The times. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1890-1903, 1892-07-30

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fCopyriqht. 1902. by Edgar l.. wakoman.l
CmENcEsTrR England July l8-One
does not know hundredth part Of England
even after years Of travel among her his
foric scenes and about her countless
shrines.
| feel this more and more when, after
firing Of grand old beaten paths, step
aside, but a step 10 sometimes seems. and
End maze upon maze Of sweet old hooks,
wonderfully winsone in collective or indi-
vidual aspects: and these could never be
exhausted, II one set out 20 explore for
such as these and know them never so little
when found, during the natural course OF
q lifetime
IL seems 10 me that the west Of England,
say the western Of the midland counties,
furnishes the most extraordinary number
Of these half mountain eeries. You need
not 20 50 far south or west as Devon and
Somerset. nor even into Wales where
scenery has more the elements Of wild and
savage grandeur. and where the good folk
who can speak English as well as you can
pride themselves in making you believe
they cannot speak 10 at all, and that Welsh
was the language Of Adam and Eve.
Neither will you have TO go 50 far as the
lake district. which is all sublimity and
hotel and posting bills; nor 20 Northum-
berland and Durham, verdureiess and sug-
gestive Of coal: nor again 20 Yorkshire,
where the shuddering fogs flap along the
grewsome moors
But here in the very heart Of England,
where anybody that has two days time,
though he should have two months in
stead. and two stout legs, can come from
any great English city almost as in n holi-
day stroll. are these myriad places Of rest
fulness and beauty, hidden coy from the
globe trOtters lOrgnettes I'm the glens and
hollOws of these midland bills, with his
tories reaching farther back than the time
OF the Saxons' first coming, with the moss
of ages upon them, and yet all OF them as
sweet and fresh as the dew trickling from
the Hottest grasses Of Cleeye Clouds and
Broadway Beacon, which stand like grim
old towers above the Cotswold hills.
know the Give" American tourist is
hardly worthy Of himself If, having ar
rived In Liverpool on Tuesday or Friday
evening, he has not done" Chester, dash
ed through bennington, nodded in
friendly way to the painted efigy Of
Shakespeare, become tired of London,
glanced at Kenilworth and Warwick and
swept around through the lake district 10
Glasgow, the Trossachs, Edinburgh, Alb
botsford and Melrose, in fact exhausted
Great Britain "a he naively and quite
correctly puts il, before the first week has
barely rolled around.
But If this sort Of person could learn
that the best results Of travel come from
iding rather than cycloning through for
eign space, and could get shunted away
from railways and then meet with some
sort Of OBTAINING accident that would hold
his lungs, eyes and heart within region
like this long enough TO get them used TO
its citation and radiance, there would be
one less ricochetting mOnstrosity among
men, and that much of a blessed calm
would come along the maelstrom lines OF
travel
A pleasant way to reach this lovely re-
giOn is through Warwickshire. Stop day
or more at Stratford if you like and loiter
about the church beside the Avon Then
get an old boatman, mind you an old and
garrulOus boatman TO row you down the
historic stream He will tell you more
about VIII Shakespeare and his times than
If the mighty bard had been his school
mate Do not let him row fast. Give him
time to rest and descant upon the origin OF
Roman roads and barrows and cromlechs,
and above all give him time for folklore
tales and bugaboos and whispered mys-
teries Of the lordly halls high up among
the parks and demesnes
Never care for the passing hours. The
thatcbes Of cottages lean everywhere along
the Avon-amost to its brink You have
no need for an inn. With your peasant
companion you will be welcome every
where at night among the peasantry. BY
and by you win come to the wales among
the Cotswolds. Then will you see hamlets
and villages dOtting the valleys, imbedded
in orchards clustering on the billsides,
perched upon the heights and all in a set
ting OF lush orchards, waving fields within
checkered lines of hawthorn hedges or
denser rows OF lines, and these in turn
backed by banks of forest primeval; all in
such droning quiet, ample content and
smiling opulence that, full of the whey
exultation of it ALL you again and again
irresistibly exclaim, Here is Already at
lastw
By and by your boat comes under the
shadows Of a gray old abbey town. Near
it is Deerhurst, where kings older than
Alfred worshiped. The Avon has sung
itself 10 sleep in the bosom of the silver
Severn, and there, by Olney, Cnut aud Ed
mund Ironside met and divided England
between Dane and Saxon. Nearer still to
the gray old abbey town is the Bloody
Meadow" where the War of the Roses was
decided
Back past this now peaceful scene, past
old matched cottages, bright gardens and
green fields, there rises upon the strangers
sight a mighty silver gray old abbey. IL
il the abbey of Tewkesbury. 1t is more
than 800 years old, and the Norman pillars
of It's dim old nave are the hugest and
highest in England. Few Of the English
abbeys, or, indeed of the great English
cathedrals, contain the materials of his
tory and story which Tewkesbury pos
Besses
Then what wonderful charm there Is In
the old half timbered houses Of Tewkes-
bury. They lean over the shadowy streets
as though they had come back from misty
past 90 crane their neeks and heads into
the affairs of this bright and modern time.
Here you have Chester Bristol, Exeter and
Coventry almost in one in the wealth Of
specimens Of the old Tudor style. In the
gables, with their browning pinnacles, in
the p0rches, doors, nullioned windows and
huge ohimneys. in the overhanging of
stories aud projection of windows they