Kenilworth Castle will in many respects disappoint the visitor, for its
chief attraction is the interest with which Walter Scott has invested it
in his vivid description of the Earl of Leicester's magnificent pageant
on the occasion of the reception of his royal mistress, Queen Elizabeth.
And the host of visitors who make the pilgrimage to this place, so
hallowed by historical associations, may be classed as pilgrims doing
homage to the genius of Scott. I find, on looking up Kenilworth's
history, that it was here that "old John of Gaunt, time-honored
Lancaster," dwelt; here also his son Bolingbroke, afterwards Henry IV.,
and Prince Hal, when he was a jovial, roistering sack-drinker; here
Henry VI. retired during the Jack Cade rebellion; Richard III. has held
high revel in the great hall; Henry VII. and bluff Hal VIII. have
feasted there with their nobles; but, after all, the visitor goes to see
the scene where, on the 9th of July, 1575, was such a magnificent fête
as that described by the novelist.
We walked through the village and on towards the castle, through the
charming English scenery I have described so often, the gardens gay with
roses and the banks of the roadside rich with wild flowers, a fair blue
sky above, and the birds joyous in the hedges and woods. This was the
avenue that led towards the Gallery Tower, through which rode Elizabeth
with a cavalcade illuminated by two hundred wax torches of Dudley's
retainers, the blaze of which flashed upon her sparkling jewels as she
rode in stately style upon her milk-white charger--the avenue now a
little rustic road, with a wealth of daisies on its banks; proudly rode
Leicester at her side, who, Scott says, "glittered, like a golden image,
with jewels and cloth of gold."
On we go to where the long bridge extended from the Gallery Tower to
Mortimer's Tower, which the story tells us was light as day with the
torches. A mass of crumbling ruins is all that remains of the two towers
now; and after passing by the end of a great open space, known as the
Tilt Yard, we come in sight of the principal ruins of the castle. We go
through a little gateway,--Leicester's gateway; R. D. is carved on the
porch above it,--and we are in the midst of the picturesque and
crumbling walls, half shrouded in their green, graceful mantle of ivy.
Here we find Cæsar's Tower, the Great Hall, Leicester's Buildings, the
Strong Tower, which is the Mervyn's Tower of the story, the one into
which the unfortunate Amy Robsart was conveyed while waiting for a visit
from Leicester during the festivities of the royal visit.
The Great Hall was a room of magnificent dimensions, nearly one hundred
feet long by fifty broad, and, as one may judge from its ruins,
beautiful in design. One oriel of the many arched windows is a beautiful
bit of picturesque ruin, and through it a most superb landscape view is
commanded. You are shown "The Pleasance," the place in the little garden
near the castle which was the scene of Queen Elizabeth's encounter with
Amy Robsart, and which still is called by the same name. The part of the
castle built by the Earl of Leicester in 1571, known as Leicester's
Buildings, are crumbling to decay, and is far less durable than some of
the other massive towers.
The outer walls of Kenilworth Castle encompassed an area of seven acres;
but walls and tower, great hall and oriel, are now but masses of ruined
masonry, half shrouded in a screen of ivy, and giving but a feeble idea
of what the castle was in its days of pride, when graced by Queen
Elizabeth and her court, and made such a scene of splendor and regal
magnificence as to excite even the admiration of the sovereign herself.
Time has marked the proud castle with its ineffable signet, and
notwithstanding the aid of imagination, Kenilworth seems but a mere
ghost of the past.
From Kenilworth Castle we took train for Stratford-on-Avon,--the place
which no American would think of leaving England without visiting,--a
quiet little English town, but whose inns have yearly visitors from half
the nations of the civilized world, pilgrims to this shrine of genius,
the birthplace of him who wrote "not for a day, but all time." A quaint,
old-fashioned place is Stratford, with here and there a house that might
have been in existence during the poet's time; indeed, many were, for I
halted opposite the grammar school, which was founded by Henry IV., and
in which Will Shakespeare studied and was birched; the boys were out to
play in the little square close, or court-yard, and as I entered through
the squat, low doorway, which, like many of these old buildings in
England, seems compressed or shrunk with age, I was surrounded by the
whole troup of successors of Shakespeare, the gates closed, and my
deliverance only purchased by payment of sixpence.
That antique relic of the past, the poet's birthplace, which we at once
recognize from the numerous pictures we have seen of it, I stood before
with a feeling akin to that of veneration--something like that which
must fill the mind of a pilgrim who has travelled a weary journey to
visit the shrine of some celebrated saint.
It is an odd, and old-fashioned mass of wood and plaster. The very means
that have been taken to preserve it seem almost a sacrilege, the fresh
paint upon the wood-work outside, that shone in the spring sunlight, the
new braces, plaster and repairs here and there, give the old building
the air of an old man, an octogenarian, say, who had discarded his
old-time rags and tatters for a suit of new cloth cut in old style; but
something must, of course, be done to preserve the structure from
crumbling into the dust beneath the inexorable hand of time, albeit it
was of substantial oak, filled in with plaster, but has undergone many
"improvements" since the poet's time.
The first room we visit in the house is the kitchen with its wide
chimney, the kitchen in which John Shakespeare and his son Will so often
sat, where he watched the blazing logs, and listened to strange legends
of village gossips, or stories of old crones, or narratives of field
and flood, and fed his young imagination to the full with that food
which gave such lusty life to it in after years. Here was a big
arm-chair--Shakespeare's chair, of course, as there was in 1820, when
our countryman Washington Irving visited the place; but inasmuch as the
_real_ chair was purchased by the Princess Czartoryska in 1790, one
cannot with a knowledge of this fact feel very enthusiastic over this.
From the kitchen we ascend into the room in which the poet was born--a
low, rude apartment, with huge beams and plastered walls, and those
walls one mosaic mass of pencilled autographs and inscriptions of
visitors to this shrine of genius. One might spend hours in deciphering
names, inscriptions, rhymes, aphorisms, &c., that are thickly written
upon every square inch of space, in every style of chirography and in
every language: even the panes of glass in the windows have not escaped,
but are scratched all over with autographs by the diamond rings of
visitors; and among these signatures I saw that of Walter Scott. At the
side of the fireplace in this room is the well-known actor's pillar, a
jamb of the fireplace thickly covered with the autographs of actors who
have visited here; among the names I noticed the signatures of Charles
Kean, Edmund Kean, and G. V. Brooke. Visitors are not permitted now to
write upon any portion of the building, and are always closely
accompanied by a guide, in order that no portion of it may be cut and
carried away by relic-hunters.
The visitors' book which is kept here is a literary as well as an
autographic curiosity; it was a matter of regret to me that I had only
time to run over a few of the pages of its different volumes filled with
the writing of all classes, from prince to peasant, and in every
language and character, even those of Turkish, Hebrew, and Chinese. The
following, I think, was from the pen of Prince Lucien:--
"The eye of genius glistens to admire
How memory hails the soul of Shakespeare's lyre.
One tear I'll shed to form a crystal shrine
For all that's grand, immortal, and divine."
And the following were furnished me as productions, the first of
Washington Irving, and the second of Hackett, the well-known comedian,
and best living representative of Falstaff:--
"Of mighty Shakespeare's birth the room we see;
The where he died in vain to find we try;
Useless the search, for all immortal he,
And those who are immortal never die."
"Shakespeare, thy name revered is no less
By us who often _reckon_, sometimes _guess_.
Though England claims the glory of thy birth,
None more appreciate thy page's worth,
None more admire thy scenes well acted o'er,
Than we of states unborn in ancient lore."
The room in which the poet was born remains very nearly in its original
state, and, save a table, an ancient chair or two, and a bust of
Shakespeare, is without furniture; but another upper room is devoted to
the exhibition of a variety of interesting relics and mementos. Not the
least interesting of these was the rude school desk, at which Master
Will conned his lessons at the grammar school. A sadly-battered affair
it was, with the little lid in the middle raised by rude leather hinges,
and the whole of it hacked and cut in true school-boy style. Be it
Shakespeare's desk or not, we were happy in the belief that it was, and
sat down at it, thinking of the time when the young varlet crept "like a
snail unwillingly to school," and longed for a release from its
imprisonment, to bathe in the cool Avon's rippling waters, or start off
on a distant ramble with his schoolmates to Sir Thomas Lucy's oak groves
and green meadows.
Next we came to the old sign of "The Falcon," which swung over the
hostelrie of that name at Bedford, seven miles from Stratford, where
Shakespeare and his associates drank too deeply, as the story goes,
which Washington Irving reproduces in his charming sketch of
Stratford-on-Avon in the Sketch Book. Here is Shakespeare's jug, from
which David Garrick sipped wine at the Shakespeare Jubilee, held in
1758; an ancient chair from the Falcon Inn, called Shakespeare's Chair,
and said to have been the one in which he sat when he held his club
meetings there; Shakespeare's gold signet-ring, with the initials W. S.,
enclosed in a true-lover's knot. Among the interesting documents were a
letter from Richard Quyney to Shakespeare, asking for a loan of thirty
pounds, which is said to be the only letter addressed to Shakespeare
known to exist; a "conveyance," dated October 15, 1579, from "John
Shackspere and Mary his wyeffe" (Shakespeare's parents) "to Robt. Webbe,
of their moitye of 2 messuages or tenements in Snitterfield;" an
original grant of four yard lands, in Stratford fields, of William and
John Combe to Shakespeare, in 1602; a deed with the autograph of Gilbert
Shakespeare, brother of the poet, 1609; a declaration in an action in
court of Shakespeare _v._ Philip Rogers, to recover a bill for malt sold
by Shakespeare, 1604.
Then there were numerous engravings and etchings of various old objects
of interest in and about Stratford, various portraits of the poet,
eighteen sketches, illustrating the songs and ballads of Shakespeare,
done by the members of the Etching Club, and presented by them to this
collection. Among the portraits is one copied in crayon from the Chandos
portrait, said to have been painted when Shakespeare was about
forty-three, and one of the best portraits extant--an autographic
document, bearing the signature of Sir Thomas Lucy, the original Justice
Shallow, owner of the neighboring estate of Charlecote, upon which
Shakespeare was arrested for deer-stealing. These, and other curious
relics connected with the history of the poet, were to us possessed of
so much interest that we quite wore out the patience of the good dame
who acted as custodian, and she was relieved by her daughter, who was
put in smiling good humor by our purchase of stereoscopic views at a
shilling each, which can be had in London at sixpence, and chatted away
merrily till we bade farewell to the poet's birthplace, and started off
adown the pleasant village street for the little church upon the banks
of the River Avon, which is his last resting-place.
However sentimental, poetical, or imaginative one may be, there comes a
time when the cravings of appetite assert themselves; and vulgar and
inappropriate as it was, we found ourselves exceedingly hungry here in
Stratford, and we went into a neat bijou of a pastry cook's--we should
call it a confectioner's shop in America, save that there was nothing
but cakes, pies, bread, and pastry for sale. The little shop was a model
of neatness and compactness. Half a dozen persons would have crowded the
space outside the counter, which was loaded with fresh, lightly-risen
sponge cakes, rice cakes, puffs, delicious flaky pastry, fruit tarts,
the preserves in them clear as amber, fresh, white, close-grained
English bread, and heaps of those appetizing productions of pure,
unadulterated pastry, that the English pastry baker knows so well how to
prepare. The bright young English girl, in red cheeks, modest dress, and
white apron, who served us, was, to use an English expression, a very
nice young person, and, in answer to our queries and praises of her
wares, told us that herself and her mother did the fancy baking of pies
and cakes, a man baker whom they employed doing the bread and heavy
work. The gentry, the country round, were supplied from their shop. How
long had they been there?
She and mother had always been there. The shop had been in the family
over _seventy years_.
"Just like the English," said one of the party, aside. "It's not at all
astonishing they make such good things, having had seventy years'
practice."
And this little incident is an apt illustration of how a business is
kept in one family, and in one place, generation after generation, in
England; so different from our country, where the sons of the poor
cobbler or humble artisan of yesterday may be the proud aristocrat of
to-day.
There is nothing remarkable about the pleasant church of Stratford,
which contains the poet's grave. It is situated near the banks of the
Avon, and the old sexton escorted us through an avenue of trees to its
great Gothic door, which he unlocked, and we were soon before the
familiar monument, which is in a niche in the chancel. It is the
well-known, half-length figure, above which is his coat of arms,
surmounted by a skull, and upon either side figures of Cupid, one
holding an inverted torch, and the other a skull and a spade. Beneath
the cushion, upon which the poet is represented as writing, is this
inscription:--
"JVDICIO PYLIVM GENIO SOCRATEM ARTE MARONEM TERRA TEGIT
POPVLVS MOERET OLYMPVS HABET.
"Stay, passenger; who goest thou by so fast?
Read, if thou canst, whom envious death has plast
Within this monument: Shakespeare, with whome
Qvicke natvre died; whose name doth deck ys tombe
Far more than cost; sith all yt he hath writt
Leaves living art but page to serve his witt.
"Obiit Ano Doi, 1616.
Ætatis 53, Die 23 Ap."
This half-length figure, we are told, was originally painted after
nature, the eyes being hazel, and the hair and beard auburn, the dress a
scarlet doublet, slashed on the breast, over which was a loose,
sleeveless black gown; but in 1793 it was painted all over white.
In front of the altar-rails, upon the second step leading to the altar,
are the gravestones (marble slabs) of the Shakespeare family, among them
a slab marking the resting-place of his wife, Anne (Anne Hathaway); and
the inscription tells us that
"Here lyeth interred the body of Anne,
wife of William Shakspeare, who depted this life the
6th day of Avg: 1623, being of the age of 67 years."
Another slab marks the grave of Thomas Nash, who married the only
daughter of the poet's daughter Susanna, one that of her father, Dr.
John Hall, and another that of Susanna herself; the slab bearing the
poet's celebrated epitaph is, of course, that which most holds the
attention of the visitor, and as he reads the inscription which has
proved such a safeguard to the remains of its author, he cannot help
feeling something of awe the epitaph is so threatening, so almost like a
malediction.
"Good friend, for Jesus' sake forbeare
To digg the dust encloased heare:
Bleste be ye man yt spares thes stones,
And cursed be he yt moves my bones."
And it is doubtless the unwillingness to brave Shakespeare's curse that
has prevented the removal of the poet's remains to Westminster Abbey,
and the fear of it that will make the little church, in the pleasant
little town of Stratford, his last resting-place. I could not help
noticing, while standing beside the slab that marked the poet's grave,
how _that_ particular slab had been respected by the thousands of feet
that had made their pilgrimage to the place; for while the neighboring
slabs and pavement were worn from the friction of many feet, this was
comparatively fresh and rough as when first laid down, no one caring to
trample upon the grave of Shakespeare, especially after having read the
poet's invocation,--
"Bleste be ye man yt spares thes stones;"
and so with uncovered head and reverential air he passes around it and
not over it, although no rail or guard bars his steps,--that one line of
magic power a more effectual bar than human hand could now place there.
The little shops in the quaint little streets of Stratford, all make the
most of that which has made their town famous; and busts of Shakespeare,
pictures, carvings, guide-books, engravings, and all sorts of mementos
to attract the attention of visitors, are displayed in their windows. A
china ware store had Shakespeare plates and dishes, with pictorial
representations of the poet's birthplace, Stratford church, &c., upon
them, so that those inclined could have Shakespeare plates from sixpence
to three shillings each, illustrating their visit here.
How often I had read of the old feudal barons of Warwick, and their
warlike deeds, which occupy so conspicuous a place in England's history!
There were the old Saxon earls, and, most famous of all, the celebrated
Guy, that every school-boy has read of, who was a redoubtable warrior in
the time of Alfred the Great, and doubtless has in history grown in
height as his deeds have in wonder, for he is stated to have been a
Saxon giant nine feet high, killed a Saracen giant in single combat,
slain a wild boar, a green dragon, and an enormous dun cow, although why
killing a cow was any evidence of a warrior's prowess I am unable to
state. But we saw at the porter's lodge, at the castle, as all tourists
do (and I write it as all tourists do), a big rib of something,--it
would answer for a whale or elephant,--which we were told was the rib of
the cow aforesaid; also some of the bones of the boar; but when I asked
the old dame, who showed the relics, if any of the scales of the dragon,
or if any of his teeth, had been preserved, she said,--
"The dragon story mightn't be true; but 'ere we 'ave the cow's ribs and
the boar's bones, and there's no disputin' them, you see."
So we didn't dispute them, nor the great tilting-pole, breastplate, and
fragments of armor said to have belonged to Guy, or the huge
porridge-pot made of bronze or bell-metal, which holds ever so many
gallons, and which modern Earls of Warwick sometimes use on great
occasions to brew an immense jorum of punch in. Guy's sword, which I
took an experimental swing of, required an exercise of some strength,
and both hands, to make it describe a circle above my head, and must
have been a trenchant blade in the hands of one able to wield it
effectively.
Old Guy was by no means the only staunch warrior of the Earls of
Warwick. There was one who died in the Holy Land in 1184; another, who
stood by King John in all his wars with the barons; another, who was
captured in his castle; another, Guy de Beauchamp, who fought for the
king bravely in the battle of Falkirk; and another, who, under the Black
Prince, led the van of the English army at Cressy, and fought bravely
at Poietiers, till his galled hand refused to grasp his battle-axe, and
who went over to France and saved a suffering English army at Calais in
1369, and many others, who have left the impress of their deeds upon the
pages of history.
The old town of Warwick dates its foundation about A. D. 50, and its
castle in 916. Staying at the little old-fashioned English inn, the
Warwick Arms, two of us had to dine in solemn state alone in a private
room, the modern style of a table d'hote not being introduced in that
establishment, which, although well ordered, scrupulously neat and
comfortable, nevertheless, in furniture and general appearance, reminded
one of the style of thirty years ago.
Of course the lion of Warwick is the castle, and to that old stronghold
we wend our way. The entrance is through a large gateway, and we pass up
through a roadway or approach to the castle, which is cut through the
solid rock for a hundred yards or more, and emerging into the open
space, come suddenly in view of the walls and magnificent round
cylindrical towers.
First there is Guy's Tower, with its walls ten feet thick, its
base thirty feet in diameter, and rising to a height of one hundred
and twenty-eight feet; Cæsar's Tower, built in the time of the
Norman conquest, eight hundred years old, still strong and in good
preservation, and between these two the strong castle walls, of the same
description that appear in all pictures of old castles, with the spaces
for bowmen and other defenders; towers, arched gateways, portcullis,
double walls, and disused moat attest the former strength of this noted
fortification.
As the visitor passes through the gate of the great walls, and gets, as
it were, into the interior of the enclosure, with the embattled walls,
the turrets and towers on every side of him, he sees that the castle is
a tremendous one, and its occupant, when it was in its prime, might have
exclaimed with better reason than Macbeth, "Our castle's strength will
laugh a siege to scorn."
The scene from the interior is at once grand and romantic, the velvet
turf and fine old trees in the spacious area of the court-yard harmonize
well with the time-browned, ivy-clad towers and battlements, and a
ramble upon the broad walk that leads around the latter is fraught with
interest. We stood in the little sheltered nooks, from which the
cross-bowmen and arquebusiers discharged their weapons; we looked down
into the grass-grown moat, climbed to the top of Guy's Tower, and saw
the charming landscape; went below Cæsar's Tower into the dismal
dungeons where prisoners were confined and restrained by an inner
grating from even reaching the small loophole that gave them their
scanty supply of light and air; and here we saw where some poor fellow
had laboriously cut in the rock, as near the light as he could, the
record of his weary confinement of years, with a motto attached, in
quaint style of spelling; and finally, after visiting grounds, towers,
and walls, went into the great castle proper, now kept in repair,
elegantly furnished and rich in pictures, statues, arms, tapestry, and
antiquities.
The first apartment we entered was the entrance, or Great Hall, which
was hung with elegant armor of all ages, of rare and curious patterns:
the walls of this noble hall, which is sixty-two feet by forty, are
wainscoted with fine old oak, embrowned with age, and in the Gothic
roofing are carved the Bear and Ragged Staff of Robert Dudley's crest;
also, the coronet and shields of the successive earls from the
year 1220. Among the curiosities here were numerous specimens of
old-fashioned fire-arms, and one curious old-fashioned revolving pistol,
made two hundred years before Colt's pistols were invented, and which I
was assured the American repeatedly visited before he perfected the
weapon that bears his name. The same story, however, was afterwards told
me about an old revolver in the Tower of London, and I think also in
another place in England, and the exhibitors seemed to think Colonel
Colt had only copied an old English affair that they had thrown aside:
however, this did not ruffle my national pride to any great degree,
inasmuch as I ascertained that about all leading American inventions of
any importance are regarded by these complacent Britons as having had
their origin in their "tight little island." There were the English
steel cross-bows, which must have projected their bolts with tremendous
forces; splendid Andrea Ferrara rapiers, weapons three hundred years
old, and older, of exquisite temper and the most beautiful and intricate
workmanship, inlaid with gold and silver, and the hilt and scabbards of
elegant steel filigree work. Among the curious relics was Cromwell's
helmet, the armor worn by the Marquis Montrose when he led the
rebellion, Prince Rupert's armor, a gun from the battle-field of Marston
Moor, a quilted armor jacket of King John's soldiers; magnificent
antlered stags' heads are also suspended from the walls, while from the
centre of the hall one can see at a single glance through the whole of
the grand suite of apartments, a straight line of three hundred and
thirty feet. From the great Gothic windows you look down below, one
hundred and twenty feet distant, to the River Avon, and over an
unrivalled picturesque landscape view--another evidence that those old
castle-builders had an eye to the beautiful as well as the substantial.
Looking from this great hall to the end of a passage, we saw Vandyke's
celebrated picture of Charles I. on horseback, with baton in hand, one
end resting upon his thigh. I had seen copies of it a score of times,
but the life-like appearance of the original made me inclined to believe
in the truth of the story that Sir Joshua Reynolds once offered five
hundred guineas for it. Vandyke appears to have been a favorite with the
earl, as there are many of his pictures in the ravishing collection that
adorns the apartments of the castle.
The apartments of the castle are all furnished in exquisite taste, some
with rich antique furniture, harmonizing with the rare antiques, vases,
cabinets, bronzes, and china that is scattered through them in rich
profusion, and to attempt to give a detailed description would require
the space of a volume. The paintings, however, cannot fail to attract
the attention, although the time allowed to look at them is little
short of aggravation. There is a Dutch Burgomaster, by Rembrandt; the
Wife of Snyder, by Vandyke, a beautiful painting; Spinola, by Rubens;
the Family of Charles I., by Vandyke; Circe, by Guido; A Lady, by Sir
Peter Lely; a Girl blowing Bubbles, by Murillo; a magnificently executed
full-length picture of Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuits,
originally painted by Rubens for the Jesuits' College of Antwerp, and so
striking as to exact exclamations of admiration even from those
inexperienced in art. One lovely little room, called the Boudoir, is
perfectly studded with rare works of art--Henry VIII. by Hans Holbein,
Barbara Villiers by Lely, Boar Hunt by Rubens, A Saint by Andrea del
Sarto, Road Scene by Teniers, Landscape by Salvator Rosa. Just see what
a feast for the lover of art even these comparatively few works of the
great masters afford; and the walls of the rooms were crowded with them,
the above being only a few selected at random, as an indication of the
priceless value of the collection.
In the Red Drawing-room we saw a grand Venetian mirror in its curious
and rich old frame, a rare cabinet of tortoise shell and ivory, buhl
tables of great richness, and a beautiful table that once belonged to
Marie Antoinette, besides ancient bronzes, Etruscan vases, &c. In the
Cedar Drawing-room stood Hiram Powers's bust of Proserpina, and superb
tables bearing rare vases and specimens of wonderful enamelled work, and
a species of singular china and glass ware, in which raised metal
figures appeared upon the surface, made by floating the copper and other
metal upon glass--now a lost art. An elegant dish of this description
was shown to us, said to be worth over a thousand pounds--a costly piece
of plate, indeed.
We now come to the Gilt Drawing-room, so called because the walls and
ceiling are divided off into panels, richly gilt. The walls of this room
are glorious with the works of great artists--Vandyke, Murillo, Rubens,
Sir Peter Lely. Rich furniture, and a wonderful Venetian table, known as
the "Grimani Table," of elegant mosaic work, also adorn the apartment.
In an old-fashioned square room, known as the State Bedroom, is the bed
and furniture of crimson velvet that formerly belonged to Queen Anne.
Here are the table that she used, and her huge old travelling trunks,
adorned with brass-headed nails, with which her initials are wrought
upon the lid, while above the great mantel is a full-length portrait of
Anne, in a rich brocade dress, wearing the collar of the Order of the
Garter, painted by Sir Godfrey Kneller.
The great dining-hall, besides some fine pictures and ancient Roman
busts, contains a remarkable piece of modern workmanship, which is known
as the "Kenilworth Buffet," and which we should denominate a large
sideboard. It is an elaborate and magnificent specimen of wood-carving,
and was manufactured by Cookes & Son, of Warwick, and exhibited in the
great exhibition of 1851. The wood from which it was wrought was an oak
tree which grew on the Kenilworth estate, and which, from its great age,
is supposed to have been standing when Queen Elizabeth made her
celebrated visit to the castle. Carvings upon it represent the entry of
Queen Elizabeth, surrounded by her train, Elizabeth's meeting with Amy
Robsart in the grotto, the interview between the queen and Leicester,
and other scenes from Scott's novel of Kenilworth; also carved figures
of the great men of the time--Sidney, Raleigh, Shakespeare, and Drake,
and the arms of the Leicester family, and the crest, now getting
familiar, of the Bear and Ragged Staff, with other details, such as
water-flowers, dolphins, &c. This sideboard was presented by the town
and county of Warwick to the present earl on his wedding day.
But we must not linger too long in these interesting halls of the old
feudal barons, or before their rich treasures of art. Time is not even
given one to sit, and study, and drink in, as it were, the wondrous
beauty and exquisite finish of the artistic gems on their walls; so we
take a parting glance at Tenier's Guard-room, the Duchess of Parma by
Paul Veronese, Murillo's Court Jester, a splendidly-executed picture of
Leicester by Sir Anthony Moore, the Card-players by Teniers, the Flight
into Egypt by Rubens, a magnificent marble bust, by Chantrey, of Edward
the Black Prince, in which the nobleness and generosity of that brave
warrior were represented so strikingly as to make you almost raise your
hat to it in passing. Before leaving we were shown the old "warder's
horn," with the bronze chain by which it was in old times suspended at
the outer gate of the castle; and as I grasped it, and essayed in vain
to extract a note beyond an exhausted sort of groan from its bronze
mouth, I remembered the many stories in which a warder's horn figures,
in poem, romance, history, and fable. I think even Jack the Giant killer
blew one at the castle gate of one of his huge adversaries. An
inscription on the Warwick horn gives the date of 1598.
Leaving the apartments of the castle, and passing through a portcullis
in one of the walls, and over a bridge thrown across the moat, we
proceeded to the green-house, rich in rare flowers and plants, and in
the centre of which stands the far-famed Warwick Vase. The shape of this
vase is familiar to all from the innumerable copies of it that have been
made. It is of pure white marble, executed after pure Grecian design,
and is one of the finest specimens of ancient sculpture in existence.
While looking upon its exquisite proportions and beautiful design, we
can hardly realize that, compared with it in years, old Warwick Castle
itself is a modern structure. The description of it states the
well-known fact that it was found at the bottom of a lake near Tivoli,
by Sir William Hamilton, then ambassador at the court of Naples, from
whom it was obtained by the Earl of Warwick. Its shape is circular, and
its capacity one hundred and thirty-six gallons. Its two large handles
are formed of interwoven vine-branches, from which the tendrils, leaves,
and clustering grapes spread around the upper margin. The middle of the
body is enfolded by a panther skin, with head and claws elegantly cut
and finished. Above are the heads of satyrs, bound with wreaths of ivy,
the vine-clad spear of Bacchus, and the well-known crooked staff of the
Augurs.
Leaving the depository of the vase, we sauntered out beneath the shade
of the great trees, and looked across the velvet lawn to the gentle Avon
flowing in the distance, and went on till we gained a charming view of
the river front of the castle, with its towers and old mill, the ruined
arches of an old bridge, and an English church tower rising in the
distance, forming one of those pictures which must be such excellent
capital for the landscape painter. On the banks of the Avon, and in the
park of the castle, we were shown some of the dark old cedars of
Lebanon, brought home, or grown from those brought home, from the Holy
Land by the Warwick and his retainers who wielded their swords there
against the infidel.
Some of the quiet old streets of Warwick seemed, from their deserted
appearance, to be almost uninhabited, were it not for here and there a
little shop, and the general tidy, swept-up appearance of everything. A
somnolent, quaint, aristocratic old air seemed to hang over them, and I
seemed transported to some of those quiet old streets at the North End,
in Boston, or Salem of thirty years ago, which were then untouched by
the advance of trade, and sacred to old residents, old families, whose
stone door-stoops were spotlessly clean, whose brass door-knobs and
name-plates shone like polished gold, and whose neat muslin curtains at
the little front windows were fresh, airy, and white as the down of a
thistle.
I stopped at a little shop in Warwick to make a purchase, and the swing
of the door agitated a bell that was attached to it, and brought out,
from a little sombre back parlor, the old lady, in a clean white cap,
who waited upon occasional customers that straggled in as I did. How
staid, and quaint, and curious these stand-still old English towns,
clinging to their customs half a century old, seem to us restless,
uneasy, and progressive Yankees!
Our next ramble was down one of these quiet old streets to the
ancient hospital, founded by Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, in
1571, for a "master and twelve brethren," the brethren to be either
deserving retainers of the earl's family, or those who had been
wounded under the conduct of Leicester or his heirs. These "brethren"
are now appointed from Warwick and Gloucester, and have an allowance
of eighty pounds, besides the privilege of the house. The edifice is a
truly interesting building, and is one of the very few that escaped a
general conflagration of the town of Warwick in 1694, and is at this
time one of the most perfect specimens of the half-timber edifices
which exist in the country. Quaint and curious it looks indeed,
massive in structure, brown with age, a wealth of useless lumber about
it, high-pointed overhanging gables, rough carvings along the first
story, a broad, low archway of an entrance, the oak trimmings hardened
like iron, and above the porch the crest of the Bear and Ragged Staff,
the initials R. L., and the date 1571.
And only to think of the changes that three hundred years have wrought
in the style of architecture, as well as comfort and convenience in
dwelling-houses, or in structures like this! We were almost inclined to
laugh at the variegated carving of the timber-work upon the front of
this odd relic of the past, as suggestive of a sign of an American
barber's shop, but which, in its day, was doubtless considered elegant
and artistic.
It stands a trifle raised above the street, upon a sort of platform, and
the sidewalk of the street itself here passes under the remains of an
old tower, built in the time of Richard II., and said to have been on
the line of walls of defence of the city. The hinges, on which the great
gate of this part of the fortification were hung, are still visible, and
pointed out to visitors.
Let us enter Leicester's magnificent hospital, an ostentatious charity
in 1571; but how squat, odd, and old-fashioned did the low-ceiled little
rooms look now! how odd the passages were formed! what quaint, curious
old windows! how rich the old wood-work looked, saturated with the
breath of time! and here was the great kitchen, with its big
fireplace--the kitchen where a mug of beer a day, I think, is served,
and where the "brethren" are allowed to smoke their long, clay pipes; a
row of their beer tankards (what a national beverage beer is in
England!) glittered on the dresser. Here also hung the uniform which the
"brethren" are obliged by statute always to wear when they go out, which
consists of a handsome blue broadcloth gown, with a silver badge of a
Bear and Ragged Staff suspended on the left sleeve behind. These badges,
now in use, are the identical ones that were worn by the first brethren
appointed by Lord Leicester, and the names of the original wearers, and
the date, 1571, are engraved on the back of each; one only of these
badges was ever lost, and that about twenty-five years ago, when it cost
five guineas to replace it. In what was once the great hall is a tablet,
stating that King James I. was once sumptuously entertained there by Sir
Fulke Greville, and no doubt had his inordinate vanity flattered, as his
courtiers were wont to do, and his gluttonous appetite satisfied.
Sitting in the very chair he occupied when there, I did not feel that it
was much honor to occupy the seat of such a learned simpleton as
Elizabeth's successor proved to be.
Very interesting relics were the two little ancient pieces of embroidery
preserved here, which were wrought by the fair fingers of the ill-fated
Amy Robsart, wife of Leicester; one a fragment of satin, with the
everlasting Bear and Staff wrought upon it, and the other a sort of
sampler, the only authentic relic of anything belonging to this unhappy
lady known to exist.
At the rear of the hospital is a fine old kitchen garden, in which the
brethren each have a little portion set apart to cultivate themselves,
and where they can also enjoy a quiet smoke and a fine view at the same
time; and this hospital is the most enduring monument that Leicester has
left behind him: his once magnificent abode at Kenilworth is but a heap
of ruins, and the proud estate, a property of over twenty miles in
circumference, wrested from him by the government of his time, never
descended to his family. Mentioning monuments to Leicester, however,
reminds us of the pretentious one erected to him in the chapel of St.
Mary's Church, which we visited, in Warwick, known as the Beauchamp
Chapel, and which all residents of these parts denominate the "Beechum"
Chapel--named from the first Earl of Warwick of the Norman line, the
founder (Beauchamp).
The chapel is an elegant structure, the interior being fifty-eight feet
long, twenty-five wide, and thirty-two high. Over the doorway, on
entering, we see the arms of Beauchamp, supported on each side by
sculptures of the Bear, Ragged Staff, oak leaves, &c. The fine old
time-blackened seats of oak are richly and elaborately carved, and
above, in the groined roof, are carved shields, bearing the quarterings
of the Earls of Warwick; but the great object of interest is the tomb of
the great Earl of Warwick, which this splendid chapel was built to
enshrine. It is a large, square, marble structure, situated in the
centre of the building, elegantly and elaborately carved with ornamental
work, and containing, in niches, fourteen figures of lords and ladies,
designed to represent relatives of the deceased, while running around
the edge, cut into brass, is the inscription, in Old English characters.
Upon the top of this tomb lies a full-length bronze or brass effigy of
the great earl, sheathed in full suit of armor,--breastplate, cuishes,
greaves, &c.,--complete in all its details, and finished even to the
straps and fastenings; the figure is not attached, but laid upon the
monument, and its back is finished as perfectly as the front in all its
equipments and correctness of detail. The head, which is uncovered,
rests upon the helmet, and the feet of the great metal figure upon a
bear and a griffin. Above this recumbent figure is a sort of rail-work
of curved strips and thick transverse rods of brass, over which, in old
times, hung a pall, or curtain, to shield this wondrous effigy from the
dust; and a marvel of artistic work it is, one of the finest works of
the kind of the middle ages in existence, for the earl died in 1439; and
another curious relic must be the original agreement or contract for its
construction, which, I was told, is still in existence.
Robert Dudley, Queen Elizabeth's Leicester, has an elaborately-executed
monument in the chapel, consisting of a sort of altar-tomb, beneath a
canopy supported by Corinthian pillars. Upon the tomb are recumbent
effigies of Leicester and his Countess Lettice, while an inscription
sets forth the many titles of the deceased, and concludes that, "his
most sorrowful wife, Lætitia, through a sense of _conjugal love and
fidelity_, hath put up this monument _to the best and dearest of
husbands_."
I have heard of the expression "lying like a tombstone," before I ever
saw Robert Dudley's monument; but it seemed now that I must be before
the very one from whence the adage was derived, unless all of that which
is received by the present generation as the authentic history of this
man and the age in which he lived be thrown aside as a worthless fable.
Indeed, there were those of the generation fifty years ago who felt an
equal contempt at this endeavor to send a lie down to posterity, for in
an odd old, well-thumbed volume of a History of the Town of Warwick,
published in 1815, which I found lying in one of the window-seats of the
Warwick Arms, where I seated myself to wait for dinner on my return, I
found this passage, which is historical truth and justice concentrated
into such a small compass, that I transferred it at once into my
note-book. Having referred to the Earl of Leicester's (Robert Dudley's)
monument, the writer goes on as follows:--
"Under the arch of this grand monument is placed a Latin inscription,
which proclaims the honors bestowed with profusion, but without
discernment, upon the royal favorite, who owed his future solely to his
personal attractions, for of moral worth or intellectual ability he had
none. Respecting his two great military employments, here so powerfully
set forth, prudence might have recommended silence, since on one
occasion he acquired no glory, as he had no opportunity, and on the
other the opportunity he had he lost, and returned home covered with
deep and deserved disgrace. That he should be celebrated, even on a
tomb, for conjugal affection and fidelity, must be thought still more
remarkable by those who recollect that, according to every appearance of
probability, he poisoned his first wife, disowned his second,
dishonored his third before he married her, and, in order to marry her,
murdered her former husband. To all this it may be added, that his only
surviving son, an infant, was a natural child, by Lady Sheffield. If his
widowed countess did really mourn, as she here affects, it is believed
that into no other eye but hers, and perhaps that of his infatuated
queen, did a single tear stray, when, September 4, 1588, he ended a
life, of which the external splendor, and even the affected piety and
ostentatious charity, were but vain endeavors to conceal or soften the
black enormity of its guilt and shame."
In the chapel are monuments to others of the Warwicks, including one to
Leicester's infant son, who is said to have been poisoned by his nurse
at three years of age, and who is called, on his tomb, "the noble Impe
Robert of Dudley," and another to Ambrose Dudley, Earl of Warwick,
brother to Leicester, and honorably distinguished, as a man, for his
virtues, as the other for his crimes.
We go from Warwick to Oxford by rail; but I must not omit to mention
that in one of our excursions not far from Warwick, as the train stopped
at Rugby junction, the "Mugby junction" that Dickens has described, we
visited the refreshment-room, and got some _very good_ sandwiches, and
were very well served by the young ladies at the counter; indeed,
Dickens's sketch has been almost as good an advertisement for the "Mugby
sandwiches" as Byron's line, "Thine incomparable oil, Macassar," was for
Rowland's ruby compound; and the young ladies have come to recognize
Americans by their invariably purchasing sandwiches, and their inquiry,
"Where is the boy?"
From Warwick, on our way to Oxford, we passed near Edgehill, the scene
of the first battle of Charles I. against his Parliament, and halted a
brief period at Banbury, where an accommodating English gentleman sought
out and sent us one of the venders of the noted "Banbury cakes," and who
informed us that the Banbury people actually put up, a few years ago, a
cross, that is now standing there, from the fact that so many travellers
stopped in the town to see the Banbury Cross mentioned in the rhyme of
their childhood,--
"Ride a cock horse to Banbury Cross
To see an old woman get on a white horse,"--
who, before it _was_ erected, went away disappointed at not seeing what
they had set down in their minds was the leading feature of the town,
thinking that they had, in some way or other, been imposed upon by not
finding any one in the place who knew of it, or cared to show it to
them.
But we will leave the old town of Warwick behind us, for a place still
more interesting to the American tourist--a city which contains one of
the oldest and most celebrated universities in Europe; a city where
Alfred the Great once lived; which was stormed by William the Conqueror;
where Richard the Lion-hearted was born; and where, in the reign of
Bloody Mary, Latimer, Ridley, and Cranmer were burned at the stake;
through whose streets the victorious parliamentary army marched, with
drums beating and colors flying, after the battle of Naseby--Oxford.
Oxford, that Hughes's Tom Brown at Oxford has made the youngsters of the
present day long to see; Oxford, that figures in so many of the English
novels; Oxford, where Verdant Green, in the novel, had so many funny
experiences; Oxford, where the "Great Tom"--a bell spoken of in
story-books and nursery rhymes--is; and a thousand other things that
have made these celebrated old cities a sort of dreamland to us in
America, who have longed to see the curious relics of the past with
which they are crammed, and walk amid those scenes, the very
descriptions of which fill one's mind with longings or pleasant
anticipations as we hang over the printed pages that describe them.
We rode in our cab to the old Mitre Tavern, and a very old-fashioned
place it is. Indeed, to the tourist, one of the lions of the place will
be the "Mitre." The first thing noticeable upon entering the
low-linteled front entrance of this first-class Oxford hotel was a
framework of meat-hooks overhead, along one side of the ceiling of the
whole entrance corridor; and upon these were suspended mutton, beef,
game, poultry, &c.; in fact, a choice display of the larder of the
establishment. I suppose this is the English "bill of fare," for they
have no way here of letting guests know what they can have served at the
table, other than through the servant who waits upon you; and his
assortment, one often finds, dwindles down to the everlasting "chops,"
"'am and heggs," or "roast beef," "mutton," and perhaps "fowls."
The cooking at the Mitre is unexceptionable, as, indeed, it is generally
in all inns throughout England. The quality of the meats, the bread, the
ale, the wines, in fact everything designed for the palate at this house
is of the purest and best quality, and such as any gastronomist will,
after testing them, cherish with fond recollections; but the other
accommodations are of the most old-fashioned style. The hotel seems to
be a collection of old dwellings, with entrances cut through the walls,
judging from the quaint, crooked, dark passages, some scarcely wide
enough for two persons to pass each other in, and the little low-ceiled
rooms, with odd, old-fashioned furniture, such as we used to see in our
grandfathers' houses forty years ago--solid mahogany four-post
bedsteads, with chintz spreads and curtains; old black mahogany
brass-trimmed bureaus; wash-stands, with a big hole cut to receive the
huge crockery wash-bowl, which held a gallon; feather beds, and old
claw-footed chairs.
This is the solid, old-fashioned comfort (?) an Englishman likes.
Furthermore, you have no gas fixtures in your room. Gas in one's
sleeping-room is said by hotel-keepers in England to be unhealthy,
possibly because it might prevent a regulation in the charge for light
which the use of candles affords. Upon my ringing the bell, and asking
the chambermaid who responded--waiters and bell-boys never "answer a
bell" here--for a lighter and more airy room than the little, square,
one-windowed, low-ceiled apartment which was assigned me, I was informed
that the said one-windowed box was the same that Lord Sophted "halways
'ad when he was down to Hoxford."
Notwithstanding this astounding information, to the surprise of the
servant, I insisted upon a different room, and was assigned another
apartment, which varied from the first by having two windows instead of
one. The fact that Sir Somebody Something, or Lord Nozoo, has occupied a
room, or praised a brand of wine, or the way a mutton chop was cooked,
seems to be in England the credit mark that is expected to pass it,
without question, upon every untitled individual who shall thereafter
presume to call for it; and the look of unmitigated astonishment which
the servant will bestow upon an "Hamerican" who dares to assert that any
thing of the kind was not so good as he was accustomed to, and he must
have better, is positively amusing. Americans are, however, beginning to
be understood in this respect by English hotel-keepers, and are
generally put in the best apartments--and charged the best prices.
It would be an absurdity, in the limits permissible in a series of
sketches like these, to attempt a detailed description of Oxford and
its colleges; for there are more than a score of colleges, besides the
churches, halls, libraries, divinity schools, museums, and other
buildings connected with the university. There are some rusty old
fellows, who hang round the hotels, and act as guides to visitors,
showing them over a route that takes in all the principal colleges,
and the way to the libraries, museums, &c. One of these walking
encyclopedists of the city, as he proved to be, became our guide, and
we were soon in the midst of those fine old monuments of the reverence
for learning of past ages. Only think of visiting a college founded by
King Alfred, or another whose curious carvings and architecture are of
the twelfth century, or another founded by Edward II. in 1326, or
going into the old quadrangle of All Souls College, through the tower
gateway built A. D. 1443, or the magnificent pile of buildings founded
by Cardinal Wolsey, the design, massive structure, and ornamentation
of which were grand for his time, and give one some indication of the
ideas of that ambitious prelate.
The college buildings are in various styles of architecture, from the
twelfth century down to the present time, most of them being built in
form of a hollow square, the centre of the square being a large,
pleasant grass plot, or quadrangle, upon which the students' windows
opened. Entrance to these interiors or quadrangles is obtained through a
Gothic or arched gateway, guarded by a porter in charge. The windows of
the students' rooms were gay with many-colored flowers, musical with
singing birds hung up in cages, while the interior of some that we
glanced into differed but very little from those of Harvard University,
each being fitted or decorated to suit the taste of the occupant.
In some of the old colleges, the rooms themselves were quaint and
oddly-shaped as friars' cells; others large, luxurious, and airy. Nearly
all were entered through a vestibule, and had an outer door of oak, or
one painted in imitation of oak; and when this door is closed, the
occupant is said to be "sporting his oak" which signifies that he is
studying, busily engaged, and not at home to any one. There were certain
quarters also more aristocratic than others, where young lordlings--who
were distinguished by the gold in their hatbands from the untitled
students--most did congregate. The streets and shops of Oxford indicated
the composition of its population. You meet collegians in gowns and
trencher caps, snuffy old professors, with their silk gowns flying out
behind in the wind, young men in couples, young men in stunning outfits,
others in natty costumes, others artistically got up, tradesmen's boys
carrying bundles of merchandise, and washer or char women, in every
direction in the vicinity of the colleges.
Splendid displays are made in the windows of tailors' and furnishing
goods stores--boating uniforms, different articles of dress worn as
badges, stunning neck-ties, splendidly got up dress boots, hats, gloves,
museums of canes, sporting whips, cricket bats, and thousands of
attractive novelties to induce students to invest loose cash, or do
something more common, "run up a bill;" and if these bills are sometimes
not paid till years afterwards, the prices charged for this species of
credit are such as prove remunerative to the tradesmen, who lose much
less than might be supposed, as men generally make it a matter of
principle to pay their college debts.
The largest and most magnificent of the quadrangles is that of Christ
Church College. It is two hundred and sixty-four feet by two hundred and
sixty-one, and formed part of the original design of Wolsey, who founded
this college. This noble quadrangle is entered through a great gate,
known as Tom Gate, from the tower above it, which contains the great
bell of that name, the Great Tom of Oxford, which weighs seventeen
thousand pounds. I ascended the tower to see this big tocsin, which was
exhibited to me with much pride by the porter, as being double the
weight of the great bell in St. Paul's, in London, and upon our
descending, was shown the rope by which it was rung, being assured that,
notwithstanding the immense weight of metal, it was so hung that a very
moderate pull would sound it. Curiosity tempted me, when the porter's
back was turned, to give a smart tug at the rope, which swung invitingly
towards my hand; and the pull elicited a great boom of bell metal above
that sounded like a musical artillery discharge, and did not tend to
render the custodian desirous of prolonging my visit at that part of the
college.
The dining-hall of Christ Church College is a notable apartment, and one
that all tourists visit; it is a noble hall, one hundred and thirteen
feet by forty, and fifty feet in height. The roof is most beautifully
carved oak, with armorial bearings, and decorations of Henry VIII. and
Cardinal Wolsey, and was executed in 1529. Upon the walls hangs the
splendid collection of original portraits, which is one of its most
interesting features, many of them being works of great artists, and
representations of those eminent in the history of the university. Here
hangs Holbein's original portrait of King Henry VIII.,--from which all
the representations of the bluff polygamist that we are accustomed to
see are taken,--Queen Elizabeth's portrait, that of Cardinal Wolsey,
Bishop Fell, Marquis Wellesley, John Locke, and over a hundred others of
"old swells, bishops, and lords chiefly, who have endowed the college in
some way," as Tom Brown says.
Indeed, many of the most prominent men of English history have studied
at Oxford--Sir Walter Raleigh, the Black Prince, Hampden, Butler,
Addison, Wycliffe, Archbishop Laud, and statesmen, generals, judges, and
authors without number. Long tables and benches are ranged each side of
the room; upon a dais at its head, beneath the great bow window, and
Harry VIII.'s picture, is a sort of privileged table, at which certain
officers and more noble students dine on the fat of the land. Next comes
the table of the "gentleman commoners," a trifle less luxuriously
supplied, and at the foot of the hall "the commoners," whose pewter mugs
and the marked difference in the style of their table furniture indicate
the distinctions of title, wealth, and poor gentlemen.
After a peep at the big kitchen of this college, which has been but
slightly altered since the building was erected, and which itself was
the first one built by Wolsey in his college, we turned our steps to
that grand collection of literary wealth--the Bodleian Library.
The literary wealth of this library, in one sense, is almost
incalculable. I was fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of Dr.
Hachman, a graduate of the university and one of the librarians, and
through his courtesy enabled to see many of the rare treasures of this
priceless collection, that would otherwise have escaped our notice.
Here we looked upon the first Latin Bible ever printed, the first book
printed in the English language, by Caxton, at Bruges, in 1472, and the
first English Bible, printed by Miles Coverdale. Here was the very book
that Pope Gregory sent to Augustin when he went to convert the Britons,
and which may have been the same little volume that he held in his hand
when he pleaded the faith of the Redeemer to the Saxon King Ethelbert,
whom he converted from his idolatrous belief twelve hundred years ago. I
looked with something like veneration upon a little shelf containing
about twenty-five volumes of first editions of books from the presses
of Caxton, Guttenberg, and Faust, whose money value is said to be
twenty-five thousand pounds; but bibliomaniacs will well understand that
no money value can be given to such treasures.
We were shown a curious old Bible,--a "Breeches" Bible, as it is
called,--which has a story to it, which is this. About one hundred years
ago this copy was purchased for the library at a comparatively low
price, because the last ten or fifteen pages were missing. The volume
was bound, however, and placed on the shelf; seventy-five years
afterwards the purchasing agent of the library bought, in Rome, a
quantity of old books, the property of a monk; they were sent to
England, and at the bottom of an old box, from among stray pamphlets and
rubbish, out dropped a bunch of leaves, which proved, on examination and
comparison, to be the very pages missing from the volume. They are
placed, not bound in, at the close of the book, so that the visitor sees
that they were, beyond a doubt, the actual portion of it that was
missing.
Ranged upon another shelf was a set of first editions of the old
classics. In one room, in alcoves, all classified, were rich treasures
of literature in Sanscrit, Hebrew, Coptic, and even Chinese and Persian,
some of the latter brilliant in illumination. Here was Tippoo Saib's
Koran, with its curious characters, and the Book of Enoch, brought from
Abyssinia by Bruce, the African explorer; and my kind cicerone handed me
another volume, whose odd characters I took to be Arabic or Coptic, but
which was a book picked up at the capture of Sebastopol, in the Redan,
by an English soldier, and which proved, on examination, to be The
Pickwick Papers in the Russian language.
Besides these, there were specimens of all the varieties of illuminated
books made by the monks between the years 800 and 1000, and magnificent
book-makers they were, too. This collection is perfect and elegant, and
the specimens of the rarest and most beautiful description, before
which, in beauty or execution, the most costly and elaborate illustrated
books of our day sink into insignificance. This may seem difficult to
believe; but these rare old volumes, with every letter done by hand,
their pages of beautifully prepared parchment, as thin as letter
paper,--the colors, gold emblazonry, and all the different hues as
bright as if laid on but a year--are a monument of artistic skill,
labor, and patience, as well as an evidence of the excellence and
durability of the material used by the old cloistered churchmen who
expended their lives over these elaborate productions. The illuminated
Books of Hours, and a Psalter in purple vellum, A. D. 1000, are the
richest and most elegant specimens of book-work I ever looked upon. The
execution, when the rude mode and great labor with which it was
performed are taken into consideration, seems little short of
miraculous. These specimens of illuminated books are successively
classified, down to those of our own time.
Then there were books that had belonged to kings, queens, and
illustrious or noted characters in English history. Here was a book of
the Proverbs, done on vellum, for Queen Elizabeth, by hand, the letters
but a trifle larger than those of these types, each proverb in a
different style of letter, and in a different handwriting. Near by lay a
volume presented by Queen Bess to her loving brother, with an
inscription to that effect in the "Virgin Queen's" own handwriting. Then
we examined the book of Latin exercises, written by Queen Elizabeth at
school; and it was curious to examine this neatly-written manuscript of
school-girl's Latin, penned so carefully by the same fingers that
afterwards signed the death-warrants of Mary, Queen of Scots, the Duke
of Norfolk, and her own favorite, Essex. Next came a copy of Bacon's
Essays, presented by Bacon himself to the Duke of Buckingham, and
elegantly bound in green velvet and gold, with the donor's miniature
portrait set on the cover; then a copy of the first book printed in the
English language, and a copy of Pliny's Natural History, translated by
Landino in 1476, Mary de Medicis' prayer-book, a royal autograph-book of
visitors to the university, ending with the signatures of the present
Prince of Wales and Princess Alexandra.
There was also a wealth of manuscript documents, a host of curious old
relics of antiquity I have forgotten, and others that time only allowed
a glance at, such as the autographic letters of Pope, Milton, Addison,
and Archbishop Laud, Queen Henrietta's love letters to Charles I. before
marriage, and Monmouth's declaration, written in the Tower the morning
of his execution, July 15, 1685.
Among the bequests left to this splendid library was one of thirty-six
thousand pounds, for the purchasing of the most costly illustrated books
that could be had; and the collection of these magnificent tomes in
their rich binding was of itself a wonder: there were hosts of octavo,
royal octavo, elephant folio, imperials, &c.; there were Audubon's
Birds, and Boydell's Shakespeare, and hundreds of huge books of that
size, many being rare proof copies. Then we came to a large apartment
which represented the light literature of the collection. For a space of
two hundred years the library had not any collection of what might
properly be termed light reading. This gap was filled by a bequest of
one of the best, if not the very best, collections of that species of
literature in the kingdom, which commences with first editions of Cock
Robin and Dame Trott and her Cat, and ends with rare and costly editions
of Shakespeare's works.
Weeks and months might be spent in this magnificent library (which
numbers about two hundred and fifty thousand volumes, besides its store
of curious historical manuscripts) without one's having time to inspect
one half its wealth; and this is not the only grand library in Oxford,
either. There are the Library of Merton College, the most genuine
ancient library in the kingdom; the celebrated Radcliffe Library,
founded in 1737 by Dr. Radcliffe, physician to William III., and Mary,
and Queen Anne, at an expense of forty thousand pounds, and which is
sometimes known as the Physic Library;--in this is a reading-room, where
all new publications are received and classified for the use of
students; the Library of Wadham College, the Library of Queen's College,
that of All Souls College, and that of Exeter College, in a new and
elegant Gothic building, erected in 1856, all affording a mine of
wealth, in every department of art, science, and belles-lettres.
A mine of literature, indeed; and the liberality of some of the bequests
to that grand university indicates the enormous wealth of the donors,
while a visit even to portions of these superb collections will dwarf
one's ideas of what they have previously considered as treasures of
literature or grand collections in America.
In one of the rooms I felt almost as if looking at an old acquaintance,
as I was shown the very lantern which Guy Fawkes had in his hand when
seized, which was carefully preserved under a glass case, and was like
the one in the picture-books, where that worthy is represented as being
seized by the man in the high-peaked hat, who is descending the cellar
stairs. Another relic is the pair of gold-embroidered gauntlet gloves
worn by Queen Elizabeth when she visited the university, which are also
carefully kept in like manner.
In the picture gallery attached to the library are some fine paintings,
and among those that attracted my attention were two portraits of Mary
Queen of Scots, looking quite unlike. Their history is to the effect
that the college had purchased what was supposed to be a fine old
original portrait of the ill-fated queen, and as such it hung in its
gallery for a number of years, till at length a celebrated painter,
after repeated and close examinations, declared to the astonished dons
that doubtless the picture was an original, and perhaps one of Mary, but
that it had been re-costumed, and the head-dress altered, and various
additions made, that detracted from its merit as a portrait. The painter
further promised to make a correct copy of the portrait as it was, then
to skilfully erase from the original, without injury, the disfiguring
additions that had been made, leaving it as when first painted. This was
a bold proposition, and a bold undertaking; but the artist was one of
eminence, and the college government, after due deliberation, decided to
let him make the trial. He did so, and was perfectly successful, as the
two pictures prove. The original, divested of the foreign frippery that
had been added in the way of costume and head drapery, now presents a
sweet, sad, pensive face, far more beautiful, and in features resembling
those of the painting of the decapitated head of the queen at
Abbotsford.
Here also hung a representation of Sir Philip Sidney, burned in wood
with a hot poker, done by an artist many years ago--a style of warm
drawing that has since been successfully done by the late Ball Hughes,
the celebrated sculptor in Boston, United States. Passing on beneath the
gaunt, ascetic countenance of Duns Scotus, which looks down from a
frame, beneath which an inscription tells us that he translated the
whole Bible without food or drink, and died in 1309, we come to many
curious relics in the museum. Among others was a complete set of carved
wooden fruit trenchers, or plates, that once belonged to Queen
Elizabeth. Each one was differently ornamented, and each bore upon it,
in quaint Old English characters, a verse of poetry, and most of these
verses had in them, some way or other, a slur at the marriage state. The
little plates were said to be quite favorite articles with her
single-blessed majesty. So, with some labor and study, I transcribed a
few of the verses for American eyes, and here they are:--
"If thou be young, then marry not yet;
If thou be old, thou hast more wit;
For young men's wives will not be taught,
And old men's wives are good for nought."
How many "old men" will believe the last line of this pandering lie to
the ruddy-headed queen? But here are others:--
"If that a bachelor thou be,
Keep thee so still; be ruled by me;
Least that repentance, come too late,
Reward thee with a broken pate."
"A wife that marryeth husbands three
Was never wedded thereto by me;
I would my wife would rather die,
Than for my death to weep or cry."
* * * * *
"Thou art the happiest man alive,
For every thing doth make thee thrive;
Yet may thy thrift thy master be;
Therefore take thrift and all for me."
* * * * *
"Thou goest after dead men's shoes,
But barefoot thou art like to go.
Content thyself, and do not muse,
For fortune saith it must be so."
Emerging all unwillingly from the charms of the library, museum, and the
interesting interiors of these beautiful old buildings, we stroll out to
that delightful place of oaks, and elms, and pleasant streams, Christ
Church Meadows, walk beneath the broad, overarching canopy of elms,
joining together like the roof of a cathedral, that shades the famous
"Broad Walk;" we saunter into "Addison's Walk," a little quiet avenue
among the trees, running down towards the River Isis, and leaving
Magdalen College,--which was Addison's college,--and its pretty, rural
park, we come to the beautiful arched bridge which spans the River Isis,
and, crossing it, have a superbly picturesque view of Oxford, with the
graceful, antique, and curious spires rising above the city, the
swelling dome of the Radcliffe Library, and the great tower of Christ
Church.
Here, at this part of the "Meadows," is the place where cricket and
other athletic games are played. Throngs and groups of promenaders are
in every direction, of a pleasant afternoon, and groups are seated upon
the benches, around the trunks of the elms, from which they gaze upon
the merry throng, or at the boats on the Isis. This river, which is a
racing and practice course of the Oxonians, appears so absurdly narrow
and small to an American who has seen Harvard students battling the
waves of the boisterous Charles, as nearly to excite ridicule and
laughter. We should almost denominate it a large brook in America. For
most of its length it was not more than sixteen or eighteen feet in
width. The Isis is a branch of the River Cherwell, which is a branch of
the Thames, and has this advantage--the rowers can never suffer much
from rough weather.
Down near its mouth, where it widens towards the Cherwell, are the
barges of the different boat clubs or universities. They are enormous
affairs, elegantly ornamented and fitted up, and remind one of the great
state barges seen in the pictures of Venice, where the Doge is marrying
the Adriatic. Their interiors are elegantly upholstered, and contain
cabins or saloons for the reception of friends, for lounging, or for
lunch parties. Farther up the river, and we see the various college
boats practising their crews for forthcoming trials of skill. These
boats are of every variety of size, shape, and fashion--two-oared,
six-oared, eight-oared, single wherries shooting here and there; long
craft, like a line upon the water, with a crew of eight athletes, their
heads bound in handkerchiefs, stripped to the waist, and with round,
hardened, muscular arms, bending to their oars with a long, almost
noiseless sweep, and the exact regularity of a chronometer balance.
The banks were alive with the friends of the different crews, students
and trainers, who ran along, keeping up with them, prompting and
instructing them how to pull, and perfecting them in their practice.
Every now and then, one of these college boats, with its uniformed crew,
would shoot past, and its group of attendant runners upon the dike, with
their watchful eyes marking every unskilful movement.
"Easy there, five." "Pull steady, three." "Straighten your back more,
two."
"Shoulders back there, four; do you call that pulling? mind your
practice. Steady, now--one, two, three; count, and keep time."
"Well done, four; a good pull and a strong pull."
"I'm watching you, six; no gammon. Pull, boys, pull," &c.
The multitude of boats, with their crews, the gayly decorated barges,
the merry crowds upon the pleasure-grounds, the arched bridge, and the
picturesque background of graceful domes and spires, combined to form a
scene which will not soon fade from memory. How many advantages does the
Oxford student enjoy, besides the admirable opportunities for study, and
for storing the mind, from the treasure-houses that are ready at his
hand, with riches that cannot be stolen; the delicious and romantic
walks, rural parks, and grounds about here; the opportunities for
boating, which may be extended to the River Cherwell, where the greater
width affords better opportunities for racing--attrition with the best
mettle of the nation; instruction from the best scholars; and a
dwelling-place every corner of which is rich in historic memories!
We walk to the place in front of Baliol College, where Cranmer, Ridley,
and Latimer were burned at the stake. The spot is marked by a small
stone cross in the pavement; and a short distance from here, in an open
square, stands an elaborately decorated Gothic monument, surmounted by a
cross, and bearing beneath its arches the statues of the bishops,
erected about twenty years ago, and is denominated the Martyrs'
Memorial. But adieu to Oxford; students, libraries, colleges, and
historical relics left behind, we are whirling over the railroad on our
way up to London. Always say _up_ to London, in England. Going to London
is always going up, no matter what point of the compass you start from.
No true Englishman ever talks of going to the great city in any way
except going "up" to it.