river, with its noble church spire piercing the sky. Its four thousand inhabitants, like those of all towns thronged by genteel visiters, have more than an average share of civility of manners, and sharpness in a bargain. Its chief bridge. We entered and passed through the, it quietly reposes on the margin of its classic gates of Warwick-for that remarkable city has two gates of entrance and departure, but no walls. We must not detain the reader at Warwick, because we may make a special pilgrimage to it for his benefit-provided always, we ever fairly bring him to and from Stratford-glory is its giving birth to Shakespeare;-its on-Avon. Leaving Warwick, we had nothing to interrupt the full impression of the rural beauty around us. All along we luxuriated in the vision of the velvet, deep green lawn, peculiar to the British Isles; the well-trimmed hedges chequering the fields, and clustering with flowers and autumnal fruits; the elms, rich in drapery, so thickly planted as to seem forest-like, yet opening here and there to reveal rich pastures, on which cattle and sheep of unsurpassed beauty and thrift were grazing; the road, nicely graded and white with pulverized rock, making a line of silver over hill and dale, before and behind us; the Avon and its little tributaries, now hidden by hills, now indicated only by the livelier green and richer shrubbery fringing their border - and now glancing out, like mirrors, to reflect a summer sun; cottages frequent, always of stone, whitewashed and embowered with green; here and there an aristocratic mansion, like its owner, recluse and unapproachable, but sublime in its solitude and frowning magnificence;-this is English scenery, and it is found nowhere else but in Old England. In jaunting amid such scenes, our young dreams of the Fatherland are realized; and to an Anglo-American traveller, romance is made reality. In England, it would seem that almost every road is a turnpike. While John Bull thus levels mountains and elevates valleys to make smooth paths for his subjects, it will readily be believed that he does not spare their pockets. But if turnpike gates occur with marvellous frequency in his dominions, they are not such outlandish bars and posts as we meet in the United States. The English enjoy the enduring public works of past centuries, and when they build, they build for centuries to come. An English turnpike gate is a graceful and massive structure, refreshing to the eye of taste, if not to the vision of avarice. Its neat cottage, too, around whose doors and windows ivy creeps and flowers nestle; its garden with its miniature subdivisions marked by clipped box; and, above all, its keeper, a little inflated, as all English, high or low, are with office;-but not, like the servants of the nobility, having the arrogance of rank without its courtesy. chief treasures, his natal mansion and his sepulchre. Though it rests beautifully in the vale of the Avon, and unites the venerableness of age with something of the neatness and briskness of a modern village,-yet separate the great name of Shakespeare from it, and no one would think it worth a paragraph. The citizens feel this. Boys meet you in advance with the inquiry, "Will you see the house?” "Shall I show you to the church ?”—assuming that all travellers are pilgrims to the shrine of Genius. For this impression they have abundant reason. While to them the birthplace and grave of Shakespeare are commonplace things, they see strangers, without distinction of nation, rank, or sex, possessed by a common enthusiasm on this classic ground. Kings, Queens, Princes, Nobles, Hierarchs, Statesmen, Philosophers, Poets, and Theologians, here bow with profound reverence before the majesty of the great creative intellect which has thrown its scintillations broadcast over the earth. Nor is their interest more intense, nor their devotion more sincere than that of tradesmen, mechanics, and rustic labourers, who mingle gratitude with their admiration of one who, rising from their own level, beat down all accidental distinctions in his way to greatness, and retained, in the eye of the world, the simple habits, the love of nature and of man, which he bore from his native village. Milton, Pope, Dryden, Cowper, Scott, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, Moore, and Byron, have each roused an enthusiastic admiration, and had devoted worshippers. But world-wide and enduring as the influence of each has been and is, it has been limited to certain classes. It has given rise to poetic schools and cliques, and elicited literary affinities and antipathies. Each has been worshipped and hated-adored and despised, according to the mental structure, education, taste, and character of those who have sat in judgment. Not so with Shakespeare. Trained at the feet of no literary or poetic Gamaliel, he had no master to imitate; and writing with no ambition or expectation of fame, he stretched himself to the "iron bed" of no clique, class, or faction. His perception of "what was in man," seemed to be almost But I will now bring the reader through intuitive, and has never been surpassed on these turnpike gates, which have so impeded earth, save by Him, the Infinite-with whom his progress. An hour and a half of pleasant to compare the finite, would be irreverent pretravelling brought us to the sight of Stratford- sumption. A poet by nature, and great by on-Avon. It is a beautiful town in prospect, as endowment rather than human instruction, he of a city in Iowa or Wisconsin; and though it may give a prosaic chill to the poetic admirers of the great Bard, the truth must out, that the house where Shakespeare was born is a meatshop! If any consolation is available for this, it may be found in rejoicing that it is no worse. I entered the house at Ayr, where Robert Burns drew his first breath, and found it a dram-shop! bowed to no earthly authority-but, like a spirit of another world, above human partialities, wrote not for a class, but a race. When the nature of the subject allowed it, he diverges from the strict claims of the matter in hand, to utter grand moral principles, which have been made the proverbs of moralists and merchants, of statesmen and soldiers, of poets and ploughmen. The fact that his eye penetrated-filled with those who resembled "Scotia's every strata of society-that he felt the universal pulse of human passion and enriched universal human nature, accounts for the common affection and enthusiasm with which he is regarded. He not only is not the property of a class, but no nation nor age can claim him. His memory is the treasure of his race. If it be suggested that his writings are exceptionable in reverence for sacred names, and often indelicate it is only saying that he adapted himself to the object he had in view, and to the standard morality and taste of his age. In his period, a dramatist would feel himself justified in adopting for the stage expressions not then deemed improper for the lips of bishops and queens. We must hold him responsible for the taste of his own times, not ours-and may well marvel, that one who wrote professedly only for the amusement of mankind, strewed the path of pleasure with gems of sober and enduring truth. But enough of digression. We have not yet reached Stratford-on-Avon. Indeed, we are in danger of imitating the New York Dutchman, so facetiously described by Washington Irving, who ran a long way to get an impulse to leap a wall, but when he reached it was out of breath, and crawled over it. On arriving at Stratford, we were driven at once to the house where Shakespeare was born, and having alighted, and ordered the carriage to the "Red Horse Hotel," took a survey of the premises. It is the only ancient house in its block. All the others are modern erections, towering above it, and rendering its antique peculiarity more striking. It is two stories in height, and low at that. In its erection, like some ancient houses among our early Germans, a frame was first put up, and then filled in with stone and mortar-still leaving the timber visible, like a rough mosaic. Its windows are venerably small-but the panes of glass redeem in number what they lack in size, so that some light actually enters the interstices of the huge sash. The lower window, by the side of the door, is without sash or glass, but longitudinal in its position, and furnished with a trap-door | opening outward, on which a butcher exhibits his meat on market days. If the expression be not Hibernian, I would say that the lower rooms are floored with stone-which is about as even and beautiful as the first stone paving sweetest bard" only in the habit which injured his character and happiness, health and life. The only other room on the ground floor of the Shakespeare house, is used as a kitchen for the widow and daughter who claimed proprietorship of the mansion. The back chamber, on what we call the second floor, and Englishmen the first floor, was the dormitory. The front chamber of this story-the Shakespeare birthplace, specifically-is the family parlour. Since the Poet's time, it has passed through many hands. Of its original furniture nothing | remains—though its place has been supplied with articles of like age. A visiter is amazed at the lowness of ceiling, which allows men of ordinary stature to reach and write their names on it. The room never had any paper; but this was fortunate—as it has given thousands an opportunity to aspire to immortality, by there inscribing their names. Above, around, all over, every inch is covered with autographs of visiters. You may be sure the Yankees are fairly represented. It is amusing to see, indicated by various tricks of chirography, an effort to make a name "stand out from the mass." Our cicerone seemed to regard the great majority as an incumbrance, but she took much pride in pointing to some royal signatures. This place must be a paradise to autograph hunters. The Album is an old book, "tattered and torn," but still legible. It has many impromptu effusions, among which that of Washington Irving is regarded as the best, not only from its originality, but because it is richly spiced with the laudation so grateful to English It is free from a vice most prominent in many of these effusions, an effort to magnify one's self while professing to laud Shakespeare. ears. It is said that the earthly immortality of those who have inscribed their autographs on these walls, was once put in fearful jeopardy. A female tenant who had long enjoyed the profits of this show-room, unwilling to pay an increased rent, was warned to leave the premises. She devised a right feminine but most Vandal scheme of vengeance. Having hired another house, to which she conveyed the Album, and all the Shakespeare relics, she next took a brush, and if not "at one fell swoop," by repeated appliances covered the whole with a coat of whitewash! Those victimized by this ebullition of feminine anger, might well say, "Absurd to think to overreach the [brush], They passed away "Like the baseless fabric of a vision, Leaving no [scratch] behind." What her successor said on first entering the denuded and blank apartment, history does not tell us; perhaps because none but the great Bard himself could depict her rage. But thanks to the progress of science, some Oxonian, or somebody else, gave her a chemical solvent, which removed the villanous lime, and released the imprisoned names of these Shakespearian martyrs from their temporary eclipse. "I tell the tale as 'twas told to me!" This house formerly had a great rival. It is known when Shakespeare returned from London, in the height of his fame, and moderately rich, he fitted for his residence a large and introducing his malicious outrage to the attention of our readers. While the world was execrating the demolition of the New House, no doubt, if the truth were known, the owner of the old house (the birthplace) secretly congratulated himself that its rivalry was ended. As an illustration of the increasing wealth of the times, and of augmented regard for the great poet, the old house, which had once been sold for £250, is now held at £4000. Our cicerone, the daughter of the owner, told us that at the death of her mother, it was to be sold, and she hoped to get £4000 for it. Her mother has since died, and the daughter has disposed of it to an association of contributors, who, to prevent its demolition or decay, united to purchase it. It is now beyond the reach of private cupidity or caprice, in the custody of the friends of literature. The world owes to this association its gratitude. May the Old House stand a thousand years! Our next pilgrimage was to the school-house is a large apartment with a low ceiling, misewhere Shakespeare received his education. It beautiful edifice, in which to spend the remain-rably lighted, and worse ventilated. It is paved with stone laid on the bare earth. Its benches us. came "The whining schoolboy, With his satchel and shining morning face, Creeping like snail unwillingly to school." After what I have said of the place, his "unwillingness" is not surprising. der of life. This, in contrast with the old mansion, was called the New House. As this was the chosen abode of the dramatist, and bore in all its internal and external arrangements and decorations, the impress of his mature taste; as here he held intercourse with the wits of his day, and the troops of friends whom his genius and fame had attracted; as here he lived and here had died, this house was justly the pride of his native village and the shrine of his admiring countrymen. In process of time it became the Manse-the property of the incumbent rector. He quarrelled with the inhabitants of the village, and on removing from town, in order to mortify his old parishioners, deliberately tore down, utterly demolished and annihilated Shakespeare's New House. Pity that some one had not suggested to the wrathful and revengeful parson, the old admonition of sacred writ: "Rend your heart and not your garments,"-nor your house! But no considerations of his sacred profession; no desire to perpetuate the mind of Shakespeare, as he had inscribed it in the plan and ornaments of his dwelling; no reverence for objects enshrined in the hearts of his countrymen; no fear of the curses of future generations, re- nothing like it in the United States. Forming strained his ruthless hand. Over all, his wrath triumphed. "Hoc censeo domum, esse delendum," was his word, and the house was demolished. Like Eratostratus, Jack Ketch, Guy Fawkes, and Judas Iscariot, he has made himself to be remembered. Perhaps this was his object, and if so, we have aided his purpose by Our next visit was to the church, in the chancel of which the Poet was buried. This edifice is a Gothic structure, of great magnitude and beauty, surrounded by a large yard, studded with graves and monuments. It is approached by an avenue, about thirty rods in length, of lime trees, which have been bent, clipped, and trained, until they form a perfect arch, with a green and rustling but well-defined roof, about three feet in thickness. We have a sweep around the churchyard, is the Avon, to whose edge it extends. The bank, about fifteen feet high, is protected by a perpendicular wall, which rises about two feet above the level of the yard, forming a most charming terrace in the interior, from which the whole vale for a great distance, up and down the stream, is brought under the eye. This terrace is the most charming spot in Stratford. Here, seated on the wide wall-our feet hanging over the stream, the old church lending its shade,—our lady friends opened their treasures, and reThis is charactergaled us with sandwiches. istic. An American party would have bespoken a good dinner at the Red Horse." The English of the highest rank are economists on the road. And besides this, their solitary, exclusive, and fastidious modes, make them reluctant to mingle with the crowd in hotels. At the hazard of being thought deficient in Shakespearian enthusiasm, I must say our sandwiches had a fine relish. Our hospitable friends, per haps, were mindful that "You take my life, when you do take The means whereby I live." Hence they were careful to provide "visible fluence of aristocracy, wealth, great names, means of support" for the excursion. The old church is the very one where Shakespeare worshipped. The old Bible, formerly attached by a chain to the reading desk, that parishioners, having none of their own, might read, but not abstract it, is still kept, chain and all, in the vestry. Its chain indicates a period when the sacred volume was inaccessible to those who have the most need of its consolations; and it illustrates the blessedness of the press, and those associations which have unchained the Bible, and made Heaven's truth as free and universal as Heaven's air. The monument of Shakespeare, attached to the wall, is an object so beautiful and unique, that I desire to give to others the pleasure which it afforded me, and therefore have furnished a drawing of it to the reader. (See page 341.) His dust is covered by a single flat stone in the chancel. An effort was once made to remove his bones to Westminster Abbey. Never was a town in such an uproar. The abstraction of the sacred relics from St. Peter's in Rome would agitate less the good Catholics of the Eternal City. The proposition outraged at once the romance, ambition, poetic veneration, and avarice of all classes. The clergy preached against it as a sacrilege; the lawyers declared it illegal; the hotel-keepers, hack-drivers, and porters, the shopmen and milliners, if they could not make a show of argument, disclosed a disposition to guard the grave of their great townsman by show of physical force-of clubs and fists. Whatever secret influence might have slept under the surface, prompting a zeal like that which protected "Diana of the Ephesians," the great argument was that Shakespeare himself had forbidden it. Whether he distrusted his neighbours, who had exiled him in youth for deer-stealing, or whether he dreamed of a and even good intentions, were powerless, before an aroused rustic community, determined to resist, if need be, by force. The plan was abandoned; but one influence of that discussion still remains. The rustic population are afraid to put their feet on the tombstone, lest they should incur the malediction of disturbing their Poet's bones. They will thus protect his epitaph, which had become almost illegible. This is as it should be. The village to which Providence gave the birth of Shakespeare, and to which his own simple affections led him back in the prime of manhood, to find a home, rest, and a grave, has a right to retain his ashes. But I may not protract this article. We remained at Stratford until late in the afternoon; and as the lengthened shadows began to throw a pensiveness over the landscape, returned leisurely to Leamington. The sole alloy to my recollection of that day, is in the fact that the only Americans whom I met at Stratford, were the Rev. Dr. Hopkins, of Buffalo, N. Y., and his lady. My friends invited them to spend the evening with us at Leamington, and it passed pleasantly away. I saw them, full of hope, leave in the morning by coach, for Blenheim and Oxford. And I shall see them no more! Mrs. H. died on the homeward passage, and her husband also now sleeps in death. My recollections of Stratford-on-Avon are mingled with musings of sadness, that two of those who shared with me in its excitementsand who united with an admiration of genius and poetry, the holiest purposes and most affluent charity, have passed from a world which they longed and laboured to bless. With the exception of a reminiscence so painful, I recall my excursion to Stratford-on-Avon with the liveliest pleasure. May I hope that I have shared in a slight degree this pleasure with my readers? SPRING. BY R. H. STODDARD. (Suggested by the beautiful picture of Spring in the April Number of Sartain.) I. THE trumpet winds have sounded a retreat, Blowing o'er land and sea a sullen strain; Usurping March, defeated, flies again, And lays his trophies at the Winter's feet! And lo!-where April coming in his turn, In changeful motleys, half of light and shade, Leads his belated charge, a delicate maid,— A nymph with dripping urn! II. Hail! hail! thrice hail!-thou fairest child of Time, Soft ministrant of its benignest Powers, Of lingering March, with wreathed crook of gold, Leading the Ram from out his starry fold, A leash of sunbeams round his jagged horns! Sometimes in April, goading up the skies The Bull, whose neck Apollo's silvery flies Settle upon, a many-twinkling swarm! And when May-days are warm, And drawing to a close, And Flora goes With Zephyrus from his palace in the west, And haste to meet the expectant, bright new-comer, The opulent Queen of Earth, the gay, voluptuous Summer! III. Unmuffled now, shorn of thy veil of showers, But where thy pathway runs, the sod is prest IV. A little month ago, the sky was gray; Snow tents were pitched along the mountain side, Where March encamped his stormy legions wide, The long-eared rabbits near their burrows play; The dormouse wakes, and see! the noisy tooks Sly foraging, about the stacks of hay! V. What sights! what sounds! what rustic life and mirth! The teamster drives his wagon down the lane, And loitering down the road, with cap in hand, VI. Methinks the world is sweeter than of yore, More fresh and fine, and more exceeding fair; There is a Presence never felt before, The soul of inspiration everywhere; Incarnate Youth in every idle limb, My vernal days, my prime returns anew; My tranced spirit breathes a silent hymn, My heart is full of dew! |
