"Mine ease in mine inn"—King John's Castle—Greywell—Country odours—Hidden beauty-spots—The valley of the Kennett—A remote spot—Our picturesque villages—The charm of ancientness—Solitude and genius—Coate—Richard Jefferies' birthplace.

That evening in the coffee-room of the "George" there was only one other guest besides myself, and we sat apart at either end of a long table taking our meals in unfriendly silence. It was very stupid and very English. The other guest was an austere-looking, clean-shaven man neatly dressed in a tweed of grey; he might have been a lord (though it was hardly an inn that lords would patronise), or a commercial traveller of a superior type in his own opinion: I inclined to the latter view. However, what he was did not trouble me, but the silence did, so I ventured some ordinary remark about the weather, that being, as the chess handbooks have it, "a common, but a safe opening." The stranger agreed that it was a warm day, then relapsed into silence. Thought I, everybody golfs now; I will try him on that. His reply was brief and sarcastic: "I'm no golfer. I think, as a game, it's inferior to marbles." Then silence again. After that I mentioned motoring as a possible subject of interest, for so many people motor nowadays, either on their own, their friends', or on hired cars. "No, I don't motor," responded he; "only went on a motor once, and I don't want to go on one again." At this point I fancy most people would have given up the game, for when every card you play is promptly trumped it hardly seems worth going on, but I determined to try one last card. I played fishing. That was a failure too. "No, I'm no fisherman," said he; "never fished since I was a boy. I think it poor sport. A worm or a fly at one end of a line and a fool at the other, as the saying is." I never came upon so pronounced a specimen of a pessimist, and pessimism with the added acid of sarcasm is the devil's own special combination. Perhaps he did not like being disturbed at his meal; perhaps he was not well; perhaps his thoughts were occupied on some important matter. Even Carlyle, we are told, had his "bad days," when he would hardly speak to a soul, and only sharply and bluntly to one when he did. Now if a philosopher can act so, how is an ordinary mortal to be blamed for the same failing to be responsive? Writing of Carlyle reminds me of a story I was told the other day of a visitor who went to Ecclefechan to see the room in which the genial author of Sartor Resartus "first saw the light of day," as the newspaper reporters have it, when the woman who acted as guide as he was inspecting the room exclaimed, "And our Mary was born here too"!

The atmosphere of the coffee-room being too freezing for my pleasure, I sought the smoke-room in search of more genial society, or the restfulness of none at all. Better an empty room than to feast with a pessimist. The smoke-room proved to be no ordinary apartment, for it was panelled, or partially so; and there my eye rested on a finely carved old oak fireplace, distinguished enough for a nobleman's mansion, and by the side of it was a cupboard, with shapely old-fashioned outside hinges, for the tidy holding of wood. How came so modest an inn to possess such a beautiful specimen of ancient carving? I wondered, for it was truly a work of art worthy of a museum, but better where it was. I had not to wonder long, for presently a man entered the room and seated himself opposite to me, first lighting his pipe and calling for a drink, and his manner showed he was quite at home there. In marked contrast with my coffee-room companion he was smiling sociability itself. "Fine old fireplace that," exclaimed he, in a right jovial voice, pointing to it with his pipe. "I'm never tired of admiring it." "I was admiring it too," I said; "do you know anything about it and how it came there?" "Well, I heard it came from Basing House when the place was sacked; they say that nearly every one round about on that occasion helped themselves to something from it, and so I suppose the owner of this house, at the time, appropriated that fireplace. He did not do so badly. I've heard that the freeholder has been offered £1300 for it and refused the offer, but I'm always expecting that some day some one will surely come along and buy it. It will be a great pity if they do, for it's a great attraction to the house. You are a stranger here, I expect?" I confessed I was. "Be you on business or pleasure, I wonder?" I felt at first inclined to reply that was my own affair; then, thought I, the man does not intend to be rude, but is only seeking to keep up the conversation by the first remark that comes handy. He explained himself: "If you be pleasure-touring I thought I might tell you that there is an old castle about a mile from the garden at the back of the hotel; it's a bit ruinous, but it's worth seeing. They call it King John's Castle, but I don't know much of its history; they say there's an underground passage from it to the town." How familiar I am with that underground passage, I meet it somewhere on every journey; but I was glad to hear of the old castle, for I had no idea there was one in the locality. Then jumping from one subject to another he went on: "Talking about fireplaces"—which we were not at the moment—"there's a lot of curious chimney corners in the cottages around," and so he gaily chatted on about this thing and that, much to his own pleasure, and would, I believe, have gone on chatting for an hour or more, had not some persons entered the room, townsfolk I took them to be, for they all seemed well acquainted; then others dropped in, so that soon there was a goodly company assembled there—mostly, if not all, tradesmen of the place, I gathered from their talk. After that I became a silent spectator, but I got plenty of entertainment out of the company by studying their various characters, and from their conversation I ascertained how the town was served; I even learned from one or two of them how the kingdom could be better governed if they only had the governing of it. Somehow it amused me to hear all this, and the pride of it. I think one of the speakers had missed his vocation; he should surely have been in Parliament; he spoke quite as wisely and more to the point than many of its paid members do. "It's as good as a play," remarked Charles II. once when listening to a long debate, and I thought the same that night of what I saw and heard; then how unconscious the actors were, and how well they performed their parts all unprepared!

"It's a deep tankard that never requires refilling," and I noticed that the glasses were fairly frequently replenished (for beer in the cellar quenches no man's thirst) and pipes recharged, whilst the conversation never flagged, not for a moment, but I liked the hum of it. Towards the end of the evening there was much laughter and merriment; many a joke was cracked; some were good, some were poor, and one or two were fresh to me, and one or two even good enough for Punch, I thought. So the hours passed in an atmosphere of good-fellowship and tobacco smoke. A merrier company never have I met, and little did that company know, I ween, how their merriment served to enliven my evening. Then, talking still, the guests departed by ones, and twos, and threes—and I was left alone.

Next morning early I took leave of "mine hostess," who in the good old-fashioned manner of an earlier day, possibly a tradition of the house, came to the door to see me off, thanked me for my small custom, and wished me a pleasant journey—moreover, wished me it in a manner so hearty that showed she meant it. How pleasant these little civilities are; how they cheer the traveller on his way; how they oil the wheels of life so that they run smoothly, and yet they cost the bestower nothing! Alas, people nowadays do not seem to appreciate an article that can be had—for nothing! I like a smile of welcome when I arrive a stranger at a strange inn, though in truth I do not always get it—I expect I have to pay the penalty of many a grumpy traveller (how I despise him)—but this I will say, I seldom leave "mine inn" without the landlord or landlady, as the case may be, coming to see me off, and that with some gracious added remark or another; it is pleasant to part thus. I pay my reckonings, of course—I could not do otherwise—still, there was hardly an inn on the road, not one, in fact, but somehow I felt, on leaving it, I had received something more, and more valued, in the shape of thoughtful attentions and kind words, than what was set down on the bill. In truth, my bill mostly seemed to me more an accidental incident of my stay than a charge for accommodation and services rendered, and I fancy—it may be even more than fancy—that a gracious guest most times finds his reckoning on a modest scale. So, take it on the lowest, meanest standard, civility pays.

I well remember when at an old country coaching inn—where I stayed for over a week, so pleasant a resting-place I found it, so pleased was I with mine host, mine hostess, and my surroundings—one day a coaching party on a hired coach arrived there, who blustered and fumed and gave themselves so many airs, and ordered the landlord about in so would-be a lordly manner as to make me ashamed of them, so much so that on their departure I went up to the landlord, a good sort if ever there was one, and heartily sympathised with him. I thought to ease his mind. "Bless you, sir," said he, "they didn't trouble me one bit; I saw they weren't gentle-folks; I charged them in the bill for their incivility."

At first, for a mile or more, we followed a smooth highway, then we took to a little lonely lane to our left; a signpost at the corner of the roads told us it led to Greywell. Now Greywell had a pleasant sound; we soon came to it, and it proved to be a pleasant village in keeping with its name; some of the cottages there are old and of half timber, and no more picturesque or comfortable a cottage was ever built than in that style, with its projecting upper story that gives more room above than below, where room is mostly wanted, besides keeping the lower walls dry and causing an agreeable effect of light and shade. How I dislike the modern cottage built on the square and strictly economical pattern, a mere slate-roofed brick box with holes for windows in it. Sometimes you meet with rows of them as like one another as peas in a pod, only even perhaps more so. They ruin the prospect wherever they are.

A footpath led from the entrance of the village to its tiny church, which, though restored, has not had all its interest restored away, for it can show some pre-Norman work, a curious old carved screen, and, what is rarer, a rood-loft; externally a simple wooden bell-turret gives a touch of character to the building.

Beyond Greywell we entered upon a low-lying land of lazy willow-bordered streams, a green and quiet land of luscious meadows loved of cattle, a land of lanes

where under the same wheel

The same old rut would deepen year by year.

Now and then we caught the scent of new-mown hay, sweetening the air as we drove along under the shadow of leafy trees, and anon in the sunshine. The scent of new-mown hay or of a fragrant beanfield in blossom, how delightful a thing it is; shop-purchased perfumery is poor stuff indeed compared with it. For once we looked above rather than around for beauty, above to the windy, wide, white-clouded sky, with its ever-varying incident of passing and changeful form; for the skyscape has interests as well as the landscape, and there are times when it is the more interesting of the two.

Even when you pass through a land of scant scenic attractions, you may often, by searching, discover unexpected and secluded beauty-spots, the charms of which, in a small way, are not readily outrivalled; but they need finding, for many lie unannounced though near the roadside. One day I was driving through an open country of flat fields and low bounding hedges, with only one little hill in all the prospect to break the level horizon of circling blue; a country not without its pleasantness, but tame and somewhat monotonous withal, though there was a fine fresh-air feeling about it, such as one finds on the far-reaching Fens. I was hungry, and so looking out for a likely spot in which to picnic, but it was some time before I could find one to my fancy; then it was not so retired as I could wish, and passing traffic robbed me of the privacy I desired. There were no grassy margins by the roadside to enjoy, and the fields did not look inviting. Having stopped the car I thought I heard the sound of falling water; it came from the direction of a little wood that had escaped my notice and to which a footpath went. Thereupon I determined to go exploring in the hope that I might find a secluded spot by some stream side for my midday halt and refreshment. The sound of running or falling water has always a fascination for me, it is as music to my ears, and who could be dull in the company of a gurgling or tumbling stream that almost seems to talk to you in the oldest language of the world?—"I chatter, chatter, as I flow," sings Tennyson of a brook. I was unexpectedly rewarded, for a few minutes' walk brought me to a little winding river that managed to conceal itself from the road, and by the river backed by trees stood an ancient water-mill with mossy roof and weather-stained walls, its great and somewhat broken, dripping, wooden wheel revolving round in so leisurely a fashion that its very movement suggested rest. The ancient mill, wood, and tumbling water, what a perfect picture they made! There on a grassy bank opposite I found an ideal place for my purpose, with the song of the mill-wheel, the swish and splash of the weir, the twittering of birds and the soothing cooing of pigeons to enliven that peace-bestowing solitude, a retired nook where one might "dream down hours to moments." Yet there was no hint from the roadway of mill or river, of anything else than a little wood. How much of quiet beauty that little wood conceals from the vulgar public gaze! How many of those who pass daily close by have discovered that charmed spot, I wonder?

Again on the road, after a time we sighted a signpost pointing the way to Basingstoke, then in a short distance another with the same legend; indeed, all the signposts we came to had "Basingstoke" writ large on their arms, as though there were a conspiracy amongst them to force the traveller to that town. Cobbett on one of his rides wanted to go from somewhere to Hindhead, and he was told he had better go through Liphook; but for some reason known to himself that obstinate farmer declared, "I won't go to Liphook." And he didn't. Just then a fit of like obstinacy came over me; I would not be dictated to by signposts, I would not go to Basingstoke. Basingstoke was a town; I would keep in the country. So whenever I came to a signpost with "To Basingstoke" upon it I went another way. It would have been better had I gone to Basingstoke, for the lanes I got on were tortuous, narrow, and rough, without any compensating virtues in the matter of scenery. However, I had a fit of travel temper strong on me, so I stuck to my whim and eventually discovered a decent road that led across a rolling open country, and from every height of our up-and-down progress we had extended views to distant hills, blue and undulating. The distances were glorious, the near scenery featureless, so our eyes feasted on the distances.

So we arrived at Kingsclere, like Odiham a pleasant and a clean little town remote from rail, and it seems to get along, in a quiet way, exceedingly well without it. The place pleased me, not because it was specially agreeable, but owing to the absence of any aggressive modern ugliness. Its virtues are of the negative order, but even that negative quality counts for much. I noticed its large and fine old church—it was so large and close to the road I could not help but notice it; all the same I did not dally to go a clerk-hunting, so failed to inspect the interior: on that sunshiny day my antiquarian zeal did not run to church interiors, though I did not miss observing a rather good example of a Norman doorway unfortunately built up on its south wall. I noted, too, opposite the church, and pleasantly retired from the street, another of those clean little unpretentious inns I had so frequently come across—an inn that from a passing glance of it almost made me wish the day's journey ended there.

After Kingsclere the country grew wilder, and presently crossing an extensive heath we dropped down into Newbury. I think it must have been market day there, for the streets of that pleasant town were thronged with carts and horses, to say nothing of pedestrians who would provokingly walk all over the roadway and not on the pavements. Some shouted to us, "Why don't you blow your horn?" and when we did others shouted, "Why do you keep blowing your horn; do you want all the road to yourself?" so we pleased no one, and made what haste we could to get out of the bustle, and to the London and Bath old mail road, smooth travelling and pleasant enough as far as Hungerford.

A little before Hungerford my curiosity was aroused by the sight of a lonely castellated building by the roadside which I stopped to photograph. Then a man appeared upon the scene: somehow whenever you start to take a photograph, even in apparently deserted places—and the highway there just then seemed deserted—some one is almost sure to put in an appearance. I asked the man about the building. "That were an old tollhouse," answered he; "it used to mark the half-way between London and Bath." "Does it not to-day?" I queried. The man made no reply. I have frequently found that certain country-folk are curiously averse to jokes, however mild or innocent those jokes may be; they seem afraid lest you are poking fun at them. Taking no heed of my query he continued, for your true-born countryman loves to talk: "Travelling by motor-car, I sees; wonderful things them motor-cars be, to be sure, and they do put on the pace on this bit of road, I reckon; make a regular railway of it, that's what us say; fortunately there baint many housen on it," and so forth for a good five minutes, whilst I packed up my camera, and was therefore a perforced listener. I was somewhat surprised to hear, preserved to this day, the old Saxon plural of "en" in the word "housen" (though we still retain it in men, women, children, and oxen); the so-termed Yankee "I reckon" did not surprise me much, as I have frequently heard it thus employed in country districts, in Sussex especially.

At Hungerford I noticed the ancient "Bear Inn" as we passed, and that is the only thing about the town that I can now remember: a comfortable-looking, time-mellowed, two-storied, old-fashioned building, a pleasing picture of a past-time coaching hostelry; now I believe its patrons are mostly motorists and anglers; for the latter there is a troutful river at hand, and troutful streams around. I noted two anglers with their rods leaning listlessly against the inn door, who looked as though they were on a lazy holiday bent, and that the wily trout must wait their turn. The town authorities still preserve an ancient horn inscribed as follows—by which horn they hold the right of fishing in the rivers and streams around—"I John a Gaunt doe giue and grant the riall of fishing to Hungerford toune, from Eldren Stub to Stil, excepting som seueral mil pond. Jehosphat Lucas, Constabl." A curious form of a deed of gift, that reminds one of the more famous Pusey horn, an even more ancient charter of rights. I fancy that name of "Jehosphat" for a constable; it has a genuinely ancient ring about it. Not being learned in old English script, I am not sure whether "riall" should read "right" or "royalty," but the intention of the sentence is clear.

A curious old-world custom, dating from about 1370, still prevails at Hungerford. I came upon an account of this in my morning paper, which I think of sufficient interest to quote here in full:

It is astonishing how many of these quaint old customs are still preserved in various parts of the country, such as the curious horn-dance at Abbot's Bromley we came upon a little later in the journey. How few people seem to be aware of them or their surprising number.

A little beyond Hungerford we bade good-bye to the Bath road, for espying a promising byway we followed it up the narrow Kennett valley. The quiet beauty of the scenery took us by surprise. As long as the river kept us welcome company the valley was as fair as a valley may be; truly we saw it under the inspiriting effect of the cheerful sunshine, but that only enhanced and did not cause its charms; the clouds had rolled away and the sky above was serenely blue, and all the land was bathed in golden light. When the English weather is really in a good humour, truly it can make things very pleasant. From one point of the road we had a delightful vision of the shallow river where it widened out and ran rippling merrily over its pebbly bed, silvery and sparkling and gold in the sunshine, with dark green woods rising above, low hills rising beyond these again; and the river sang its song as it ran to the music of the wind-stirred trees. So both eye and ear shared in the charm of the spot. When next I go a-fishing I should like to go a-fishing there, then, sport or no sport, it would be joy enough to be amongst such pleasant scenery, for I have an eye for a pretty river-side, an ear for rural sounds, as well as for that crowning delight—the exciting plash of a trout. Then we drove on between wooded hills that rose gently on either hand, passing near by to our left Littlecote House, that lonely, grey, ancient, and some people have it haunted, home, overshadowed by the gruesome story of "Wild" Darell, a tragedy too well known to need repeating here—an almost incredible tragedy, only that time has shown it to be true, and "truth is stranger than fiction," though some modern fiction is running truth uncommonly hard in this respect.

Aldbourne, the first village we came to, with its fine old stately-towered church, its big round pond, and its antique houses grouped around it, pleased us vastly, for the village had such a remote and an unmistakable old-time air—a spot where we really seemed to have left the modern world wholly behind. For a moment we gave ourselves up to the illusion of the place, and were back in the seventeenth century. We pay the novelist to romance for us; why should not we do our own romancing at times? Therein lies the charm of old-fashioned places; they spur the imagination. As Laurence Sterne showed us, sentiment, after all, is not a bad thing.

It may have been wholly imagination on my part, but I thought that the people there had a contented look and a quiet eye, as though they had no part in the stress of modern life and the wearisome struggle of it. For where striving ceases, there life runs smoothly; and where life runs smoothly, there contentment reigns. Truly, my impressions were purely those of a passer-by, who had no part in the life of the place. Perhaps the traveller chiefly sees what he desires to see. Now I set out to see the bright side of life—who would blame me for that?—and I happily found what I sought; at some places more than others, still, always the bright side. It is a mere matter of eye-training, the seeking the gold and leaving the dross.

There is a Society for the Preservation of Ancient Buildings; I would there were a Society for the Preservation of Picturesque Villages, for many still there are, more than people imagine, that remain unspoilt, or almost so—villages that have not known the hand of the modern builder, bits of old England surviving in the midst of the new, and a gulf of centuries separates the two. Their churches stand on the same sites they did in the thirteenth or other early century; some of the Saxon times are of much earlier date; the continuity of the village and its life is astonishing. As in the days of old, there stands the snug rectory where it has stood for generations past; the humble inn with its swinging sign of "The Red Lion" as likely as not, though it may have suffered alteration, occupies the same spot where an inn has been "time out of memory." So with the cottages, one of which is generally the Post Office; and even in these democratic days the inhabitants are still divided into three classes—the squirearchy, the tradesfolk, and the labourers—and they seem to get along thus very well and contentedly, till the Socialist comes and scatters his tares.

After Aldbourne the country had a wild and a deserted look, for we found ourselves traversing the open downs where the landmarks are few, our grey road winding before us miles away, with nothing else visible but bare, green, sun-flushed hills around. It was a glorious drive over those billowy downs, and bracing was the air of them, delightful too in its purity and in the delicate scent of the thymy turf that the breezes gathered on their way and brought to us. There one might indulge in

The pleasure of believing what we see
Is boundless, as we wish our souls to be.

The downs, bare to the skyline, looked lonely enough to satisfy an anchorite. It is refreshing now and again in this crowded England to come upon such silent yet friendly solitudes, for there is nothing frowning or austere about them; hardly does the sunshine cast a shadow upon their spacious slopes of greenery. The charm of English scenery generally lies in its rich detail and finish, the result of the tireless toil of centuries; but the downs afford us broad effects, and broadness of outlook begets broadness of thinking. Fortunately the downs are unblest with mineral deposits, so they will probably remain unspoilt for ages yet; they have no attraction for the tourist crowd, nor are they likely to be vulgarised by too ready railway accessibility, for their population is too scanty for that.

Our solitary road ended its solitude in the small but straggling village of Coate, that, like Stratford-on-Avon, has a certain, though lesser, fame cast on it by being the birthplace and early home of Richard Jefferies; and there amongst the fields around and sequestered downs beyond he used to roam alone, neglecting, I am afraid, his father's farm, considered by the local people—and perhaps not without excuse according to their lights—a lazy, loafing, unsociable fellow, "with never a pipe in his mouth nor a glass in his hand." To be a genius is not always to reap a reward, for fame, as in poor Jefferies' case, frequently comes too late—for what profit is fame to the dead?

Some years ago, when touring in Lincolnshire, I met an aged man, a Mr. Baker of Horncastle, now gone to his forefathers, who when a boy knew of Tennyson, for Somersby is near to Horncastle, and Mr. Baker told me "people around used to think Tennyson a wild sort of fellow, for ever wandering alone over the wolds a-muttering to himself"; and I believe much the same was said of Wordsworth, "a-booing to hisself" during his solitary rambles over the Cumberland Fells. Solitude is company enough for the majority of geniuses, it seems. Byron says, "In solitude I am least alone"; and Thoreau remarks, "I never found a companion that was half so companionable as solitude." Once when an acquaintance offered to go a walk with him, Thoreau ungraciously declined. "I have no walks to throw away on company," said he. At any rate, there are worse companions than solitude; yet, in spite of poets and philosophers, I am wholly with genial Charles Lamb in my love of sympathetic human company, but the sympathetic quality is not always to be discovered. Doubtless Richard Jefferies failed to find amongst the farmers around a suitable companion; their thoughts were not his thoughts, so he roamed the downs alone in close communion with the nature he loved so dearly and understood so well. It is said, and with some truth, of Thoreau that he found the freedom of the wilderness within the sound of Emerson's dinner-bell; so too Richard Jefferies found his freedom within a walk, if not within actual sight, of his home. Now solitude for the day, with a home, friends, fireside, and a welcome to come to at evening time, is solitude with the keen edge of it considerably blunted.

Coate is a quiet village, not noteworthy in any way of itself. It is neither picturesque nor ugly, merely commonplace; like some worthy people in the world, it lacks character. Had it not been the birthplace of Richard Jefferies, I should have passed it unregarded by; but authors, poets, and other men who have earned fame for themselves in this world have no command over their birthplaces: that is the chance of circumstance. In the village I pulled up and asked the first man I met, a man apparently of average intelligence and as well clad as I, if he could point out Richard Jefferies' house. "Richard Jefferies," replied he thoughtfully; "I never heard of him. There's no one lives here of that name." Then after a moment's hesitation he exclaimed, "Maybe it's Mr. Dash the auctioneer you wants. He lives at yonder house to the left; it's the best house in the place." Why he imagined I wanted Mr. Dash the auctioneer, whose name was quite different, I could not understand. I asked the man if he lived there. "I do," responded he; "I've lived here some time." And yet he declared he had never heard of Richard Jefferies! "Perhaps he lives at Swindon," he suggested as I left; now Swindon is not far off Coate. Poor Richard Jefferies!

Then I made my way to the house indicated. It seemed to be the most important house of the few unimportant houses there, a pleasant, long rather than square, two-storied dwelling, retired behind a bit of garden and walled in from the road; and there on the wall by the entrance gateway I espied a stone slab, plainly inscribed—

Birthplace
of
Richard Jefferies.
Born
November 6th, 1848.

Yet even that tablet means nothing to the villager!