Woodstock

“ My people have been thinned, I grant you, or have fallen off from me in these times—I owe them no grudge for it, poor knaves; what should they do waiting on me when the pantry has no bread and the buttery no ale? But we have still about us some rugged foresters of the old Woodstock breed—old as myself most of them—what of that? old wood seldom warps in the wetting;—I will hold out the old house, and it will not be the first time that I have held it against ten times the strength that we hear of now. ”

“ The man who inherits New England traditions from towns like Woodstock is worth more to the country than an army of Anarchists and Socialists.
Woodstock is distinguished, too, for its “notable meetings,” inherited from the Woodstock in England, of which Judge Sewell speaks. The first “notable meeting” was when John Eliot preached to the Indians on Plaine Hill. The second “notable meeting” was when the first settlers drew their home lots in Wabbaquasset Hall. ”

“ To show the extreme ages of some of the Woodstock people, it may here be said that Paraclete Skinner, now living, remembers Deacon Jedediah Morse, who died in 1819 at the age of ninety-three, and Deacon Morse was seventeen years old when Col. John Chandler, a first settler, was living; and thirty-two years of age the year that Thomas Bacon, another first settler, died. That is, an inhabitant of this town remembers one who knew some of the first settlers of Woodstock. Lieut. Henry Bowen, one of the first settlers, attained the age of ninety. ”

“ Hardly any trace remains of old Woodstock, and the only ruin of interest is a curious chimney-shaft of the fourteenth century, which a probably inaccurate tradition says was part of the residence of the Black Prince.
Woodstock Park covers twenty-seven hundred acres, and is nearly twelve miles in circuit, abounding with fine trees and having an undulating surface, over which roam a large herd of deer and a number of kangaroos. When the [Pg 163] manor was granted to the Duke of Marlborough, Parliament voted a sum of money to build him a palace "as a monument of his glorious actions." ”

“ The spirit of revolution, which had been growing, rose to fever-heat when the powder stored in Cambridge by the patriots was removed, in September of 1774, to Boston. The news flew as fast through the New England towns as horses’ hoofs could take it. A son of Esquire Wolcott brought the news to Curtis’ tavern in Dudley, and a son of Captain Clark carried it to his father’s house in Woodstock, where it was carried to Colonel Israel Putnam in Pomfret.97 The young men of Woodstock did not wait for the call to arms. ”

“ Richard the Lion-Hearted and John were visitors to Woodstock. Henry III made some improvements in the house. Edward III and Queen Philippa were much attached to Woodstock and often made it their residence. It was during their reign that the poet Chaucer, who was first a page and later a royal 'esquire,' was frequently at Woodstock. He married one of the Queen's maids of honour, and lived in a house in the village which is still standing. As late as the time of James II, Woodstock continued to be occupied, as a favourite country seat, by the English sovereigns. ”

“ At the close of the Revolution the wave of emigration extended still farther West, and some of the oldest families in Ohio trace their ancestry back to this very town. To-day Woodstock has its representatives in almost every State in the Union, and the material growth and prosperity of the country has been in full measure owing to the settlements made by men from towns in New England like Woodstock. ”

“ The picturesque almshouses were erected in 1798 by Caroline, duchess of Marlborough. The town is dependent chiefly on agriculture, but a manufacture of leather gloves (dating from the 16th century) is carried on. Woodstock is governed by a mayor, 4 aldermen, and 12 councillors. ”

“ What with the truly English scenery of the Oak Plains, the good road, and the British style of settlement, Woodstock would appear to be the spot at which a man tired of war's alarms should pitch his tent; and accordingly there are many old officers here; but the land is dear and difficult now to obtain. A recent traveller says it is the most aristocratic settlement in the province, and contains, within ten miles round, scions of the best English and Irish families; and that the society is quite as good as that of an average country neighbourhood at home. ”

“ They then came back into Woodstock, which they found to be like all Oxford towns, only rather duller perhaps, the principal signs of life being some fowls lazily pecking about in the grass-grown street, and two cats sporting without fear of interruption from a dog, who was too much overcome by the ennui of the place to interfere with them. ”

“ Blenheim is chiefly situated on the spot where stood the ancient royal park of Woodstock (which you remember from Walter Scott’s last novel) . A great part of the oak wood which existed in the time of the unhappy Rosamond is still alive, and dying in an agony of a century’s duration. There are perfect monsters of oaks and cedars, both as to form and size. Many are so entirely enwreathed with ivy that it has killed them, but at the same time clothed them with a new and more beautiful evergreen foliage which enwraps the decayed trunk, like a magnificent shroud, till it falls into dust. ”

“ Those very extraordinary impositions on the sense of hearing at Woodstock, in the truth of which, Astrophel, your faith was so firm, were resorted to to create terror, and effect a political purpose. In “the genuine History of the good Devil of Woodstock,” written in 1649, we are told of the pealing of cannon, the barking of dogs, and neighing of horses, and other mysterious sounds, which certainly created the greatest wonder and anxiety, until “funny Joe Collins” explained and demonstrated all the mechanical process of this imposture. ”

“ Woodstock had, till just now, taken less interest in the property than formerly. Things had got worse on the whole. Whereas Waymark had here and there been successful in suppressing the grosser forms of uncleanliness by threats of expulsion, and at times by the actual enforcement of his threat, no such supervision had of late been exercised. There were very few houses in which the air was at all tolerable; in many instances the vilest odours hung about the open door-ways. To pass out of Elm Court into the wider streets around was like a change to the freshness of woods and fields. ”

“ Woodstock, the nearest village, as I suppose I must in modesty call it, is fast rising into an important town, and the whole district is, for its scenery, fertility, and advantages of every kind, perhaps the finest in Upper Canada. [9]
The society in this immediate neighbourhood is particularly good; several gentlemen of family, superior education, and large capital, (among whom is the brother of an English and the son of an Irish peer, a colonel and a major in the army,) have made very extensive purchases of land, and their estates are in flourishing progress. ”

“ The commissioners, dreading at that time no devil, arrived at Woodstock on the 13th of October, 1649. They took up their lodgings in the late king's apartments—turned the beautiful bedrooms and withdrawing-rooms into kitchens and sculleries—the council-hall into a brew-house, and made the dining-room a place to keep firewood in. ”

“ At that time there was a vogue for naming tracts after Sir Walter Scott's novels, and in the southeast part of Portland we have Woodstock, Ivanhoe, Kenilworth, Waverly, sic., and even such flights of fancy as Waverleigh. The word stoc came from the Anglo-Saxon and means a stockaded place, and woodstock means a place fortified with wooden posts. ”

“ And so, friend, touching these same Commissioners, bear them this message; that Sir Henry Lee is keeper of Woodstock Park, with right of waif and stray, vert and venison, as complete as any of them have to their estate—that is, if they possess any estate but what they have gained by plundering honest men. Nevertheless, he will give place to those who have made their might their right, and will not expose the lives of good and true men, where the odds are so much against them. ”

“ This neighborhood is called New Woodstock, but has by no means the brand-new appearance of an American town, being a large village of stone houses, most of them pretty well time-worn and weather-stained. The Black Bear is an ancient inn, large and respectable, with balustraded staircases, and intricate passages and corridors, and queer old pictures and engravings hanging in the entries and apartments. ”

“ The town of Woodstock has a long line of traditions, but shows little evidence of modern progress. It is a quiet, old-world little place with clean streets and many fine trees. Tradition asserts that the father of English poetry, Geoffrey Chaucer, was born here and the old house, alleged to be his birthplace, still stands in Park Street. However, the poet himself declares that London was his native city and the confiding tourist is left with the necessity of balancing the poet's own assertion on this important point against that of the Woodstock guide books. ”

“ The settlement of Woodstock is intimately connected with the first organized settlement on Massachusetts Bay; and how our mother town of Roxbury was first established is best told in the words of Thomas Dudley in his letter to the Countess of Lincoln under date of Boston, March 12, 1630-1:
“About the year 1627 some friends, being together in Lincolnshire, fell into discourse about New England and the planting of the gospel there. ”

“ Harmonious Woodstock organ notes,
And men employment secure
In factory for furniture;
Old Oxford is a seat of knowledge,
Woodstock has a fine new college,
And farm implement work shops,
So farmers easy reap their crops;
The old court house is a disgrace,
Grand structure soon will take its place.
[Pg 63]
INGERSOLL. Ex-Mayor Thomas Brown may be considered the father of the town, he projected the first roads and bridges.
The Thames and tributary rills,
Here they do drive numerous mills,
Enabling millers to compete
To pay high price for oats and wheat. ”

“ Edward III and his Queen Phillipa resided at Woodstock in the fourteenth century, and it was here that the Black Prince, who figured so largely in English history, was born. A nice little love story was connected with their court. The king had a page and the queen had a damsel, who fell deeply in love with each other, and whenever they got a chance walked out in the beautiful park and woods which surrounded the castle, where the young man made some poetry about the "Cuckoo and Nightingale," whose notes they so often heard amongst the sylvan beauties of Woodstock. ”

“ Without the Park the King’s demesne woods were, it cannot well be said now are, the timber being all sold off, and underwoods so cropt and spoiled by that beast the Lord Munson, and other greedy cattle, that they are hardly recoverable. Beyond which lieth Stonefield, and other mannors that hold of Woodstock, with other woods, that have been aliened by former kings, but with reservation of liberty for his majestie’s deer, and other beasts of forrest, to harbour in at pleasure, as in due place is to be shewed. ”

“ Stocks of Trees "couped and eradicated" are by no means uncommon. They figure in the arms of the Borough of Woodstock: "Gules, the stump of a tree couped and eradicated argent, and in chief three stags' heads caboshed of the same, all within a bordure of the last charged with eight oak-leaves vert." They also occur in the arms of Grove, of Shenston Park, co. ”

“ At ten o'clock next morning, a little vehicle, like that which brought me from Hamilton, was at the door; and I set off for Woodstock, driven by my American landlord, who showed himself as good-natured and civil as he was impenetrably stupid.
No one who has a single atom of imagination, can travel through these forest roads of Canada without being strongly impressed and excited. The seemingly interminable line of trees before you; the boundless wilderness around ”

“ On the 19th January, two days after the failure, he calmly resumed the composition of Woodstock—the novel on which he was then engaged—and completed, he says, "about twenty printed pages of it;" to which he adds that he had "a painful scene after dinner and another after supper, endeavouring to convince these poor creatures" [his wife and daughter] "that they must not look for miracles, but consider the misfortune as certain, and only to be lessened by patience and labour." ”

“ Nowhere in England is the turf more green, the English landscape purer or more characteristic. The air is eloquent with learning and splendid names. We drove to Blenheim and enjoyed its magnificence, tried to realize that we were in Woodstock Park ”

“ On account of great distances between the plantations, almost all the ladies can ride on horseback; we met several of them elegantly dressed, and also black women. The race of horses of this country, appears to be a very strong one. They use also oxen for drawing; to many carts were put two oxen, and before them two horses. On the 20th of November, we left Woodstock at half-past two o’clock in the morning, in a very miserable stage, and proceeded to Staunton, seventy-one miles distant, on a still more rugged road than that of yesterday ”

“ Aubrey, writing in 1686, records that at Woodstock, in Oxfordshire, the people were accustomed on May-eve to go into the park and procure a number of Hawthorn-trees, which they set before their doors. ”

“ Woodstock, his first publication after the crash, appeared in the same year and brought £8000; by 1828 he had earned £40,000. In 1827 The Two Drovers, The Highland Widow, and The Surgeon's Daughter, forming the first series of Chronicles of the Canongate, appeared together with The Life of Napoleon in 9 vols., and the first series of Tales of a Grandfather; in 1828 The Fair Maid of Perth and the second series of Tales of a Grandfather, Anne of Geierstein, a third series of the Tales, and the commencement of a complete ed. of the novels in 1829 ”