The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1893-04-23
WAkeman's Pen Still Flashing 10
View Masterful Pictures OF
Rural England.
Glorious Groupings and Sylvan
Scenes Depicted by the
Poet Traveller.
Wondarons J%ournoyings Into tho Past and
the Immovta,s brought From W raith-
land to Walk Beside You.

hundred 10 truly nearer tho number ! nave
personally visited. Each one could furnish
through l~eisurely study. for brush or pen,
abundant material for q winsome volume
Some writer's would have us believe that
English villages were things OF the past;
TINT rural Englnnd had completely gone
to decay; that the smoke OF fac
tory.stacks hung like a pail over the
remains of all that is mellow and old and
good: that the thunders Of the mills had
drowned Nil the dear old country sounds;
that commercial England, with hard and
cruel hand. had effnced almost the last
vestige of tho erst sweet and charming
countrysides; and that brick and iron,
stone and steel. coal and Brummagen,
varied now and then by nobleman's de-
mesne or gentleman's seat, we're the char
acteristic features of an English landscape.
As goodly a proportion of English as
American people have come to accept this
as true. But it is astoundingly false. as
any one, who will really Saunter, not rush,
about England may know. Books arc
largely responsible for this. English nc.
ton, like American fiction, of from q half
century to q century ago was repleto WIN
pictures of village life and character. When
labor of George Eliot-who was to the early
Victorian aae, at least in q degree, what
Shakespeare was to the Elizabethan-was
done, mastership in this school OF delinea-
ton seemed to cense.
Neither America nor England has since
produced a LASTING work of fiction upon
rural scenes and lowly folk. sNovclists
have wallowsd in altruism. psychological
phenomena, subtleties of crime and its de-
teotion, hideous salaciousness, positive and
comparative religion, the heroics Of aRnos-
ticism and in6delity and in the shredded
and bedraggled warp and wool OF ultra
intense metropolitan life. So those who
rely on intelligent fiction to reflect reality
folk had surely passed away.
Again, the great world Of activities has
come constantly to intelligent attention.
through the press, the reviews and through
statistical volumes. largely to the exclusion
of the great underlying world of fact and
sentiment. In America the stupendous at
fairs and progress of our great cities have
almost obliterated the memory of some Of
the sweetest old hooks in all the world-the
historic and beautiful hamlets OF New Eng
land, of the eastern and even of
the southern and middle states. Yet
they are all just as they once were.
prettier and tenderer for their ,pensiveness
and increasing age. Here, similarly. every
Liverpool. Hull. and that host of practically
new manufacturing towns and cities Of
Yorkshire and Lancashire.
The American commercial mind and the
English commercial mind have heard for a
quarter of q century of naught else than
their inRots and spindles. pottery and
looms. fabrics and ships. look-outs aAd
walk-outs. depression and expansion and
their tremendous trade superlatives of
every hard and harassing description.
But tho material and literary fact etill re-
mains that all the thousands of ancient
English villages. and with not a half hun-
dred exceptions. arc here just as they wore
at the beginning of the century. and just %
~~n kn~n ~~ral 4uav <h>rr d. kha ho.A z1l
works of English fiction. Not only this,
but hundreds of modern villages with win
some olden architecture in the habiliment
of Elizabethan and even earlier Tudor
times, enriched with luxurious parking and
intelligent Horticulture. and windows filled
with rudy English faces, have been added
to the mossier olden stock.
Even in the congested districts OF Lnn-
cashire, Yorkshire, northern Warwickshire,
Staffordshire and Shropshire, not an an
cient village has passed from sight. save
where q town or city has grown within and
around it; and, whore factory towns are 80
thick that clusters of chimney-staoks
crowd every acre of the horizon like giant
there between still stand the ancient ham
lets. more witchinR for the Rrimy fellow
ship of trade; an endless solace to eye md
heart OF those who oeaseless toll.
Therefore when the lively American who
rural England Of literature is no more, he
tells us what perhaps some Hyde Park ora
tor. railway station porter OF travelling
salesman has told him. but still something
which he does not know; and when the
disposes OF rural England in a single
breezy magazine article or smart review,
he commit for q needed stipend of ElO or
eco little short of literary crime.
Such as these and better still all those
who love the truly beautiful and winsomely
picturesque in our land. without seeking
Quixotio quests among political and social
problems. should certainly pass at least one
summer among English villages. Hundreds
can be found even along the lines Of rail-
way. Leaving these at any station, BY
coach, BY trap. upon bicycle, or more ad-
va%ntageously and fuller of citation than ali,
on your own good legs. every fne old hedge
bordered highway will furnish you an as
founding revelation in every hulf-day's
drive or walk.
What wondrous journeyings into the past
are thus afforded. What splendid pages Of
history are thus reopened-for it has been
in and about English villages rather than
in towns that English history has been
made. What challenges are prompted to
the great and tho immortal to come from
their wraithlands and walk beside you
where they once dwelt. And how You find
that all you knew of books has mex pressibly
lacked in the true color and feeling until
you thus wed presence and actually with
the %toneless tale of words!
The wealth of number OF these oldcn vii
lagos in Kent alone would confound che
Drynsdusts and the iconoclasts OF rural
England. 1t is with n thrill Of delight that
You wander through Saltwood, peeping out
between lenfy hills upon the glorious sea;
Lyminge. NOISY and still beside the most
ancient church Of southern Kent. 80 ancient
that in its walls are actually seen every
specimen of ecclesiastio architecture from
saxon to PERI endicular, go ancient still that
81. Ediberga. ono of its patron saints and
daughter of the Saxon King Ethelbert, who
,eiRned more than 1000 years ago, lies
buried within; Firth with its unique old
houses. its winding lanes Of green, banks Of
chalk, shadowy combes and tender uplnnds;
Gotham, l%eniest. snuggest and p~rottiess
of all kentish villages. with its
lordly park, its stately lowered church
and brasses of GOO years in memory Of
the noble Cobhoms. and its Leather Bot
Ito" inn. made famous in the immortal
pages OF Pickwick; beautiful old Shorno,
Qirdled with massive Gins and richest or
chard bloom; and a hundred moro SGT
along the lnne-cirt downs, clustering in tho
woody Weld. or nesting among tho Kent
ish orchards and hop gardens. with their
rows OF cottages with w~hitewaahed walls.
dormer windows, matched roofs and gar
dea-fronts each a mnze Of fuschias, pinks,
carnations and ioscs; and all OF them
from a hundred 10 n thousand yenrs old.
Who IL there to fifty describe or paint the
droninp old villnueR of TINT Curioua Enoiiuh