Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-10-11

| seen in a few hours countless sue
cession of the most beautiful and dreamful
countryside pictures in England And if
! you should come on foot for the eleven
miles, as l did, along the hard, white high
way'from Warwick, underneath an almost
unbroken archway of elms, through the
! crisp yet drowsy atmosphere OF an Eng
| lish midland antumnal morning, there is
still surrounding you the glamor Of be-
witchlng unreality you cannot and would
not dispel.
Tramping over this witching way, what
| a food of historic memories sweeps in with
| the breath of the rosy morning! Here upon
| this noble eminence, with historic Clopton
house to the right and Hampton Lucy to
the left, beneath the arching elms is caught
| the first glimpse of the valley Of the
Avon. 4 hundred lesser gentle
yerdure-clad eminences rise and fall, as
if with the throbbing of natures heart,
northeast winds thread of silver. II
| broadens as it disappears aud reappears in
its course towards the Severn. and Is finally
lost completely, where, above mass Of
| elms and lines and red-tiled roofs, rises u
slender spire. The silvery thread is the
Avon. The mass of elms and lines and red
| tiled roofs is Stratford. The slender spire
and shrine of
THE WORLDS IMMORTAL BARD.
Lettering here the old days, places and
stirring scenes fit quickly into the wide
horizon rim. The three spires OF ancient
Coventry can almost be seen, not for away
pilgrimages and the deed of fair Godiva
which brought freedom from the oppres-
sion of her fierce, grim lord. to the peo-
pie Of her well-beloyed town. The
grand ruin of Kenilworth, with its men,
cries of iousts, tournaments and revelries
of Elizabeth and her favorites are nearer
still Gray old Warwick, with its walls
still as mighty as in the furious times of
the third Henry, Is just behind you to the
north. Over TO the west Eyesham and
Tewksbury recall a grewsome tale. Only
fifteen miles to the north, just at the edge
of Oxfordshire, the first great battle be-
tween the kings and parliamentary forces
was fought in the 18th century at Edge
Hill. Not far away, in Northamptonshire,
is Fotheringay notably connected with the
lives and fates of princes, and famous and
infamous as the place of execution of Mary
Queen of Scots.
Below Edge Hill is Banbury Of cherished
nursery rhyme memory, to whose tooth
some cheese Shakespeare likened F'alstaff,
for his rich and unctuous habit. Itsis but
few miles away, just over there in North
ampton, beyond the ivy-hid Rugby of tom
Browns School Days" that the Avon
springs from the hills about Naseby,
where Cromwell and Fairfax drove the
hapless Charles from his throne and king
dom. SiXty-four great seats with their
castles or halls. from Allesley park
to Wraxal House, besides many fine ca
thedrals and superb monastic and castle
ruins, cluster close within the shire. The
chimneyS and minareted turrets of one rise
above primeval trees down there to the
east in the dreamful Avon valley. They
mark old Charlecote, scene of certain
rb
same Charleccte once stood in the greatest
of all British forests, the forest Of Arden,
whose name and fame
CAN NEVER GROW OLD,
so long as the fair and tender R0salind and
all the other winsome brood in las You
Like IT, shall repeat their wise and Won
drous human truths to those who own and
love the English thought and tongue.
AS you descend into the old town every
thing is strangely still. On the way you
see few blackbirds hopping sagely among
the stubble, close to the sheltering hedge.
Here and there weary peasant that has
escaped the annual autumnal slaughter
border for little, and then as suddenly
and silently disappears. The kline
are sleepily chewing their cuds
against the farm house byres.
A few "stooks" of late gathered grain are
huddled in the little fields. The smoke as
and hall. They are late riserS, these En-
glish folk, and the low sun is far up in its
slender arc before dwellerS give sign of be-
ing astir. Even the sable rocks that haunt
the dead trees and high, wide chiTneys of
ancient demesnes, rise sluggishly from
their hiding, wheel lazily about it, and set
tie down quietly again, not yet ready to
unloose
THEIR sAUCY, CHATTEgING TONGUES
You know, as everybody knows, when
YOU have come to the little closely -hedged,
tiled houses, where the open highway has
merged into long, picturesque though
humble street, that We're you to remain
in Stratford for months time there
could be only Just the half dozen places
Immediately identified with Shakespeare,
to visit-the house where he was born,
the vacant site of the house where he
lived at New Place, the church where he is
buried, Ann Hathaway's cottage, and the
memorial fountain and theater. And while
YOU could see these in an hours time, the
impulse, now that they are SO near your
ken, is to avoid them; to wander away
through the town for little at first, and,
shaking off the dreamful captivity of it all,
to try and come back to those objects and
places one by one, with increased attitude
and power OF recognition and companion
ship.
You are now in the center of Stratford,
curious fact that in all the hundreds or
English towns you have visited, you have
always found High street, and that every
place of interest to be seen, as at Stratford,
is only few moments walk from every
other place, off Or on this old familiar High
street. Here is an open space, the ancient
.'Mercate square, Jagged, zigzag thor
oughfares lead to it from outlying pictur
esque spots and quarters. All about are
half-timbered houses projecting story over
story, into the market-place; and you Won
der how long before, from sheer age, they
will tumble, red roofs first, over into the
clean, cool square below. Quaint shops,
just now opening, are pinched in between
staid old mansions,
BANDBoXES OF INNS,
scores Of them, each striving to Guido the
other in curious name or escutcheon sug-
gestive Of the one memory of the slumberous-
old town, speck the gray facades with gilt
and color.
Down one Of these streets, old Henley
street, through whose windings a glimpse
of the upland is caught you know is to be
found the house of all others in Stratford.