Gads Hill

“ Lilac Hill had known many a picnic and similar outings; for Branton Hills folks, living for six days amidst bricks and asphalt, just had to go out on Sundays to this dainty knoll, living for an hour or so amongst its birds, blossoms and calm surroundings. City traffic was far away, only a faint rumbling coming to this natural sanctuary; and many a mind, and many a worn body had found a balm in its charms. ”

“ When a boy, he would often pass the house with his father and frequently said to him, "If ever I have a dwelling of my own, Gad's Hill Place is the house I mean to buy." In that beautiful retreat he had for many years been accustomed to welcome his friends, and find relaxation from the crowded life of London. On the lawn playing at bowls, in the Swiss summer-house charmingly shaded by green leaves, he always seemed the best part of summer, beautiful as the season is in the delightful region where he lived. ”

“ After leaving the scene of their Hot Springs adventure the five daring highwaymen, finding that they were not pursued, rode up into the northern part of Arkansas, where they had several friends, and there planned a scheme for plundering a train on the Iron Mountain Railroad. The place chosen for the purpose was Gad's Hill, a very small station in Wayne county, Missouri, which, in the summer time, is almost hidden by the copse of pine trees which surrounds it. The adjacent country was a very jungle in which it was easy to hide and elude the most determined pursuit. ”

“ Descending the slope of the ridge that divides Gold Hill from Virginia City a strange scene attracts the eye. He who gazes upon it for the first time is apt to doubt if it be real. Perhaps there is not another spot upon the face of the globe that presents a scene so weird and desolate in its natural aspect, yet so replete with busy life, so animate with human interest. It is as if a wondrous battle raged, in which the combatants were man and earth. ”

“ North Hill is so striking a feature in all views of the town, that one comes unconsciously to regard it as the only typical outstanding feature of the place. It is, so far as pictures go, Minehead. A noble hill it is, with the old quayside houses of the original fisher-village and ancient little port nestling beneath it. Immemorially a swelling green hillside, seamed and lined irregularly with hedgerows roughly into a chessboard pattern, it is distressing nowadays to find it being studded with villas and scarred with roads. ”

“ The verdure seems to spring directly from its bosom; there are no stems nor roots. The meadows are so many mirrors reflecting the light,—toward sunset dazzlingly bright.
I visited this afternoon (June 3d) Goodman’s Hill in Sudbury, going through Lincoln over Sherman’s Bridge and Round Hill, and returning through the Corner. It probably affords the best view of Concord River meadows of any hill. The horizon is very extensive as it is, and if the top were cleared so that you could get the western view, it would be one of the most extensive seen from any hill in the county. ”

“ And you will, as you grow up. My two big sons just put off on that big troop train. I don’t know how long Bill and Julius will stay away. Your big cannon might go Boom! and hit Bill or Julius. Do you know Frank Morgan, Paul Johnson and John Smith? All right; that big cannon might hit that trio, too. Nobody can say who a cannon will hit, Allan. Now, you go right on through Grammar School, and grow up into a big strong man, and don’t think about war;” and Gadsby, standing and gazing far off to Branton Hills’ charming hill district, thought: “I think that will bust up a wild young ambition!” ”

“ For what reason have I this vast range and circuit, some square miles of unfrequented forest, for my privacy, abandoned to me by men? My nearest neighbor is a mile distant, and no house is visible from any place but the hill-tops within half a mile of my own. I have my horizon bounded by woods all to myself; a distant view of the railroad where it touches the pond on the one hand, and of the fence which skirts the woodland road on the other. But for the most part it is as solitary where I live as on the prairies. It is as much Asia or Africa as New England. ”

“ The modern wayfarer is not so easily rid of the Great City, whose low-pitched roar not only follows him to these northern heights, but pursues him, clamant, onwards through Finchley, and whose rising tide of houses now laps the crest of Highgate Hill and spills over the brim, in driblets of new suburban streets, like a brick and mortar Deluge. ”

“ There is said to be never less than twenty feet of water in the well.
It may be interesting to mention that Gad's Hill Place ("the title of my estate, sir, my place down in Kent") , which is in the parish of Higham, and about twenty-six miles from London, stands on an elevation two hundred and fifty feet above mean sea-level. The house itself is built on a bed of the Thanet sands. The well is bored right through these sands, which Mr. ”

“ The morning of Sunday, the 21st of October, broke dull and cold; the grey clouds swept hurriedly over the sky, like charging squadrons, and the wind whistled through the branches of a solitary clump of old beeches, which marked the highest point of the sharp rise called Edgehill. From the brow might be seen a wide open slope, extending down nearly to the little town of Keinton, or Kineton, with some flat meadows at the bottom, having a number of hedges and enclosures on the left as one looked from the hill. ”

“ Anyway, talk or no talk, Gadsby said that it should stand as a building for man, woman and child; rich or poor; and, barring its "film show," without cost to anybody. Branton Hills' folks could thus swim, do gymnastics, talk on public affairs, or "just sit and gossip", at will. So it was finally built in a charming park amidst shrubs and blossoms; an additional honor for Gadsby.
But such buildings as Branton Hills now had could not fulfill all functions of so rapidly growing a city; for you find, occasionally, a class of folks who cannot afford a doctor, if ill. ”

“ There was a chance to gallop along the brow of the hill, [12] turn to the left, plunge through a shallow lagoon, and strike into the path ahead of Gadsby, and this chance Little Crotchet took. He waved his hand to Mr. Jonathan Gadsby, gave the Gray Pony the rein, and went galloping through the underbrush, his crutches rattling, and the rings of the bridle-bit jingling. To Mr. Jonathan Gadsby it seemed that the lad was riding recklessly, and he groaned and shook his head as he turned and went on his way. ”

“ They're o'er the hill to the linn, for wee Willie telt them ye were gane there to a preaching."
"This comes," says the afflicted Gideon, "of speaking of secret things before bairns; wha could hae thought, that a creature no four years old would have been an instrument of discovery?—It'll no be safe now for you to come hame wi' me, which I'm wae for, as ye're sae sorely weary't; but there's a frien o' ours that lives ayont the Holmstone-hill, aboon the auld kirk; I'll convey you thither, and she'll gi'e you a shelter for the night." ”

“ Descending Alder Hill on the east, by way of a tortuous route, we at last reach Merced Valley, beautiful as a poet’s inspiration, and crossing this low-lying strip of meadow land, climb another hill, where wonder compels us to pause upon its crest. Away yonder in the misty west, where the horizon drops down like a curtain on the world to hide the mysteries behind, are the dim outlines of the Coast Range, nearly 200 miles distant. But more bewildering sights are near at hand, for there to the left a little way are noisy cascades playing leap-frog over giant stones ”

“ Long before he came to live at Gad's Hill, close by, he loved the place. As a boy at Chatham, probably he walked over in company with his father; and when spending his honeymoon at Chalk, he no doubt roamed in the beautiful lanes around the village. In 1840, after spending a vacation at Broadstairs, he posted back to London with Maclise and Forster by way of Chatham, Rochester and Cobham, and the three spent two agreeable days in revisiting well-remembered scenes. ”

“ Hill City is in the heart of the Black Hills. It has excellent connections with various cities, fishing grounds and places of scenic interest. Sylvan Lake is nine miles distant, Rapid City 20, Deadwood 40, Custer 15 and the Game Lodge 27. Hill City is only a small place, but it is an “up and coming” progressive little town. They believe in advertising, and a few of its citizens are rather farsighted in their attitude toward visitors. The tourist park is not like some of the rest, but it affords shelter and many conveniences. ”

“ All distant landscapes seen from hilltops are veritable pictures, which will be found to have no actual existence to him who travels to them. “’T is distance lends enchantment to the view.” It is the bare landscape without this depth of atmosphere to glass it. The distant river-reach seen in the north from the Lincoln Hill, high in the horizon, like the ocean stream flowing round Homer’s shield, the rippling waves reflecting the light, is unlike the same seen near at hand. Heaven intervenes between me and the object. By what license do I call it Concord River. ”

“ Any man with so kindly a disposition toward Youth as has brought our Mayor forward in Branton Hills’ history, may, without warning, run across an occasion which holds an opportunity for adding a bit of joy in living. So, as Gadsby stood, on a chilly fall day, in front of that big glass building which was built for a city florist, admiring a charming display of blossoming plants, a small girl, still in Grammar School. ”

“ The whole stupendous property is on the old Dover road....”
Among “the blessed woods and fields” which, as he says, had done him “a world of good,” in a season of unceasing bodily and mental unrest, the great English writer had indeed found a habitation fitted to become inseparable from his name and fame. It was not till rather later, in 1860, that, after the sale of Tavistock House, Gad’s Hill [Pg 142] Place became his regular abode, a London house being only now and then taken for the season, while furnished rooms were kept at the office in Wellington Street for occasional use. ”

“ A vigorous twist of his ship's gigantic "fan" a shout, a roar, a whizz, a mighty cloud of dust, and amid a tornado of clapping, shouts, and band music, Branton Hills was put on aviation's map. Way, way up, so far as to look as small as a toy, Harold put on a show of banking, rolling and diving, which told Gadsby that, still again, had Branton Hills found profit in what its Organization of Youth, and, now, its small kids, had to say about improving a town.
During that box-lunch picnic, many of our "big girls" brought so much food to Marian that Dad and Ma had to stand guard against tummy pains. ”

“ Our hill to-day is certainly in the heart of a district about which the average dweller within 40 miles of Glasgow knows less, we are persuaded, than he does of some of our colonial possessions. And yet it is not more than 12 or 13 miles from the city. We can return as we came, or make for the old Toll House on the road between Fintry and Campsie, and get the train at Lennoxtown, or we can take a walk along the ridge of hills for 2 or 3 miles to the east, and make for Gavel Station, a mile or so on the near side of Kilsyth. ”

“ Though this was a school graduation, Mayor Gadsby said it would do no harm to point out a plan for still adding to Branton Hills' public spirit:—
"This town is too plain; too dingy. Brick walls and asphalt paving do not light up a town, but dim it. So I want to plant all kinds of growing things along many of our curbs. In our parks I want ponds with gold fish, fancy ducks and big swans; row-boats, islands with arbors, and lots of shrubs that blossom; not just an array of twigs and stalks. I want, in our big City Park, a casino, dancing pavilion, lunch rooms ”

“ That is enough to relate of a hill, methinks, that its 467 elevation gives you the first sight of some distant lake. The horizon is remarkably blue with mist this afternoon. Looking from this hill over Acton, successive valleys filled with blue mist appear, and divided by darker lines of wooded hills. The shadows of the elms are deepened, as if the whole atmosphere were permeated by floods of ether. Annursnack never looked so well as now seen from this hill. The ether gives a velvet softness to the whole landscape. The hills float in it. A blue veil is drawn over the earth. ”

“ If a voting booth was in a school building, as is a common custom pupils had that day off; and, as Gadsby was Youth's champion, groups of kids hung around, watching and hoping with that avidity so common with youth, that Gadsby would win by a majority unknown in Branton Hills. And Gadsby did!
As soon as it was shown by official count, Branton Hills was a riot, from City Hall to City limits; throngs tramping around, tossing hats aloft; for a hard-working man had won what many thousands thought was fair and just. ”

“ For many days Gadsby had thought of ways in which folks with a goodly bank account could aid in building up this rapidly backsliding town of Branton Hills. But, how to show that class what a contribution could do? In this town, full of capitalists and philanthropists contributing, off and on, for shipping warming pans to Zulus, Gadsby saw a solution. In whom? Why, in just that bunch of bright, happy school kids, back from many a visit to a city, and noting its ability in improving its living conditions. ”

“ The road leads up Bald Mountain and Pole Hill to an elevation that brings into view the valleys of three rivers, and from Park Hill the whole entrancing scenery of Estes Park, probably the finest in Colorado, is spread out in one unbroken and bewildering panorama of astounding beauty. It is not all a vision of primeval nature, for the vast table-land is abloom with fields of husbandry, and immense herds of cattle give animation to the seemingly boundless pasturage. ”