Elihu Burritt

“ If such a building could be erected in a century, to the finest and last line of the sculptor's chisel, even an amateur of architecture might walk up and down under its lofty arches and roofage with but a forced sentiment of veneration. But the rime of age and history, which six hundred years have breathed upon its gray forests of columns, pillars, and carved work, produces upon a thoughtful mind an impression which no artistic architecture, however grand, can create without such associations. ”

“ Here, too, is the doublet in which Lord Brooke was killed at Lichfield, in 1643. Three great Gothic windows are set out in deep recesses, as if to embrace and welcome the first and last light of the day, and to soften and diffuse it, a tinted smile, over the spacious apartment and its embellishments. But if the outside world smiles inward through these great windows so graciously, their outward vision opens upon a scene of exquisite beauty, which few can be found to equal. Here a vista deploys before the view full of all the attractions that nature and art can give to a landscape. ”

“ Indeed, both for its architectural features, its antiquity, and internal embellishment and symbolic heraldry, no other hall in England that I have seen presents so many aspects of interest to the visiter.
Coventry does not look like a city that has sewed new patches to this old garment of antiquity. The very streets are like the crooked seams of the ancient robe, and on them are worked fabrics that harmonize as well with these century-worn buildings as the pictures in the tapestry of St. Mary's Hall do with that edifice. ”

“ Surely no man could be less than eight feet and a half high who needed such a kettle for cooking for himself and family, even if his children were nearly as large as himself. And this is the size accorded to that prehistoric hero. He was one of those amphibious beings who, like King Arthur, have lived in the misty border-land of history, half substance and half shadow, but projecting a full human outline upon the spectrum of by-gone centuries. The history of the Great Vase is more ancient and uncertain still. It is of white marble, executed in the purest Grecian order of conception and art. ”

“ But this is only the beginning of her wealth of fame. Shakespeare has wreathed for her another reputation of almost equal lustre, in the character of Falstaff. What reading man has ever walked her streets, or heard of them, without thinking of that doughty coward's horror at "marching through Coventry with such a jail delivery" as his awkward squad presented? These fictions of romance or of genius give the town a reputation and a place in the world's mind for which all the incontestable and proven facts of its history hardly serve as a setting. ”

“ Between Coventry and Warwick, in a green, quiet, rural district, stands Kenilworth. And Kenilworth is a castle, which absorbs into itself all of space, population, and history that belongs to the name. Not only novel readers but practical history readers at a distance, never think of anything but the castle when the name is mentioned or suggested. Still, there is a goodly, tidy, and comfortable village near the ruins worth visiting without the lion which attracts so many thousands a year to pay their homage and their admiration—to the genius of Sir Walter Scott. ”

“ It was natural and inevitable that the ribbon trade of Coventry, when thus unroofed and turned out of the conservatory of protection, should experience a chill and check in its growth for awhile, though in the end it may become more hardy and prosperous than ever from this very exposure to the out-door climate of the world's competition and commerce. Some one has said that commerce has no conscience; and that fashion has no patriotism is a truth still more evident and universal. No trade could be subjected to more sudden and sweeping vicissitudes of taste than that of ribbons. ”

“ The Gate House is in excellent preservation, and is occupied by a tenant of the Earl of Clarendon. The towers are supported by old pear trees that clasp their long arms around the stone-work and hug it so tightly that you may see their impress in the wall. It is a pleasant sight, which a poet might make something of, to see them hanging their clusters of luscious fruit up and down, as if, like the idea expressed in Solomon's Song, they were staying the venerable building with apples and cheering delicacies. ”

“ The church itself is a spacious building and creditable to modern architecture, but presenting nothing impressive inside or out. But the choir, which is a part of the ancient edifice, is a beautiful structure. The groined ceiling overhead is a work of wonderful art. The ornate roofage is supported by long delicate branches that seem to grow out of the graceful trunks of the stone trees planted against the side walls on either side. They are called flying ribs, but are more like long taper fingers of white marble. ”

“ Each has contributed its contingent to the magnificent whole to be handed down to a posterity which should cherish and adorn the heirloom of illustrious ancestors, and send it down the line of the future with added wealth and beauty. With such an anchorage to moor a family name and estate to, there is no wonder that both should attach their being, life, and treasures to it with a proud ambition of perpetuity. ”

“ But structures of wider reputation than the cathedral have been founded and erected in Lichfield. It has given physical or intellectual birth to men of a stature of mind that has overlooked the tallest of the three cathedral spires, and cast a luminous shadow over two hemispheres. Can any other town so small in England boast, like this flat-footed little city, of giving birth, first shaping, or residence to four such men as Johnson, Addison, Garrick, and Ashmole? ”

“ Warwick Castle is a structure which must grow more and more interesting from decade to decade. It is the only feudal palace left intact in England. It was ranked among the very best of them when they were all alive and strong over the land. It is associated with a name that stands among the first in the Norman aristocracy. Its location in itself is deeply interesting. Shakespeare breathed an inspiration upon the little Avon that laves its foundations, and gave to its name an immortality more vital and beautiful than the Tiber's. ”

“ He left footholdings and footposts for the men wrestling with the surges of misfortune, and many a half-drowned struggler has reached the sunny shore of fame and fortune by taking hold of the skirts of his great example. Some one would do a good service to all coming generations by simply giving to them the consecutive chain of his experiences, just as they were linked to his life, and by doing it in a series of pictures or illustrations graven in stone, after the manner of his monument in the Lichfield market-place. ”

“ No other building is the centre and attraction of so many German associations. For nearly a thousand years it has been rising under the thin, trickling streams of German contributions. But the builders, with these small means, have hardly been able to outstrip the slow feet of time and to fill its deforming footsteps. While working at one end of the cathedral the other is falling to ruin. Time seems to be chasing them from one end to the other, defacing their work as they creep on with the slow centuries. But look at Lichfield Cathedral. ”

“ All these aspects and associations are becoming more and more widely appreciated, and the footfall of visiters from distant countries crossing the threshold will grow more and more frequent as the readers of English history and romance increase in both hemispheres.
But Warwick is not all castle. Far from it. It is a goodly, venerable town with a public character and history distinct from the castle. One of its streets, full a third of a mile in length, can hardly be surpassed in the country for neatness, tidy elegance, and picturesque variety and vista of architecture. ”

“ For the poorest man on earth must have some distant relation, and the richest man's son would take the name of the twentieth cousin to inherit the title and castle of Warwick. However thin and attenuated may be the line of blood relationship between these families, the favoured heir to this baronial rank and wealth gathers within his coronet all the memories and distinctions and even relationships of his predecessors all the way back to the Conquest. He is the heir of all of them. Saxon, Dane, and Norman converge into his status and blend in his being. ”

“ To begin with, there is the legendary Guy and the historic Guy, the Saxon of King Arthur's century, and the Norman who fought at Falkirk, and cut off the head of Piers Gaveston, the favourite of King Edward I, who had "called him names," such as "The Black Hound of Arden." Then we have two illustrious "Richards," easily to be confounded in one nebula of reputation. Here is the Richard that founded this chapel, and lies in solid brass on this tomb over a long posterity weeping in marble beneath. ”

“ A sentiment stronger than even patriotism, an association more enduring than ever attached to a great emperor, has rebuilt the desolated edifice, and beautified it with trophies and treasures of art which Solomon's sculptors and workers in iron, brass, and wood could not produce for his Temple. The people of the district have been made willing in the power of this sentiment. The wealth of their contributions, if they could be reduced to the low standard of a money value, would show how they prize this great heirloom of past generations. ”

“ Take away that famous novel, and, with all the authenticated history that remains attached to them, not one in five of the visitors they now attract would walk around them with admiration. In fact they are more a monument to the genius of the great novelist than to the memory of Elizabeth and the Earl of Leicester. If any community ever owed a statue to the honour of a benefactor for money value received, the Kenilworthies owe one to the celebrated Scotch writer. ”

“ Few cities in England, in a word, will present to the visiter so many features of interest as Coventry. It has played its part conspicuously in the history, literature, and industry of the kingdom, and it contains several of the most impressive monuments of the architecture of the fifteenth and fourteenth centuries. The romantic lore of legends and poetical fictions has illuminated its actual history, and made it stand out with attractive features of interest. ”

“ The hall is seventy feet long, thirty feet broad, and thirty-four feet high; making excellent proportions for the best aspects and uses of such an apartment. The great north window over the platform or throne gallery, is the centre-piece and first object of attraction that meets the eye on entering. It is the only one that retains its original stained glass, which impresses upon you a more vivid sense of antiquity than even the time-eaten face of the outside wall. ”

“ After the Restoration, Charles II gave the castle to Lawrence Hyde, the second son of the great Chancellor, and through his descendants it has come into the possession of the present Earl of Clarendon, who fully appreciates its value as a historical monument of interesting and romantic associations. The facing of the massive and lofty Cæsar's Tower must be nearly three centuries old, and it is wonderfully perfect. The perpendicular lines from base to battlement are as straight as if the walls were run in a mould. The eye cannot detect a deflection of a hair's-breadth ”

“ Few living queens, on either side of Elizabeth's time, have been honoured with more stately pageants than the memory of this Saxon lady, "the woman of a thousand summers back." The most splendid of them all was probably the last, which took place in June, 1866. Indeed, no city ever impressed the existence of one human being upon its own more vividly than Coventry has done that of Lady Godiva. ”

“ Whoever appreciates fully the genius of the sculptor to breathe speaking life into cold marble, and give it the visible pulse of thought and feeling, should see and study this work of Chantrey, if he has not done so already. ”

“ As he looks down from an upper window of a corner house upon the main street, he wears the very face of a conscious poltroon, as an outlaw that has sinned against the best sex in the world more outrageously than any man in history. ”

“ Here are private parks and gardens kept in the highest state of beauty and perfection, at immense expense, by wealthy noblemen, opened as pic nic and play-grounds for the multitudes that toil in the mines and redden the heavens of the district by night with their fiery industries. While the spaces between these villages grow narrower and blacker; and while the chimneys thicken, and their swart dew falls faster on roof, road, and walk, here are breathing-grounds held in reserve for their recreation, and kept smokeless, free, and open for their enjoyment. ”

“ In this little quiet church, which one might almost take for the crickets' cathedral, are the monuments of men who have won great names in English history. Here lies entombed the father of that Earl of Essex whom Elizabeth delighted to honour until she found a more attractive favourite. ”

“ The very pallet in which their young cheeks are half buried looks as if you might blow up wrinkles in it with your breath. I should not wonder if, now and then, a tender mother approaching them, has softened her step unconsciously as if loth to wake them up out of such sweet repose, for they look tired, not dead. ”

“ Mary's is the great, commanding edifice, and a kind of Westminster Abbey to the noble families of the castle. Most of the building is comparatively modern, and fails to impress you with the sense of venerable antiquity. The tower is a lofty, massive structure, standing on four feet, between two of which the main street passes; so that doubtless loads of hay are frequently seen going through the porch on the way to market. ”