Thos. D. Murphy

“ About Loch Leven and the ruin that rears its low, square tower from the clustered foliage of its tiny islet, there will always hover an atmosphere of romance. And why should it not be thus, since the authentic feats that history records have in them more of romance than many of the wild tales of the imagination? But more than this: the halo which the genius of Scott has thrown over the spot and the song and story that have been builded on the captivity and escape of the fair prisoner of Loch Leven, continue to make the placid lake a shrine for many pilgrims. ”

“ Our guide urges us to ascend the tower—it is the day of all days to see the golden vale of Tip [Pg 333] perary from such a viewpoint—and indeed the prospect proves an enchanting one. It is a perfect day and the emerald-green valley lies shimmering under the expanse of pale-blue sky. In the far distance on every hand are the purple outlines of the hills—they call them mountains in Ireland—and stretching away toward them the pleasant fields intersected by sinuous threads of country roads. The landscape is cut up into little patches by the stone fences and gleams with tiny whitewashed cottages. ”

“ Nowhere in England is there another place that speaks so eloquently of the past or which brings so near to our prosaic present day the life, manners and environment of the English nobleman of three or four centuries ago. No sight in England is more enchanting than the straggling walls and widely scattered towers of Haddon, standing in gray outline against the green of its sheltering hill—the point of view chosen by the painter of our picture. Yet, with all its battlements and watch-towers, Haddon was never a fortified castle—a circumstance to which we owe its perfect preservation. ”

“ Blarney Castle to some extent deserves the encomiums that have been so lavishly heaped upon it. It is the one place in Ireland that every tourist is expected to see; and its fame is probably due more to its mythical Blarney stone than to its historical importance. As we saw it on a perfect summer day, the great square tower with overhanging battlements rising out of the dense emerald foliage and darkly outlined against the bluest of Irish skies, it seemed to breathe the very spirit of chivalry, but a rude, barbarous chivalry, for all that. ”

“ It is a lonely town following a steep, roughly-paved main street, at the top of which we stop for luncheon at an old-fashioned but very pleasant country inn. From Bishop’s Castle to Barmouth by the way of Welshpool, Llanfair, Dinas Mawddwy and Dolgelley, we pass through the very heart of North Wales and see many phases of its beauty, though generally in the wilder and sterner moods. The hills are often steep, but from their crests we have far-reaching views over the wooded vales and green hill ranges. In places we wind through tangled forests or run along the banks of swift little rivers. ”

“ We wander into the crooked lanes that lead to the nooks and corners about the cathedral. We catch the towers from different viewpoints; as they stand, boldly outlined against an opalescent sky flecked with red-toned clouds, they form a fit study for the artist—and one of which the artist has often availed himself. The college court is full of shadows; how easy it would be to imagine a cowled figure stealing along in the dusk and passing from sight in the Norman entrance yonder—than which there is no choicer bit of medieval architecture in the Kingdom. ”

“ The road to Ringwood and from thence to Lymington leads through an open, heathlike country—stretches of rank-growing ferns interspersed with the vivid purple of the heather. A little beyond Ringwood we enter New Forest, though in this section little of the forest—as one thinks of the word now—is to be seen. There are occasional groups of trees, but the prevailing feature of the landscape is the fern-clad heath. A cheerless road it is, but open, finely surfaced and nearly level, with nothing to hinder the mad rush of our motor. ”

“ The ruin is deserted and we find ourselves sole possessors of Whitby Abbey at an hour when the twilight softens the outlines and touches with gray and purple hues the old town at our feet and the rough moorland hills in the background, while the wide expanse of ocean glows mysteriously from the reflection of the dim-lit skies. The ruin rises abruptly from the soft greensward upon which the cows are contentedly grazing, and near at hand, gleaming darkly in the fading light, lies the fish pool, which lends much to the picturesqueness of the surroundings. ”

“ We pass bleak little towns, climb many steep, winding hills, speed swiftly along the uplands, leaving a long trail of white dust-clouds in our wake—until we are surprised by Glossop, a good-sized city in the midst of the moor. It has large papermills, substantially built of stone, an industry made possible by the pure waters of the moor. The streets are paved with rough cobble-stones and the town has altogether a cheerless, unattractive look, but interesting as quite a new phase of England. ”

“ But we may not linger in Coventry, and after a hasty glance at the almshouses—whose brick-and-timber front, with richly carved black-oak beams, rivals Leicester’s Hospital at Warwick—we are again on the King’s highway. And it is a highway fit for a king, this broad sweeping road that leads from Coventry through Kenilworth and Warwick to Stratford-upon-Avon. There are few more picturesque runs in Britain and few that take one past so many spots of literary and historic interest. ”

“ It is growing late and we must not loiter longer by the way if we are to reach Bournemouth for the night. We sweep across the great open Salisbury Plain past Stonehenge and down the sweet vale of the Avon until the majestic spire of Salisbury pierces the sky. Then southward through Ringwood to Christchurch, where we catch a glimpse of the scant fragments of the castle and the abbey church, with its melancholy memorial to Shelley. A few minutes more on the fine ocean road brings us into Bournemouth. ”

“ We begin our climb out of the valley over the Bwlch Ooeddrws Pass—the name is even more alarming than the heavy grade shown in the road book—and for three miles we climb steadily up the mighty hill alongside an incline that drops sharply to the roaring stream far below. From the summit a grand prospect greets our eyes: the wild, broken, intensely green Welsh hills stretching away range after range until they fade in the purple shadows of the distance, and yet higher above us looms the crest of Cader Idris, on which still linger flecks of snow. ”

“ It has much of interest, but it does not rightly belong in this chronicle. The low hum of our motor calls us to the open road, the green fields, and the unfrequented villages. We are soon away on the Carlow road with Cork as our objective.
The road out of Dublin is distressingly rough as compared with English highways, though it improves before we reach Naas. Our first impressions are distinctly melancholy; a “deserted village”—a row of stone cottages, roofless, windowless, and with crumbling or fallen walls—speaks of Ireland’s sorrows more plainly than any words. ”

“ It is a scene of unparalleled beauty, whichever way one turns; whether to the sea, out beyond the sandy beach at the foot of Castle Rock, running far away, a sheet of intensest blue, until it meets the pale sapphire of the sky; or whether toward the mountains of the north, Snowdon, the snow-crowned king of them all, rising in matchless majesty above his satellites; or to the landward where the tiny village nestles at the foot of craglike hills ”

“ It is a typical second-class village inn, not overly clean. It appears more of an alehouse than hotel, for a crowd of villagers and farmers is tippling at the bar.
Directly across the river from Leyburn is Middleham, the old-time capital of Wensleydale and one of the quaintest and least modernized towns it was our good fortune to see. The drab-colored buildings straggle up the hill upon whose crest sits Middleham Castle, grim, vast and wholly ruinous. And after wandering through the maze of shattered walls and tottering towers, it seemed to us that here was the very ideal of ruined castles. ”

“ We have spacious quarters at the Station Hotel, our lattice windows opening upon a stone balcony beyond which we can see the fountain, flowers and shrubbery of the gardens, and farther away, against the purple sky, the massive yet graceful towers of the minster. How different the Station Hotel is from the average railway hotel in America can be appreciated only by one who has enjoyed the hospitality of the one and endured the necessity of staying at the other. ”

“ It leads through quaint villages, snug and cozy among the hills, seemingly little disturbed by the workaday world beyond. What a change it is to come into the Holyhead road at Daventry, the splendid highway that charms one more and more every time he passes over it; and did ever anyone see it more golden and glorious than we as we hasten toward Coventry in the face of the setting sun? The giant elms and yews and pines that border the road stand sharply against the wide bar of lucent gold that sweeps around the horizon, flecked here and there with purple and silver clouds. ”

“ Amidst all this quiet and beauty one forgets the dark problems that threaten England and thinks only of her ineffable charm. Little Brington is not less attractive than its neighbor—the thatched structure above the well in the village green and the two hoary firs overshadowing it forming a picture as quaint as pleasing. We leave the lovely villages regretfully, and winding out of the maze of byroads, take the highway that leads toward the ancient city of Northampton, whose chief distinction should be that a Washington was once its Lord Mayor. ”

“ Facing the inn is the church, remarkable for its Early English windows and fine open hammer-beam, carved-oak roof, supported from corbels of angel figures with extended wings. Quite as unusual is the hexagonal market cross, built of heavy oak timbers, gracefully carved, which support the leaden roof. Besides these ancient landmarks, there is much else pleasing in Mildenhall. The thatched cottages, brilliant flower gardens and narrow streets, all combine to make it a snug, charming place where one might quite forget the workaday world without. ”

“ Along the walls directly in front of us, a blaze of purple bloom, stretches the [Pg 375] “largest wisteria in England,” one hundred and eighty feet in length, its stem like a good-sized tree. It has been thus with so many of the old-time inns; each has had some peculiar charm. But surely no architect ever planned the Red Lion Inn; it is a rambling building that seems to have grown up with the years. No straight line curbs its walls; none of its floors maintain the same level; it is a maze of strangely assorted apartments, narrow, winding hallways and odd nooks and corners. ”

“ To the right the ocean still shimmers in the setting sun and in nooks on the coast we catch glimpses of fishing villages—among them Robin Hood’s Bay, called by some the most picturesque of the smaller fishing-towns in England. Long before we come into Whitby we catch sight of the skeleton of the abbey on the headland, standing almost weirdly against the evening sky. We descend a long, winding hill and find ourselves threading our way through crooked, narrow streets thronged with people who get out of the way only when they have to. ”

“ It would be hard to imagine that there was ever a time when Grassington, Coniston or Kettlewell did not nestle, angular and weather-beaten, at the foot of the eternal hills, and they are as bare and as devoid of the picturesque touches of the village of southern England as the hills they lie beneath. They seem to have little excuse for existence and it is not clear to a casual visitor how the lonely moors that encircle them can afford sustenance to their inhabitants. Lead-mining once employed many people, though at present most of the mines are exhausted. ”