The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-04-14

mat Which appeals #lhe most S1IonE ly to the traveller in foreign land but there are few visitors to London who do not agree that the most in teresting trio of the city's attractions embrace St. Paurs, West Minister Alb
 bey and the Tower
 In most instances the Tower takes precedence and all are delighted at thet precedence and all are delighted at the uniforms of the heefeaters, the stone
 upon which Anne Boleyn was beheaded land the glittering display of crown 1 jewels. The prison chamber wherein 1 Sir Walter wrote his life during the I2 years of his Incarceration and the stairway beneath which the young prin- ces were smothered are no longer open 1 to visitors. though I have seen both
 but there is spot that most travellers
 miss, and that is the crypt beneath
 the White Tower, whlcn once marked
 the burial site Of the Blessed Bran. 1 Bran was a petty ruler of the vest
 ern section of Great Britain and his I history is most interesting. His sister, the Princess Brianon, was married to an
 Irish monarch and atsthe wedding d vis- ting brother of the bride, not approv- l Ing of the match, cut off the tails and Ieyelashes of the grooms horses. The l Irish King smothered his resentment at the time, but upon the bridal couple set ting down In the Emerald Isle the story began to be mooted about and poor Brianon was badly treated by her new subjects who visited upon her head the punishment for her brothers eseapade. Finally. the new Queens environment l became so intolerable that she deter mined to appeal to her brother and ladopted a most unique method of com lmunication. She captured some young | b 4f1H ~l.t t,l i Bran, Bran. When they had learned
 thei rlesson well. she wrote a tiny note
 to her brother telling him of her most
 miserable condition and begging him to I rescue her. This note she fastened se-
 curely hidden under the wings or her
 pet birds and started them on a Journey
 across the water to England. It was
 hot long ere the continued cry of Bran, | Bran attracted notice and the feathery
 messengers. being captured, were sent
 to him whose name had been the burden or their repeated notes. Bran read the lmissive and hastened to his sisters re- lief Brianon was rescued. but Bran was slain in the expedition, and his warriors in arms were directed to bear 1 his severed head to the Tower at Lon l don and bury it with it's eyes gazine
 toward the sea. It was prophesied that
 so long as the head thus remained Eng
 land would never be conquered by a
 foreign foe. The men did as they were bidden and the little birds accompanied them. but so entrancing1y did they sing
 that the warriors consumed so years in
 the journey listening to the melody of
 the warblers. the head of Bran being in all that period miraeulously preserved from decay
 For centuries Bran remained with his
 eyes guarding the coast but, alas, when Arthur came to the throne his pride
 would not permit him to admit that his throne and country were preserved from invasion by a spell; it must be his own
 prowess that saved the land, so he had
 Brans head disnterred and cast into
 the Thames. Thus was the spell brolx :
 en and Merry Old England was soon
 afterwards the prey of the Piet, the Scot. the Anglo-SaXon Ind the Norman lconquerers.
 warblers, not even the nightengals,
 sing so sweetly as did the birds of Brianon.
 I take it that most visitors to the
 British capital are familiar with the
 quaint little dog cemetery in a corner
 of Hyde Park, but few there are who
 know of the Field of the Forty Foot steps.
 This vicinity is still supposed to be a accursed and was long the scene Of
 robbery. murder and every species of 1 ldeprayity and it's uneanny reputation lemenates from deadly fratrieidal l struggle which occurred there in the period of the Duke oy Monmouth's re bellion The locality originally em-
 braced the fields in the rear of Montagu 1 House and is now the extreme termina l ton of the northeast end of Upper
 Montagu street. Here the two brothers
 fought so forociously as to destroy each
 other and 40 footsteps of the yengeful
 struggle are still extant. but since that 1 day neither grass nor vegetable will
 grow thereon. Even after the prints are
 bricked over the pavement rises and 1 falls in spots as the undulating bosom | of a gasping man.
 l This undulation of the pave has it's analogue at Ephesus, where John the 1 Divine sleeps, untouched by corruption.
 with the ground still heaving over his brea st as he breathes waiting the sum- mons to come forth and testify against the anti-Christ
 l These two oddities will suffice for | London at present and while I spoke in former paper of several strange ob- 1 jects to be seen at Rome, | must revert again to the Eternal Cf.V.
 It is odd with what tenacity legend | N hoof, and equally odd how these foot
 prints were originally created. Not far 1 from the Coliseum stands the fontana sudens, which most visitors know It
 was the fountain at which the combat ants and gladiators who survived the bloody contests came tt wash the. dust and precipitation from their bodies. but quite close to the base Is the foot 1 print of a horse said to have been left l by the steed of Castor or Pollux. II will he remembered that after a
 bloody battle with the Etruscans the tide of warfare was going against the Romans, when two youths, mounted
 upon white chargers. entered the ranks
 and turned defeat into victory. Later
 in the day the champions appeared at
 this fountain to refresh their battle stained bodies. To thez gaping crowd they conided their identy as Castor and
 Pollux, and having finished their ablu-
 tions. mounted their steeds and sprang E up into the air. On- of the depart ing horses left his hoofprint upon the l stone and there it fs today.
 In the Roman forum Is another hooe- 1 print left by the disappearing steed of l self-sacrificing Curtius.
 Rome was trembling under a great l earthquake and a hu-c crevasse had 1 been opened in the forum. A sybil had
 said the city could not be saved unless l the citizens would cast their most pre- 1 cious treasures into the abyss. Curtiua l conceived that the men of any com
 munify were it's greatest treasures and
 urging his horse to the brink disap-