Midlands

“ Travelling all that long summer day, first from the south-west of England to the Midlands, then from the Midlands to the north, Spargo and Breton came late at night to Hawes’ Junction, on the border of Yorkshire and Westmoreland, and saw rising all around them in the half-darkness the mighty bulks of the great fells which rise amongst that wild and lonely stretch of land. ”

“ The Triassic rocks, red sandstones, marls and conglomerates cover a broad area in the Midlands in Worcestershire, Warwickshire and Leicestershire, whence they may be followed south-westward through Somerset to the coast at Sidmouth, and northward, round either flank of the Pennine Hills, through Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire to Middlesbrough on the one hand, and upon the other through Staffordshire, Cheshire and Lancashire to Carlisle. ”

“ In an area some three hundred and fifty miles long by three hundred broad are contained the ruggedness of Cornwall, the idyllic softness of Devon, the dreamy solitudes of the South Downs, with their billowy, chalky contours, the agricultural fertility of Kent and Middlesex, the romantic woodlands and hilly pastures of Surrey, the melancholy fens of Lincolnshire, the broad, bosky levels of the midlands, the sudden wildness of Wales, with her mountains and glens, Yorkshire, with its grim, heather-clad moors, Westmoreland, with its fells and Wordsworthian "Lakes" ”

“ Well, then, if we take this road, and make Birmingham, the most important town on the road, a sort of centre of a district, we shall obtain a pretty good insight into the subject.
The metropolis of the Midlands has always been celebrated for its public spirit, and it has nowhere been made more conspicuous than in the way it met the demand for good coaches. ”

“ In 1607, in the Midlands, the enclosing of land produced serious armed resistance, probably because the Midland counties were then the great corn-growing district of England, and the change to pasture and the consolidation of farms displaced a larger population there than elsewhere. Between 1628 and 1630 enclosures in Leicestershire, for instance, were very numerous, no less than 10,000 acres being enclosed in that time, most of which was converted to pasture. ”

“ Although we cannot trace the survival of junior inheritance over any considerable districts in the Midlands, as we can in Sussex, and some counties on the eastern or south-western coasts, yet examples of its existence have been found in a few manors of nearly all the old Mercian shires. ”

“ This is thoroughly characteristic of the Midlands, and exhibits one of their most attractive types. “The Avon, a fairly broad bright stream, sweeps silently along [Pg 111] on its way to the Severn, through level meadows, where the grass grows green and deep. The higher ground on either side rolls gently down, descending sometimes to the margin of the stream, but elsewhere parted from it by broad stretches of level valley. The slopes are dotted with cornfields, and varied by clumps of trees and lines of hedgerow timber. It is a peaceful, unexciting land, where hurry would seem out of place.” ”

“ By the end of the winter Newcastle had got possession of the whole county except Hull, and the cluster of manufacturing towns in the West Riding and on the Lancashire border. He had raised an army of 10,000 men, and controlled the whole countryside from the borders of the Scots as far as Newark-on-Trent. But in the Midlands the first campaign settled nothing; districts that held for the king and districts that held for the Parliament were intermixed in hopeless confusion. It would obviously need much further fighting before any definite result could be secured. ”

“ There can be no doubt that the Pendleside series of the Midlands represents the Lower Culm of Codden Hill, north Devon, and the Lower Culm of the continent of Europe. The faunas in these localities have the same biological succession as in the midlands. ”

“ At present, notwithstanding the occasional prospect of distant collieries, there are few districts in the Midlands which offer more attractions than Cannock Chase. The contour of the ground, it is true, does not exhibit much variety. It is, as has been said, an undulating plateau from which fairly well-marked valleys, gradually deepening, descend towards the lowlands, but there is much diversity in the minor details. Here sturdy oaks are scattered or graceful birches cluster close on slope or valley. ”

“ While the moors and vales of the North awakened to new and strange activities, the agricultural districts of the Midlands and32 South also advanced in wealth and population. A scientific rotation of crops, deep ploughing, and thorough manuring of the soil altered the conditions of life. Here again England led the way. Arthur Young, in his “Travels in France” (1787–9) never tires of praising the intelligence and energy of our great landowners, whereas in France his constant desire is to make the seigneurs “skip.” ”

“ Middle Passage, in the slave-trade the part of the Atlantic stretching between Africa and the West Indies.
Middlesbrough (99) , iron manufacturing and shipping town at the mouth of the Tees, in the N. of Yorkshire, 45 m. N. of York; has also shipbuilding yards and chemical works, and exports coal. It owes its growth to the discovery of one of the largest iron-fields in the country in the Cleveland hills, near at hand, in 1850.
Middlesex (560) , a small county on the N. of the Thames, adjacent to and W. of London; has no hills and no rivers, only undulating pasture land and small streams. ”

“ While our battalion was at Flushing the Officers frequently visited the town of Middleburgh, the capital of the Island, and pleasantly situated in its centre. It is a clean and very beautiful place, surrounded by gardens and richly improved pleasure grounds, among which are interspersed many handsome buildings and cottages, laid out with a degree of taste and neatness, seldom to be found beyond the boundaries of England. With regard to the town it is perfection itself, free from every nuisance; the houses are well built, the streets wide and regularly paved. ”

“ I can be one little corner; there's all Middlefield beside. Isn't there work for you as a citizen and as a Christian in our little town? Suppose you go to Middlefield with the same motives that you would go on a mission to India, Africa, or the Isles of the Sea! ”

“ Though it stands in the midst of a flat and dreary country, with good corn-land spread among desert fens, and fewer and smaller trees than ours—for the glory of Middlesex is the noble elms—yet the house has the advantage of a fine rise towards it, and a wide and open view for many miles across the level. ”

“ WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE DISCOVERY OF HERVEY’S ISLAND, AND THE INCIDENTS THAT HAPPENED AT MIDDLEBURG. After leaving Ulietea, as before mentioned, I steered to the west, inclining to the south; to get clear of the tracks of former navigators, and to get into the latitude of the islands of Middleburg and Amsterdam: for I intended to run as far west as these islands, and to touch there if I found it convenient, before I hauled up for New Zealand. I generally lay to every night, lest we might pass any land in the dark. ”

“ Here the main line of the Midland Railway receives one or two important tributaries, and as the result, Trent Junction has sprung up. As we approach, tall factories are seen to rise above lines of red-brick houses, and the College—a young but important school, which has helped to make the name of the place familiar—is conspicuous just on the outskirts of the town. The valley here is wide and level, and the scenery naturally becomes a little monotonous, but its right bank, near to which the river, for a time, is flowing, is sometimes rather steeply scarped. ”

“ They who are accustomed to the varied loveliness of Surrey, Sussex, and Kent, with their delightful mixture of arable, pasture, woodland, waste, and down, one shading off into the other, cannot but find the unvaried pastures and gentle hills of Middlesex and Hertfordshire wearisomely monotonous in their prevailing heavy tints and ever-recurring bounding lines ”

“ It was at Middelburg that the leak proved its existence. Middelburg is an architecturally delightful town even in heavy, persevering rain and a northwest gale. It lies on the canal from Flushing to Veere, and its belfry had been a beacon to us nearly all the way down the Schelde from Temeuzen. Every English traveler stares at its renowned town-hall; and indeed the whole place, having been till recently the haunt of more or less honest English racing tipsters and book-makers, must be endeared to the British sporting character. ”

“ The village has a large green overlooked here and there by pretty cottages, and the proximity of the richly coloured moorland scenery that lies spread out in every direction makes the place particularly fascinating. The railway in the valley has brought a few new houses to the village, but there seems little chance of any great accretions of this nature, although the existence of the railway station is a permanent menace to the rural character of the place.
Middleton, the hamlet immediately to the west of Pickering, lies along the main road to Helmsley. ”

“ But the presence of Midland and Northern forms to a greater or less extent in all the manuscripts, although four of them at least were written by Southern scribes, points to the Northern border of the Midland area as the home of the original, while the large Scandinavian element in the vocabulary and the absence of the characteristic u in unaccented final syllables (-ud, -un, -us, -ut) decide for the East against the West Midland. MS. N is a copy made by a scribe of the Middle South ”

“ Everywhere in the vicinity alike of Stonyhurst and of the two Mittons, the country constantly reminds one of the south. Upon foot it is impossible to go astray, for if in rambling we do not reach the particular point that was contemplated at the outset, meadows, running water, woodlands, and the sweet spectacle of hills, both near and distant, and of all chaste hues, are everywhere our own, and the last hour is no less animating than the first. A very lovely walk in particular is that one from Mitton to Clitheroe, keeping the Lancashire side of the stream. ”

“ Below these towns the country was level, while above them it was hilly, and even mountainous near the head of the lake. Middleport and Centreport were of very modern origin, so far as their social and commercial importance was concerned, and their growth and history were somewhat remarkable. They are located on the verge of the hilly region, and the scenery around them, without being grand or sublime, is very beautiful. ”

“ On the northern edge of Exmoor, parted from the outer world by a long ridge of wooded hills that die away into a bold headland by the grey sea, there lies a spacious valley—fair even for the West Country, a valley that for its beauty of broad fields and noble trees and old-world villages, may rank among the fairest in all England. ”

“ The friendly Zeelanders—A Spanish heritage—Deceptive Dutch towns—The Abbey Hotel—The Abbey of St. Nicholas—Middelburg’s art—Sentimental songs—The great Tacius—The siege of Middelburg—A round-faced city—When disfigurement is beauty—Green paint—Long John—Music in the night—Foolish Betsy—The Stadhuis—An Admiral and stuffed birds—The law of the paving-stones—Veere—The prey of the sea—A mammoth church—Maximilian’s cup.
With Middelburg I have associated, for charm, Hoorn; but Middelburg stands first. It is serener, happier, more human ”

“ The very name of Birmingham will no longer meet my eye, except when I unconsciously write it on some part of the ship that bears me over the beaming waters, or on some gloomy tree in the wilderness of Australia. I shall hear no more of Birmingham except from my own tongue, or from my weeping wife's, when we think of those dear friends who live there, and of those angel-infants of our own, who sleep there in their little graves. ”

“ If by round we mean not only circular but also plump and comfortable, we have Middelburg and its sons and daughters very happily hit off. Structurally the town is round: the streets curve, the Abbey curves; seen from a balloon or the summit of the church tower, the plan of the city would reveal itself a circle. And there is a roundness also in the people. They smile roundly, they laugh roundly, they live roundly.
The women and girls of Middelburg are more comely and winsome than any in Holland. Their lace caps are like driven snow, their cheeks shine like apples. ”

“ Johnson at Midhurst—Cowdray Park.
If it is better, in exploring a county, to begin with its least interesting districts and to end with the best, I have made a mistake in the order of this book: I should rather have begun with the comparatively dull hot inland hilly region of the north-east, and have left it at the cool chalk Downs of the Hampshire border. But if one's first impression of new [Pg 2] country cannot be too favourable we have done rightly in starting at Midhurst, even at the risk of a loss of enthusiasm in the concluding chapters. ”

“ In the midland counties, on the other hand, take the trees away and the landscape would be scarcely beautiful at all, though the land might be equally rich, undulating and productive. Half the special beauty of England depends on her greenery, her hedges, her trees and her gardens, in which the houses and cottages take the place of birds' nests. ”

“ It was not merely a picture of the life my brother and I had lived,—it was an attempt to set forth a typical scene of the Middle Border. "The Farm Life of New England has been fully celebrated by means of innumerable stories and poems," I began, "its husking bees, its dances, its winter scenes are all on record; is it not time that we of the west should depict our own distinctive life? The middle border has its poetry, its beauty, if we can only see it." ”