Passages from the English Notebooks, Complete. Hawthorne Nathaniel
wandered about town, and entered a quadrangle of gabled houses, with a church, and its churchyard on one side. This proved to be St. John's Church, and a part of the houses were the locality of Bond's Hospital, for the reception of ten poor men, and the remainder was devoted to the Bablake School. Into this latter I peered, with a real American intrusiveness, which I never found in myself before, but which I must now assume, or miss a great many things which I am anxious to see. Running along the front of the house, under the jut of the impending story, there was a cloistered walk, with windows opening on the quadrangle. An arched oaken door, with long iron hinges, admitted us into a school-room about twenty feet square, paved with brick tiles, blue and red. Adjoining this there is a larger school-room which we did not enter, but peeped at, through one of the inner windows, from the cloistered walk. In the room which we entered, there were seven scholars' desks, and an immense arched fireplace, with seats on each side, under the chimney, on a stone slab resting on a brick pedestal. The opening of the fireplace was at least twelve feet in width. On one side of the room were pegs for fifty-two boys' hats and clothes, and there was a boy's coat, of peculiar cut, hanging on a peg, with the number "50" in brass upon it. The coat looked ragged and shabby. An old school-book was lying on one of the desks, much tattered, and without a title; but it seemed to treat wholly of Saints' days and festivals of the Church. A flight of stairs, with a heavy balustrade of carved oak, ascended to a gallery, about eight or nine feet from the lower floor, which runs along two sides of the room, looking down upon it. The room is without a ceiling, and rises into a peaked gable, about twenty feet high. There is a large clock in it, and it is lighted by two windows, each about ten feet wide, – one in the gallery, and the other beneath it. Two benches or settles, with backs, stood one on each side of the fireplace. An old woman in black passed through the room while I was making my observations, and looked at me, but said nothing. The school was founded in 1563, by Thomas Whealby, Mayor of Coventry; the revenue is about 900 pounds, and admits children of the working-classes at eleven years old, clothes and provides for them, and finally apprentices them for seven years. We saw some of the boys playing in the quadrangle, dressed in long blue coats or gowns, with cloth caps on their heads. I know not how the atmosphere of antiquity, and massive continuance from age to age, which was the charm to me in this scene of a charityschool-room, can be thrown over it in description. After noting down these matters, I looked into the quiet precincts of Bond's Hospital, which, no doubt, was more than equally interesting; but the old men were lounging about or lolling at length, looking very drowsy, and I had not the heart nor the face to intrude among them. There is something altogether strange to an American in these charitable institutions, – in the preservation of antique modes and customs which is effected by them, insomuch that, doubtless, without at all intending it, the founders have succeeded in preserving a model of their own long-past age down into the midst of ours, and how much later nobody can know.
We were now rather tired, and went to the railroad, intending to go home; but we got into the wrong train, and were carried by express, with hurricane speed, to Bradon, where we alighted, and waited a good while for the return train to Coventry. At Coventry again we had more than an hour to wait, and therefore wandered wearily up into the city, and took another look at its bustling streets, in which there seems to be a good emblem of what England itself really is, – with a great deal of antiquity in it, and which is now chiefly a modification of the old. The new things are based and supported on the sturdy old things, and often limited and impeded by them; but this antiquity is so massive that there seems to be no means of getting rid of it without tearing society to pieces.
July 2d. – To-day I shall set out on my return to Liverpool, leaving my family here.
TO THE LAKES
July 4th. – I left Leamington on Monday, shortly after twelve, having been accompanied to the railway station by U – and J – , whom I sent away before the train started. While I was waiting, a rather gentlemanly, well-to-do, English-looking man sat down by me, and began to talk of the Crimea, of human affairs in general, of God and his Providence, of the coming troubles of the world, and of spiritualism, in a strange free way for an Englishman, or, indeed, for any man. It was easy to see that he was an enthusiast of some line or other. He being bound for Birmingham and I for Rugby, we soon had to part; but he asked my name, and told me his own, which I did not much attend to, and immediately forgot.
[Here follows a long account of a visit to Lichfield and Uttoxeter, condensed in "Our Old Home."]
July 6th. – The day after my arrival, by way of Lichfield and Uttoxeter, at Liverpool, the door of the Consulate opened, and in came the very sociable personage who accosted me at the railway station at Leamington. He was on his way towards Edinburgh, to deliver a course of lectures or a lecture, and had called, he said, to talk with me about spiritualism, being desirous of having the judgment of a sincere mind on the subject. In his own mind, I should suppose, he is past the stage of doubt and inquiry; for he told me that in every action of his life he is governed by the counsels received from the spiritual world through a medium. I did not inquire whether this medium (who is a small boy) had suggested his visit to me. My remarks to him were quite of a sceptical character in regard to the faith to which he had surrendered himself. He has formerly lived in America, and had had a son born there. He gave me a pamphlet written by himself, on the cure of consumption and other diseases by antiseptic remedies. I hope he will not bore me any more, though he seems to be a very sincere and good man; but these enthusiasts who adopt such extravagant ideas appear to one to lack imagination, instead of being misled by it, as they are generally supposed to be.
NEWBY BRIDGE. – FOOT OF WINDERMERE
July 13th. – I left Liverpool on Saturday last, by the London and Northwestern Railway, for Leamington, spent Sunday there, and started on Monday for the English lakes, with the whole family. We should not have taken this journey just now, but I had an official engagement which it was convenient to combine with a pleasure-excursion. The first night we arrived at Chester, and put up at the Albion Hotel, where we found ourselves very comfortable. We took the rail at twelve the next day, and went as far as Milnethorpe station, where we engaged seats in an old-fashioned stage-coach, and came to Newby Bridge. I suppose there are not many of these coaches now running on any road in Great Britain; but this appears to be the genuine machine, in all respects, and especially in the round, ruddy coachman, well moistened with ale, good-natured, courteous, and with a proper sense of his dignity and important position. U – , J – , and I mounted atop, S – , nurse, and R – got inside, and we bowled off merrily towards the hearts of the hills. It was more than half past nine when we arrived at Newby Bridge, and alighted at the Swan Hotel, where we now are.
It is a very agreeable place: not striking as to scenery, but with a pleasant rural aspect. A stone bridge of five arches crosses the river Severn (which is the communication between Windermere Lake and Morecambe Bay) close to the house, which sits low – and well sheltered in the lap of hills, – an old-fashioned inn, where the landlord and his people have a simple and friendly way of dealing with their guests, and yet provide them with all sorts of facilities for being comfortable. They load our supper and breakfast tables with trout, cold beef, ham, toast, and muffins; and give us three fair courses for dinner, and excellent wine, the cost of all which remains to be seen. This is not one of the celebrated stations among the lakes; but twice a day the stage-coach passes from Milnethorpe towards Ulverton, and twice returns, and three times a little steamer passes to and fro between our hotel and the head of the lake. Young ladies, in broad-brimmed hats, stroll about, or row on the river in the light shallops, of which there are abundance; sportsmen sit on the benches under the windows of the hotel, arranging their fishing-tackle; phaetons and post-chaises, with postilions in scarlet jackets and white breeches, with one high-topped boot, and the other leathered far up on the leg to guard against friction between the horses, dash up to the door. Morning and night comes the stage-coach, and we inspect the outside passengers, almost face to face with us, from our parlor-windows, up one pair of stairs. Little boys, and J – among them, spend hours on hours fishing in the clear, shallow river for the perch, chubs, and minnows that may be seen flashing, like gleams of light over the flat stones with which the bottom is paved. I cannot answer for the other boys, but J – catches nothing.
There are a good many trees on the hills and roundabout, and pleasant roads loitering along by the gentle river-side, and it has been so sunny