St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1890-11-20
SIGHTSEEING IN ENGLAND.
Visits TO the Castles and Universities of
Great Britain.

Great Britain.
We are enabled to give to the read
ers of the Caledonian the following
extracts from a private letter of
Charles D. Hazen to his home friends
in this place.
~ After leaving Scotland our first
visit was to the two great English
Universities, Oxford and Cambridge
1 was almost fascinated by them,
they are so much richer than ours
are in their histories, their architect
ural glories and scholastic treasures,
as well as in the associations that
cluster more thickly about them than
even the ivy does about their walls.
When we think that they were built
two and. three hundred years before
the western world was even diScOv-
cred, we are certainly impressed with
the fact that our history is all recent.
Each University is made up of sew
eral independentc olleges-Cambridge
about twenty, Oxford twenty-five;
and each college has its own build
ings, chapels, libraries, etc, and the
University is a sort of loose union of
them all. 1t is as if our New Eng
land colleges were all united under
one head, yet each left to pursue its
own course in most of it's internal
affairs. These colleges were built by
kings and other wealthy men in for
mer centuries and have very rare col
lections of books, manuscripts, pic
lures, etc. The colleges have their
separate grounds and some of them
are very elegant. Such beautiful
lawnsi l should like to see them in
term time, when their three thousand
students apiece were there to make
the University what it is.
The next objects of interest were
and Warwick castles.
These are nearly exact opposites;
one old, dismantled, decayed and
with its glory gone; the other in all
the pride of present wealth and pros
perity. Yet the former was Just as
as the latter. In the case
of Kenilworth the Imagination must
re-people the deserted halls, must
regild the decaying walls and breathe
into it its one time pomp and pagean-
try and gaiety. In Warwick you see
a castle full of old armor, old mir
rors, desks, plate, pictures and the
most costly bric-a-brac. The
to the castle is through a
long avenue cut out Of solid rock, so
that the walls on either side are ten
or fifteen feet high and covered with
ivy. The grounds contain a thou
sand acres and are very beautiful.
From here we went to Stratford-
on-Avon, a delightful, queit, COM
mon-place town, specially interest
ing only as being Shakespeare's
home. American liberality has done
much to perpetuate his memory
there. We have also visited Windsor
castle, one of the Queens palaces.
We did not see her majesty as she
was away, up in Scotland, but were
shown over the State apartments
the presence chamber, the grand
room, the banqueting hall,
and the Kings and Queens closets,
which were to me something new in
the line of closets, as they were hung
with paintings by Rubens, Hogarth
and Van Dyke, and were Respondent
With gilt and stained glass. We
we're shown the royal stables, built
at cost of half a million dollars
and in which the Queen keeps two
hundred and fifty beautiful horses
and many elegant carriages.
In London we have Of course visi-
ed Westminster Abbey and were
ortunate enough to get good seats
It is an intensely interesting place,
the one who was with me
.emarked that she should like to
a housekeeping on the
premises. 1 should have been glad
% have spent a whole day there.
There is enough about this old coun-
he time. To walk in the very midst
If these STORED, historic places is apt
o derange ones equanimity, at
east it has mine.
We also attended service at St.
oaul's, said to be the third largest
hurch and to have one of the finest
ZONES in the world, larger and more
beautiful than the one on the capitol
It Washington. Below the church
1ord Wellington and Admiral Nelson
re buried, whose cenotaphs we saw.
these are the two men, whom above
ii others Englishmen delight to