Bath, England

“ Bath, therefore, as it eminently agrees with us all, is, in England, the only place for us, since here, all the year round, there is always town at command, and always the country for prospect, exercise, and delight. ”

“ The distant appearance, or first glimpse of the city of Bath, is enough to impress a stranger with the most favourable opinions of the place. The regularity of the streets, and the tasteful character of the architecture of the principal buildings, are certainly superior to that of any other place of public resort in England; added to which, there is an attention to cleanliness apparent in the costume of the lower classes that is not so conspicuous in other places. ”

“ But the King was not the only person who sought health away from London in the seventeenth century. It was becoming the fashion for persons of note to resort to some watering-place, such as Bath or Tunbridge Wells, there to take the medicinal waters, which had long been known to be beneficial. Bath, or The Bath, as it was called at this time, occupied a prominent position in the social life of these times. Thither, during the summer months, flocked the rank and fashion of England, not always, it is true, for the sake of the waters, but "to divert themselves with good company." ”

“ On the whole, I suppose there is no place in England where a retired man, with a moderate income, could live so tolerably as at Bath; it being almost a city in size and social advantages; quite so, indeed, if eighty thousand people make a city,—and yet having no annoyance of business nor spirit of worldly struggle. ”

“ The old Bath Road knows no more the coaches, curricles, wigs and hoops, holstered saddles or the beaux and fine ladies, and gentleman’s gentlemen whose environment they were. We drift half-unconsciously into the language of the novelist who has recalled these old days so vividly. ”

“ I am truly delighted to hear that you are accommodating yourself a little to an English climate; if you once get over that one great obstacle, nothing else need prevent your establishing yourself in the country which, after all, is still the dearest to you; with the prospect of pleasant and desirable society for yourself and the girls, and of other resources for Papa, there is every reason to hope that you will find in Bath what you have so long wished for, a home in England. ”

“ Of the sights of Bath, the Abbey is most disappointing, and well it may be, for it was despoiled not only of its glass but even of its iron and lead by Henry VIII, and only a [316] bleak framework left to pass through a series of purchasers to the citizens. The west front wears a curious design of ladders on which battered angels clamber up and down. The interior has no "dim religious light," but gilt and colour and such a throng of gaudy monuments that the wits have made merry at the expense of the vaunted mineral springs. ”

“ There are delightful shops everywhere in Bath, and so many places to buy old family silver that it seems as if all the old families must have poured all their old silver into them, till you visit other parts of England, and find the same superabundance of second-hand plate everywhere. But it is in Milsom Street that most of the fine shops are, and I do not deny that you will see some drops of the tide of fashion clustered about their windows. Other drops have percolated to the tea-rooms, where at five o’clock there is a scene of dissipation around the innocent cups. ”

“ The opposite shore is the western boundary of the town of Woolwich, which has always remained under the quiet rule of agriculture, and made no attempts to enter the field of commerce. Capital has been sparingly invested in manufactures; and although her people have the prestige of wealth and brains, Bath will undoubtedly continue for years to come as she is to-day. She is the natural head of the lower Kennebec, which embraces so many charming nooks and [Pg 207] corners in its winding way to the sea. ”

“ The upper part contains the church, and amongst some handsome houses, is one which was formerly the residence of John Wood, Esq., the ingenious architect, to whom Bath owes many of its noblest buildings. The church is antique. At the west-end it has a fine square tower, one hundred feet high. The inside is remarkable for its neat and decent appearance. A custom long observed at the villa of Sir John Millar, Bart., displays his elegance and refinement in the choice of his amusements, as well as of his visitors. ”

“ I then departed alone, determining to proceed as far as Bath, and take the stage for London, upon the ensuing morning. As I passed over one of the most charming roads in England, and alone, I had not only time for reflection, but my reflections were pensively pleasing: I was advancing towards the metropolis; hitherto I had experienced the goodness of God, and I indulged the most sanguine hopes. My heart was greatly elated; I beheld the surrounding scenes with rapture; I was not wearied by my walk, it was only sixteen miles from Bristol, to Bath ”

“ These are the history less of events than characters, marked and wilful, and often passing into eccentricity; and in the abbey is the municipal monument of the chiefest of such characters, that Beau Nash—namely, who ruled the fashion of Bath for forty or fifty years with an absolute sway at a period when fashion was elsewhere a supreme anarchic force in England. ”

“ Perhaps I shall catch a sight of him in London; as also of old Thackeray who, Donne p. 288writes me word, came suddenly on him in Pall Mall the other day: while all the while people supposed the Newcomes were being indited at Rome or Naples.
If ever you live in England you must live here at Bath. It really is a splendid City in a lovely, even a noble, Country. Did you ever see it? One beautiful feature in the place is the quantity of Garden and Orchard it is all through embroidered with. ”

“ They have a very pretty house at Bath for the winter, and one at Bath Easton for the summer; their houses are adorned by the ingenuity of the owners, but as their income is small, they deny themselves unnecessary expences. ”

“ Dorsetshire and Huntingdonshire were animated by the same spirit. The Earl of Bath, after a long canvass, returned from the West with gloomy tidings. He had been authorised to make the most tempting offers to the inhabitants of that region. In particular he had promised that, if proper respect were shown to the royal wishes, the trade in tin should be freed from the oppressive restrictions under which it lay. ”

“ Beware of the insipid Vanities and idle Dissipations of the Metropolis of England; Beware of the unmeaning Luxuries of Bath and of the stinking fish of Southampton.”
“Alas! (exclaimed I) how am I to avoid those evils I shall never be exposed to? What probability is there of my ever tasting the Dissipations of London, the Luxuries of Bath, or the stinking Fish of Southampton? ”

“ BATH, a city, municipal, county and parliamentary borough, and health resort of Somersetshire, England, on the Great Western, Midland, and Somerset & Dorset railways, 1071/2 m. W. by S. of London. Pop. (1901) 49,839. Its terraces and crescents, built mostly of grey freestone, cover the slopes and heights of the abrupt hills which rise like an amphitheatre above the winding valley of the river Avon. The climate is pleasant, and the city, standing amidst fine scenery, itself possesses a number of beautiful walks and gardens. ”

“ Mary of Stall, which stood on the spot of ground now occupied by the houses connected with the Pump-room Piazza. The Abbey church of Bath is of that class of architecture commonly denominated the Florid Gothic. It remains in the same form as when finished in 1532. It was founded by Oliver King, Bishop of Bath and Wells. It is in length, from east to west, 210 feet; length of the cross aisles, from north to south, 126 feet; breadth of the body and aisles, 72 feet; height of the tower, 152 feet; and the height of the roof, or vaulting, 78 feet. The west window is of extreme richness. ”

“ The musical bells remind me of those at Bath, and every thing here seems, as at Bath, the work of this present century; but there is a Benedictine convent seated on the top of a hill above the town, of exceeding antiquity, founded before the conquest of England by William the Norman; under which lie its founder and protectors, the old Dukes of Bavaria ”

“ A large part of his collections is in the British Museum.
Bath (ba ̇th) , a city of England, in Somersetshire, on the Avon, which is navigable for barges from Bristol; is beautifully placed among the hills, and the houses are built of freestone, obtained from the neighbourhood. The Abbey Church, dating from the fifteenth century, ranks as one of the finest specimens of Perpendicular Gothic architecture. ”

“ How do you know that your husband and children are still living at Bath? It is a long journey from Newcastle to Bath, and when you arrive there you may find that your husband has broken up his home and gone away, no one might be able to tell you where, for you must consider as beyond all question that your husband and sister have long ago supposed you dead. They may have left England for all you know. How can you tell but that they may be residing abroad? The newspaper paragraphs stating your case were very plentifully published: that you know ”

“ They stand the wear and tear of time as well as its mellowing, and, like language, if they are here and there vulgarized by the usage of every day, without it they would be a dead language.
Queen Anne's Walk, overlooking the river, and close to the town station, is a small colonnade of the Renaissance style, which is most familiar to us in the architecture of Bath; it has an outlandish look, with its classical lines seen against the background of the smooth river and green Devonshire country, and has not the homely charm of Elizabethan or Stuart building. ”

“ For the temperate lover of it, the soft brownish tone of the architecture is in itself almost of a delicate sufficiency; but if one is greedier there is an inexhaustible picturesqueness in the winding and sloping streets, and the rounding and waving downs which they everywhere climb as roads when they cease to be streets. I do not know that Bath gives the effect of a very obvious antiquity; a place need not, if it begins in the age of fable, and descends from the earliest historic period with the tradition of such social splendor as hers. ”

“ I believe we sympathised, for I was very ill with a feverish disorder and cough for a month, which obliged me to defer answering your letter till I came to town. I left the Bath last Sunday sennight, very full and gay. I think Bath a more comfortable place to live in than London; all the entertainments of the place lie in a small compass, and you are at your liberty to partake of them, or let them alone, just as it suits your humour. This town is grown to such an enormous size, that above half the day must be spent in the streets, going from one place to another. ”

“ Malm. The bishop of Constance taketh the town of Bath. of Northumberland setting foorth from Bristow, came toward Bath, which towne they tooke and sacked, and likewise Berkley, with a great part of Wiltshire, and brought the spoile and booties backe to Bristow, where they had a castell stronglie fortified for their more safetie. In like maner Roger de Bygod, departing from Norwich, with great forraies ouerrode and robbed all the countries about, and conueied such riches as Hugh Grandmesnill. Hen. Hunt. Wil. Mal. he had gotten into the said citie. ”

“ The streets are well shaded, chiefly with elms. At Bath are the state military and naval orphan asylum, two homes for the aged, and a soldiers’ monument. Bath has a good harbour and its principal industry is the building of ships, both of wood and of iron and steel, several vessels of the United States navy have been built here. In 1905 three-fourths of the city’s wage-earners were employed in this industry. Bath also manufactures lumber, iron and brass goods, and has a considerable trade in ice, coal, lumber and iron and steel. ”

“ In the fine days when Bath was the resort of the greatness to which such greatness as the Woods’ has always bowed, every person of fashion thought he must have some sort of lodgment of his own, and, if he were a greater person than the common run of great persons, he must have a house. He might have it in some such select avenues as Milsom Street and Great Pulteney Street, or in St. James’s Square or Queen’s Square, or in Lansdowne Crescent or the Royal Crescent, but I fancy that the ambition of the very greatest could not have soared beyond a house in the Circus. ”

“ There seemed to be a good many of these gardened spaces in the town, as well as in the outskirts where more new houses were going up, in something of the long leisure of the vegetation. The famous Bath building-stone is in fact so much employed elsewhere that there may not be enough of it for home use, and that may account for the slow growth of the place; but if I lived there I should not wish it to grow, and if I were King of Bath, in due succession from Beau Nash, I would not suffer one Bath-stone to be set upon the other within its limits. ”

“ But there are some who by force of an indomitable will and the highest gifts of intellect and culture leave behind them a name which to all time shall be honoured, and Bath may think herself favoured that in the long list of distinguished men and women who have frequented that fair city and Queen of the West, she may write in letters of gold the names of William Herschel and his sister Caroline.
[1] DUELLING ON CLAVERTON DOWN.
In the year 1778 many foreign nobles made Bath their residence. ”