the Portsmouth highway, it becomes really beautiful: the
curving banks are in places embowered in trees that descend to the
water's edge. When the tide is full the scene would hold its own with
many more favoured by the guide books. The fields around are devoted
to the culture of the strawberry for the London market, and the crops
are said to be finer than those of the better-known Kentish districts.
Two finds from the stream bed are in Botley market hall, a portion of
a Danish war vessel and an almost entire prehistoric canoe.
[Illustration: GATE HOUSE, TITCHFIELD.]
A name better known to the majority of our readers will be that of the
Meon, a further reference to which district will be found in the
concluding chapter. The waters of this longer stream rise on a western
outlier of Butser Hill and, draining a remote and beautiful district
served by the Meon Valley Railway, reach Titchfield Haven over three
miles below the Hamble. Titchfield, two miles as the crow flies from
the sea (for we are now on the open waters of the Solent), is a
pleasant old town with an interesting church and the gatehouse remnant
of a once famous abbey of Premonstratensians. Part of the tower and
nave of the church are Saxon, and the remainder is in a whole range of
styles. A chapel on the south was once the property of the abbey and
is called the Abbot's Chapel, this has a fine tomb of the first and
second Earls and first Countess of Southampton. Perhaps of more
interest to some visitors will be the flag hung near the opening to
the chancel. This was the first to fly over Pretoria after the British
occupation.
The western shore of Southampton Water may be accepted as the eastern
boundary of the New Forest, as the straight north and south valley of
the Salisbury Avon is its western barrier. From the sea at
Christ-church Bay to the Blackwater valley west of Romsey is about
twenty miles and all this great district partakes more or less of the
character of the country seen from the Bournemouth express after it
leaves Lyndhurst Road. To attempt to describe in detail this unique
corner of England would be beyond the possibilities of this book or
its author, and only the barest outline will be attempted.
One authority claims 95,000 acres as the extent of the Forest. The
present writer would increase this estimate considerably. About
two-thirds of the more central portion are crown lands, and as will be
seen by the most superficial view (from the afore-mentioned express
train for instance) much of the central woodland is interspersed with
farms and arable land and a large extent of open heath, as are those
outlying fringes in the Avon valley and elsewhere. It is unaccountable
that the word "forest" should have so altered in meaning during the
course of centuries that its earlier significance has almost become
lost. The word is associated in every one's mind with the density of
tropical foliage or the dark grandeur of northern fir woods. Forest as
a topographical suffix denotes a wild uncultivated tract of hilly or
common land, more often than not quite bare of trees. The great
expanse of Radnor Forest is well known to the writer and not even a
thorn bush comes to the mind in picturing its miles of fern-clad
billowy uplands.
The "New" Forest was first so called by the Conqueror. He brought
within its bounds certain tracts that had been preserved by his
predecessors, but that he "burnt and razed whole villages, and
converted a smiling countryside into a wild place devoted to the
king's pleasure" is extremely improbable, unless we may credit William
with an altruistic care for the sport of his great-grandchildren at
the expense of whatever little popularity he may have had in his own
time. Undoubtedly the folk of this part of Hampshire felt aggrieved at
losing their rights over a great stretch of wild common where the more
democratic Saxon kings had taken their pleasure without interfering
with the privileges of the churl. That certain small settlements were
at some time abandoned is attested by names such as Bochampton,
Tachbury, Church Walk, etc., and it is said that Rufus established
certain dispossessed peasantry in far-off portions of his kingdom. The
Conqueror's immediate successors made cruel and arbitrary laws, in
connexion with the preservation of the deer, that were much mitigated
by the Forest Charter of 1217 which provided that death should no
longer be the penalty for killing the King's deer, but merely a fine,
or imprisonment in default.
The wild life of the Forest is much the same as that of the remoter
parts of rural England, apart from the ponies and the deer. Of the
latter only a few still roam the glades. An Act was passed in 1851 for
their removal, when the number was reduced from nearly 4,000 to about
250 of two kinds--fallow deer and red deer. Latterly roe deer have
appeared, adventurers from Milton Abbey park. The New Forest pony was
a distinct breed and the writer has been told that it was the
descendant of a small native horse, but its characteristics have been
lost through scientific crossing with alien breeds. A legend used to
be current in the Forest that the ponies were descended from those
landed from the wrecked ships of the Spanish Armada, but there is a
limit to what we may believe of this wonderful fleet. Most villages
along the south coast having rather more than the usual proportion of
dark-haired folk have been claimed as asylums for the castaway sailors
and soldiers of Spain by enthusiastic amateur anthropologists.
Before breaking-in, the Forest pony is a wild and often vicious little
beast--more so, perhaps, than its cousins of Wales and Dartmoor--and a
"drive," when the little horses are corralled, is an exciting and
interesting affair, human wits being pitted against equine, not always
to the advantage of the former.
Small companies of rough-coated donkeys may occasionally be seen, in
an apparently wild state, roaming about the more open parts of the
Forest. Some years ago the breeding of mules for export was a
recognized local concern, but this seems to have fallen into
desuetude.
Badgers and otters are common, as is the ubiquitous squirrel. The
badger, however, is seldom seen by the chance visitor by reason of its
nocturnal habits, but it is said to be more numerous than in any
similar wild tract in the south. The smaller wild mammals, carnivorous
and herbivorous, and a truly representative family of birds, including
one or two rare visitors, have here a perfect sanctuary. The forest is
obviously a happy hunting ground for the lepidopterist and botanist.
The latter will find many of the rarer British orchids in the central
"dingles" and on the more remote western borders. During the Great War
a large number of trees were felled and the usually silent woods
re-echoed with the noises of a Canadian lumber camp. About this time
great flocks of migratory jays from central Europe were noticed in the
eastern parts of the Forest. For the pedestrian who toils over the
Forest roads in the height of summer there is one form of wild life in
evidence that claims his whole attention, and that is the virulent and
audacious forest fly. Only the strongest "shag" and gloved hands can
keep this horrible creature at bay.
The observant stranger will notice a large proportion of small, dark
folk among the inhabitants of the Forest. It is a fascinating matter
for conjecture that these may be remnants of the Iberians that once
held south Britain or even, perhaps, of a still older people left
stranded by the successive races that have swept westwards by way of
the uplands to the north.
The western shore of Southampton Water has little of interest to
detain the visitor. The small town of Hythe, almost opposite Netley
Abbey, has nothing ancient about it, though it is a picturesque and
pleasant little place. Fawley, nearly opposite the opening of the
Hamble, has a fine late Norman church with much Early English
addition. Calshot Castle is another of those forts of Henry VIII
already mentioned, and once round the corner of this spit we are in
the Solent at Stanswood Bay. A few miles farther and the beautiful
estuary of the Beaulieu river runs into the recesses of the Forest.
Small steamers sometimes bring holiday-makers from Southampton to the
port of Beaulieu, called Bucklershard, where, over a hundred years
ago, there was an attempt to make a new seaport. It is difficult to
believe that this quiet creek was, during the second half of the
eighteenth century, the birthplace of many "wooden walls of old
England." Here among other famous ships was launched the _Agamemnon_,
commanded by Nelson at the siege of Celvi, where he lost his right
eye. An unfortunate disagreement between the shipbuilders and the
Admiralty, in which the former were so ill advised as to seek the help
of the law, led to the abandonment of the yards. At St. Leonards,
nearer the mouth of the estuary, is the ruin of a chapel belonging to
the Cistercians of Beaulieu and also portions of their great barn,
said to be the largest in England (209 feet by 70 feet). The great
Abbey church, nearly four miles off, was entirely swept away during
the Demolition. It was here that the wife of the King Maker took
refuge after the death of her husband at the battle of Barnet. A few
days before, on the actual day of the fight, arrived Margaret of Anjou
with reinforcements for Henry VI. Some years later, after his repulse
at Exeter, Perkin Warbeck sought sanctuary, the right of which had
been granted to the monastery by Pope Innocent IV. The monks'
refectory is now the parish church and a very fine and interesting one
it makes. Considerable portions of the domestic buildings remain.
Palace House, the residence of Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, was once the
gatehouse of the abbey.
A return must now be made to Southampton, and the Christchurch road
taken through Totton to Lyndhurst. The station for the latter town is
over two miles away on the Southampton road, where the railway makes a
wide detour to Beaulieu Road and Brockenhurst. The absurd title given
to Lyndhurst by local guide-books, "Capital of the New Forest," is
uncalled for. Certainly it is nearly the centre of the district and is
within convenient distance of some of the most beautiful woodlands,
but nothing could be a greater contrast to the surroundings than this
new-looking brick excrescence. It has one fine old Jacobean
building--the "King's House," where the Forest Courts are held. The
Verderers, of whom there are six, are elected by open ballot. They
must be landowners residing in or near the Forest and may sit in
judgment upon any offence against Forest laws. These Verderers Courts
have been held since Norman days and the old French terms "pannage,"
"turbary" and so on, are still used. Further, the old name for the
court, "Swain Mote," indicates a Saxon origin for this seat of
greenwood justice.
[Illustration: THE KNIGHTWOOD OAK IN WINTER.]
The spire of Lyndhurst church can be seen for miles wherever high
ground and a break in the woods render this possible. It surmounts a
mid-Victorian erection of variegated bricks in about the worst
possible taste for its situation. The one redeeming feature is a wall
painting of the Ten Virgins by Lord Leighton.
A little over two miles away, and on the road to the Rufus Stone, is
Minstead church, which will make a different appeal to the
understanding stranger. This is (or was lately) a charming survival
from the days of our grandfathers with a three-decker, old room-like
pews, and double galleries. Malwood Lodge, close by, is a seat of the
Harcourt family, and not far away, about a mile and a half from
Minstead church, is the spot where William Rufus was killed by that
mysterious arrow which by accident or design, relieved England of a
tyrannical and wicked king. The "Rufus Stone," as the iron memorial is
called, with its terse and non-committal inscription was placed here
by a former Lord de la Warr. The body was conveyed to Winchester in
the cart of a charcoal-burner named Purkiss, and descendants of this
man, still following his occupation, were living within bow-shot of
the memorial one hundred years ago. The family "enjoyed for centuries
the right to the taking of all such wood as they could gather _by hook
or by crook_, dead branches, and what could be broken, but not cut by
the axe." It is said that the train of accidents that befell the
Conqueror's family in the Forest was considered by Hampshire folk to
be a just retribution for his iniquity in "making" it. His grandson
Henry, his second son Richard, and lastly his third son Rufus, all met
a violent death within its glades.
A short distance westwards we reach the "Compton Arms Hotel" and
Stoney Cross, from which an alternate route through beautiful
Boldrewood can be taken back to Lyndhurst or a long and lonely but
good road followed all the way to Ringwood, nine miles away on the
Avon. The traveller who would explore the recesses of the forest
remote from the beaten track should make his way north and west from
Stoney Cross through the sandy heaths of Eyeworth Walk and the
mysterious depths of Sloden with its dark yews of great and unknown
age. Not far from Stoney Cross on the way to Fritham, are a number of
prehistoric graves clustered closely together, and an interesting
relic of the Roman occupation exists at Sloden where there are mounds
of burnt earth, charcoal, and broken pottery. The locality has long
been known as "Crock Hill" and is evidently the site of an earthenware
factory. The road going south and west by Broomy Walk leads to
Fordingbridge on the Avon. Here is a beautiful and interesting old
church, a typically pleasant Hampshire town, and a quiet but
delightful stretch of the river.
The straight high road, that runs south from Lyndhurst through the
thick woodlands of Irons Hill Walk and the giant oaks of Whitley Wood,
reaches Brockenhurst in four miles. This small town, to the writer's
mind, is pleasanter and less sophisticated than Lyndhurst, though
boarding-houses are as much in evidence and the railway station is
close to the main street. The church stands on a low hill among the
trees of the actual forest. Here was recently to be seen, and possibly
is still, a quaintly ugly survival in the squire's pew, placed as a
sort of royal box at the entrance to the chancel. The building is of
various dates and contains a Norman font of Purbeck marble. The
enormous yew of great age will at once be noticed in the churchyard.
The main road continues over Whitley Ridge to Lymington nearly five
miles from Brockenhurst, passing, about half-way on the left, Boldre,
with an old Norman church among the thickly-set trees on the hill above
Lymington River. The village and inn are at the bottom of the valley
near a bridge that carries the Beaulieu road up to the great bare
expanse of Beaulieu Heath.
After passing the branch railway, and about half a mile short of
Lymington, is a fine circular prehistoric entrenchment called Buckland
Rings. The road now drops to the one-time parliamentary borough and
ancient port of Lymington, now only known to the majority as the point
of departure by the "short sea route" to the Isle of Wight, and those
who make the passage when the tide is out do not usually regret the
shortness of their stay on this particular bit of coast. But their
self-congratulation is wasted, Lymington itself is a very pleasant and
clean town, even if its shore is a dreary stretch of salt marsh, grey
and depressing on the sunniest day. There are some fine old houses in
the picturesque High Street, though none of them remember the day in
1154 when Henry II landed on the way to his coronation. The much
restored church will be best appreciated for the picture it makes from
the other end of High Street.
Though a fashionable resort in those days when any seaside town was a
possible future Brighton, Lymington is never likely to become crowded
with visitors again, but artists find many good studies on the river
and in the town and even on the "soppy" flats themselves, and there are
salt baths at high tide for those unconventional holiday-makers who
favour the place.
To resume the main route through the forest from Lyndhurst the western
road must be taken. It presently turns sharply towards the south and
penetrates the fastnesses of the woods lining the Highland Water. Here
we find the celebrated Knightwood Oak and the grand beeches of Mark
Ash, nearly two miles away in the depths to the right, but worth the
trouble of finding. In less than six miles from Lyndhurst the traveller
reaches the cross-roads at Wilverley Post on the top of Markway Hill,
and in another long mile Holmsley station on the Brokenhurst-Ringwood
railway. Then follows an undulating and lonely stretch of four and a
half miles of mingled wood and common and occasional cultivated land to
the scattered hamlet of Hinton Admiral, that boasts a station on the
South Western main line to Bournemouth. There is now but an
uninteresting three miles to the outskirts of Christchurch.
[Illustration: LYMINGTON CHURCH.]
The one-time Saxon port of Twyneham and present borough of Christchurch
(the change of name, like several others in the country, was due to the
over-whelming power of the ecclesiastical as opposed to on the secular)
has a similarity to Southampton in its situation on a peninsula between
two rivers before they form a joint estuary to the sea. But, alas,
although the waterways of the Avon and Stour are considerable,
Christchurch Harbour long ago silted up and the long tongue of land
that runs eastward across the mouth effectually bars ingress to
anything in the nature of a trading vessel.
The town, though pleasant enough in itself, has but one real
attraction for the visitor and, judging by the crowds of
holiday-makers brought in every day by motor, tram and train from the
huge pleasure town on the west, the study of ecclesiastical
architecture must be gaining favour with the British public. Or is it
that the uncompromising modernity of Bournemouth, without even the
recollection of a Hanoverian princess to give it antiquity, drives its
visitors in such swarms to the one-time Priory, and now longest parish
church in England.
The old Saxon minster, after passing through many vicissitudes
(including a particularly humiliating one at the hands of William
Rufus, whose creature, Flambard, made slaves of its clergy and ran the
church as a miracle show!), became in the middle of the twelfth
century an Augustinian priory and the choir of the new building was
finished just before 1300. At the crossing of nave and transepts the
usual low and heavy Norman tower had been built with the usual
result--it collapsed and brought some of the choir down with it. This
was again rebuilt during the fifteenth century, which period also saw
the rise of the western tower that graces every distant view of the
town. The transepts have beneath them Norman crypts, though the
structure immediately above is of varying date, with a good deal of
original work remaining, including an apsidal chapel. The Lady Chapel
was built in the fifteenth century; over it is a room known as "St.
Michael's Loft." This served for years as Christchurch grammar school.
[Illustration: NORMAN TURRET, CHRISTCHURCH.]
Every one will admire the beautiful rood screen, well and carefully
restored in the middle of the last century, and the unusual reredos
which represents the Tree of Jesse and the Adoration of the Wise Men.
On the left of the altar is the Salisbury chantry and in front a stone
slab to Baldwin de Redvers (1216). There are several fine tombs in
other parts of the church including that of the last Prior, who has a
chapel to himself at the end of the south choir aisle. The fine
monument to Shelley at the west end of the church is as much admired
for its beauty as it is criticized for its "unfitness for a position
in a Christian church" (Murray). The female figure supporting
Shelley's body represents his wife. Mr. Cox in his _Little Guide to
Hampshire_ draws attention to the fact that the conception is "an
obvious parody of a Pieta, or the Virgin supporting the Dead Christ"
and therefore in the worst possible taste. The poet had no personal
connexion with Christchurch. His son lived for some years at Boscombe
Manor.
The custodian shows, when requested, a visitors' book where, on one and
the same page are the signatures of William II and Louis Raemaekers!
Comparatively few old buildings remain in the vicinity of the great
church and the visitor will not need to make an exhaustive exploration
of its environs, but before leaving Christchurch the fine collection
of local birds brought together and mounted by a resident of the town
should not be missed.
Embryo watering places, the conception of the "real estate" fraternity
whom Bournemouth has set by the ears, line the low shore of
Christchurch Bay between Hengistbury Head and Hurst Castle. First
comes Highcliffe, this has perhaps the most developed "front," then
Barton, nearly two miles from New Milton station, and lastly
Milford-on-Sea, the most interesting of them all, but suffering in
popularity by reason of the long road, over four miles, that connects
it with the nearest stations, Lymington or New Milton; possibly its
regular habitués look upon this as a blessing in disguise. Milford is
well placed for charming views of the Island: it has good firm sands
and a golf links. An interesting church stands back from the sea on
the Everton road. The thirteenth-century tower will at once strike the
observer as out of the ordinary; the Norman aisles of the church were
carried westwards at the time the tower was built and made to open
into it through low arches. The early tracery of the windows should be
noticed. The addition of transepts and the enlargement of the chancel
about 1250 made the church an exceptionally large structure for the
originally small village.
Southbourne, one and a half miles south-west of Christchurch, will
soon become a mere outer suburb of Bournemouth. It almost touches
Boscombe, that eastern extension of the great town that has sprung
into being within the last fifty years. Southbourne is said to be
bracing; it is certainly a great contrast to the bustle and glitter of
its great neighbour. There is a kind of snobbishness that strikes to
decry any large or popular resort, seemingly because it _is_ large and
popular, but surely there must be some virtue in these huge watering
places that attract so many year after year, and if Southbourne
pleases only Tom, and Bournemouth Dick and Harry _and_ their friends,
well, good health to them! That their favourite town does not start
off a new chapter may offend the latter, but they will perhaps admit
that although it is on the west side of the Avon the town among the
pines forms, with its sandy chines and the trees that gave it its
first claim to popular favour, an extension and outlier of the great
series of heath and woodland that has just been traversed and that it
makes a fitting geographical termination to south-western Hants.
Though the pines themselves have not been planted much longer than a
hundred years, they now appear as the only relics of a lonely and
rather bare tract of uncultivable desert. Local historians claim that
the beginnings of Bournemouth were made in 1810, but it would appear
that only two or three houses existed by the lonely wastes of sand in
the first few years of the Victorian era. One of these was an adjunct
to a decoy pond for wild fowl. The parish itself was not formed until
1894, and although fashionable streets and fine churches and a
super-excellent "Winter-garden" had been erected when the writer first
saw the town, not much more than twenty years ago, the front was
extremely "raw" and the only shelter during a shower was a large tent
on the sands that, on one never-to-be-forgotten occasion, collapsed
during a squall upon the crowd of lightly-clad holiday-makers
beneath. But this is a very dim and distant past for Bournemouth, the
"Sandbourne" of the Wessex novels. The town is now as well conducted
as any on the English coast. It is large enough and has a sufficient
permanent population to justify its inclusion in the ranks of the
county boroughs. It is becoming almost as popular as Ventnor with
those who suffer from weak lungs, though it can be very cold here in
January.
[Illustration: SAND AND PINES, BOURNEMOUTH.]
Bournemouth will be found a convenient centre, or rather starting
point, for the exploration of the beautiful Wessex coast. From the
pier large and comfortable steamers make the passage to Swanage,
Weymouth, Lyme and further afield. Another advantage which these large
towns have for the ordinary tourist is that he may generally count
upon getting some sort of roof to cover him when in the smaller coast
resorts lodgings are not merely at a premium but simply unobtainable
at any price.
[Illustration: CORFE CASTLE.]