Part 114

Westminster Abbey, one of the finest specimens of the pointed style in Great Britain, dates from the reign of Henry III. and Edward I. It adjoins the Houses of Parliament, is five hundred and thirty-one feet long, including Henry VII.’s chapel, and two hundred and three feet wide at the transepts. Here the kings and queens of England have been crowned, from Edward the Confessor to George V. In the south transept are the tombs and monuments of great poets from Chaucer downward, whence it is called “Poets’ Corner”; and in other parts are numerous sculptured monuments to sovereigns, statesmen, warriors, philosophers, divines, patriots, and others, many of whom are interred within its walls. Among many old churches are St. Bartholomew’s in West Smithfield; the Chapel Royal, Savoy; St. Andrew’s, Undershaft; St. Giles, Cripplegate; St. Margaret’s, Westminster; St. Stephen’s, Walbrook; the Temple Church, Bow Church, St. Bride’s in Fleet Street. The Roman Catholic Cathedrals at Westminster and in Southwark should also be mentioned.

PLACES OF AMUSEMENT.--These are naturally exceedingly numerous. Among the theaters may be mentioned: Covent Garden, the home of opera; Drury Lane, identified with melodrama and pantomime; His Majesty’s, famous for its efforts in the cause of the higher drama; the Haymarket, St. James’s, Criterion, Wyndham’s New, Duke of York’s, Garrick, Court, and others, for comedy; the Gaiety, Daly’s, Lyric, Prince of Wales’s, Savoy, and Vaudeville for musical comedy and comic opera. The “music-hall” is equally conspicuous among London’s places of amusement, variety entertainments being given at the Alhambra, Empire, Palace, Coliseum, Hippodrome, Lyceum, and a host of others. Among the more dignified concert halls may be mentioned the Royal Albert Hall (capable of holding an audience of eight thousand persons), Queen’s Hall, and Crystal Palace.

MUSEUMS.--The British Museum, the great national collection, in a very central position, is the principal one. It contains an immense collection of books, manuscripts, engravings, drawings, sculptures, coins, etc.

The South Kensington Museum is a capacious series of buildings containing valuable collections in science and the fine and decorative arts, and there is a branch museum from it in Bethnal Green, in the East End. The very extensive natural history department of the British Museum occupies a fine Romanesque building at South Kensington. The India and the Patent Museums are also at South Kensington, and here was built the Imperial Institute, partly intended as a museum of home and colonial products, but now also accommodating the University of London.

The Soane Museum contains many valuable objects of art. The chief picture-galleries are the National Gallery, in Trafalgar Square, the National Gallery of British Art (known as the Tate Gallery), the collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the National Portrait Gallery. Mention must also be made of the Wallace Collection, at Hertford House, Manchester Square, a magnificent collection of pictures, sculpture and objects of art, bequeathed to the nation by the widow of Sir Richard Wallace in 1897.

The chief libraries are the British Museum, Lambeth Palace library, the Guildhall library, Sion College library, the London library, London Institution library. Many free libraries have recently been established.

SHIPPING.--The port of London has been for many years the greatest in the world. The control and management of the business of the port was transferred in March, 1909, from the Thames Conservancy to the Port of London Authority. This new body controls the river from Teddington to Warden Point, fifty-one miles east of London Bridge. It also took over the India, Millwall, and Surrey Commercial docks. The total cost of the transfer was one hundred and twelve million dollars.

ITS COSMOPOLITAN POPULATION.--There are in London nearly 60,000 persons of Scottish birth and over 60,000 of Irish birth. Of 150,000 foreigners, 40,000 are Russians (including Jews), with 16,000 Russian Poles, 30,000 Germans, 12,000 French, 11,000 Italians, 6,000 Austrians, 6,000 Americans (U. S.), 4,500 Dutch, 45,000 Swiss, 2,500 Belgians, 1,800 Swedes, 1,000 Norwegians, and 1,000 Danes.

COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL CENTERS

=In England and Wales.=--_Hull_, the _Tyne Ports_ (Newcastle, Gateshead, and Shields), and _Sunderland_, with London, form the great outlets of the east of England. _Liverpool_ (with Birkenhead), ranking with London in maritime importance, and _Bristol_, are the great outlets and seats of commerce in the west of England, as _Southhampton_ and _Plymouth_ on the Channel are in the south.

The most important of all the textile industries of England is that of cotton, which has centered itself in _Manchester_ and in its satellite cities on the coalfield of Lancashire and Cheshire (Preston, Blackburn, Oldham, Wigan, Bury, Rochdale, Bolton, Stockport, Macclesfield), drawing a dense population round these centers, with their thousands of factories, fed with raw material from abroad, and relieved of their manufactured products by Liverpool and the port of Manchester.

The woolen manufactories, next in importance, are on the opposite side of the Pennine chain, in the great towns of _Leeds_ and _Bradford_, as well as in Halifax, Huddersfield, Wakefield, and Dewsbury, clustering round these. Linen manufactures center at _Barnsley_, farther south, also on this Yorkshire coalfield. Three outlying woolen manufacturing centers may be noted; these are _Leicester_, in a famous sheep-raising district, and _Kidderminster_, noted for its carpets, _Stroud_, _Bradford_, and other towns in the west of England, noted for the quality of their cloth. Newtown, in Montgomeryshire, is the center of the Welsh flannel trade.

Hardwares have two great points of production--the one round _Sheffield_, on the Yorkshire coal and iron field, the other round _Birmingham_ and the towns on the South Stafford coal and iron field (Wolverhampton, Wednesbury, Bilston, Dudley, Walsall), called the “Black Country” because large parts of it are so completely cut up with collieries and ironworks that no cultivation exists.

In North Staffordshire, between the iron and the cotton manufacturing regions, lies the “Potteries,” a district which by supplying coal is able to maintain its staple industry. _Stoke-upon-Trent_ is the center of the cluster of Pottery towns (Burslem, Longton, Hanley, Tunstall), all connected by lines of busy hamlets. Worcester, on the Severn, is also celebrated for its pottery.

English silk manufacturers give importance to three separate districts, those round _Congleton_ and _Macclesfield_, in Cheshire; Derby; and _Coventry_, in Warwickshire. _Nottingham_ town combines silk and cotton manufactures in hosiery and lace work. _Stafford_ town supplies boots and shoes to all the manufacturing towns which lie round it.

The coal trade of North England centers in the _Tyne Ports_ and Sunderland, which are also famous for their iron, ships and engines, and their chemical works. The South Wales iron and coal field has its heart in _Merthyr Tydfil_, one of the largest towns of Wales; _Cardiff_, with fine docks and iron shipbuilding yards, besides its large coal export trade; _Swansea_ is the headquarters of copper and tin smelting, from ores brought thither from the most distant parts of the world; _Milford Haven_ aspires to becoming the rival of Liverpool in the trade with America.

Among the few large towns besides London which lie outside the manufacturing and mining region of England, may be noted _Norwich_, in agricultural Norfolk, a seat of manufactures of the most various kind, introduced by about four thousand Flemings who fled thither in Queen Elizabeth’s reign.

=In Scotland.=--On the Scottish coal and iron field, _Glasgow_, favored by its position on the estuary of the Clyde, has risen to be at once the great commercial and manufacturing center of the country, carrying on a large trade with all parts of the world, in manufacturing cottons and machinery, and in building ships. A number of manufacturing towns (Paisley, noted for its shawls; Greenock, for its sugar-refining; Dumbarton, for its iron ships; Airdrie, in the midst of the collieries and iron works) have risen round Glasgow over the Scottish coalfield. _Leith_, the port of Edinburgh, is mainly engaged in the Baltic grain trade; _Dundee_, on the estuary of the Tay, owes much of its prosperity to its jute and hemp factories, and to its Greenland whaling and sealing trade.

=In Ireland.=--Owing to its poverty in coal and iron, the manufactures of Ireland have not attained an extent at all comparable with those of Britain. Its only extensive manufacturing district is that which lies round _Belfast_, in the northeast, where the flax, grown largely in the north of the country, is made into linen. The linen district extends to _Armagh_, on the west, and _Coleraine_, in the north.

_Dublin_, the capital, is noted for its poplins, stout, and whiskey; its quays afford excellent accommodation for shipping, and it takes the lead in the foreign trade of Ireland.

_Cork_, with its fine harbor the “Cove of Cork,” or Queenstown, in the south; _Limerick_, on the Shannon; _Galway_, the port of the west; _Londonderry_, in the north, are the other important centers of population in Ireland.

EDUCATIONAL, HISTORICAL AND LITERARY CENTERS

=Edinburgh= (ed-in-bo-ro; _Edwin’s burgh_), the metropolis of Scotland, grew up originally beneath the protecting walls of its castle, and is not a manufacturing town, but derives its importance mainly from the law courts, its university and schools, and its printing and publishing trade. It is situated upon two ridges of ground, divided by a deep, narrow valley, formerly a morass, now made into a public park, through which the railways pass. To the north of this park is the New Town, composed of modern and elegant buildings--the principal street, Princes Street, bordering upon and overlooking the park. The principal hotels are on the opposite of Princes Street. The railway stations are in the valley. To the south lies the ridge of the Old Town, terminating, to the west in a rocky bluff, upon which stands the Castle in the heart of the city. The Old Town is the historic part of the city, the New being quite modern. The first Scottish Parliament was convened here by Alex. II., 1215.

The principal places of interest are Edinburgh Castle, Holyrood Abbey and Calton Hill. Among the objects of less interest are the house of John Knox, High Street; St. Giles Church; Allan Ramsay’s Theater, the favorite resort of Burns; the Black Turnpike, the prison of Queen Mary, near the Iron Church; and the Heart of Midlothian, the site of an old prison. Annie Laurie was married in Iron Church two hundred and fifty years ago. John Knox is buried in the paved court between the Parliament House and St. Giles; marked by the letters J. K. in the pavement.

THE CASTLE, stands on a precipitous rock about three hundred feet above the valley, accessible only from the east side. It is an extensive mass, of which the oldest portion--and the oldest building in the city--is St. Margaret’s Chapel, the private oratory of the Saxon Princess Margaret, queen of Malcolm Canmore. Another portion is a lofty range of old buildings, in a small apartment of which Queen Mary gave birth to James VI. in 1566; while in an adjoining apartment are kept the ancient regalia of Scotland. Here, also, is the old Parliament Hall, restored in 1888-1889. The castle as a fortress contains accommodation for two thousand soldiers, and the armory space for thirty thousand stand of arms. An old piece of ordnance built of staves of malleable iron, cask fashion, and known as _Mons Meg_, stands conspicuous in an open area.

HOLYROOD PALACE AND ABBEY was founded by King David I., who is said to have been saved from the horns of a stag, driven to bay near this spot, by a luminous cross in the sky. In the northwest angle of the building are the apartments which were occupied by Mary, Queen of Scots, nearly in the same state in which they were left by that unfortunate princess.

CALTON HILL (_call-ton_) is at the eastern end of Princes Street and has an altitude of about three hundred and fifty feet. Upon the hill, adjacent to the stairs, is Dugald Stewart’s monument at the left; to the north is the Old Observatory, and the New Observatory with a small dome. To the south is Nelson’s monument, one hundred and two feet high, surmounted by a time-ball. The unfinished colonnade is a part of a structure in honor of Waterloo, intended to be a copy of the Parthenon at Athens. The foundation was laid 1822, but, proving too costly, the project was abandoned.

The view from the summit of this hill is scarcely to be surpassed. To the north is what may be called New Edinburgh, extending toward Granton and the port of Leith. Across the Forth, is Fifeshire. Following down the Forth, is first, the islands of Inch Keith, Portobello, Bass Rock, and the Isle of May, farther at sea. Toward the south and west the Burns monument; Holyrood immediately below; Salisbury Craig and south, Arthur’s Seat, eight hundred and twenty feet high; thence to the north the Old Town, commanded by the frowning Castle.

=Oxford=, capital of Oxford county, and seat of one of the most celebrated universities in the world, is situated about fifty miles northwest of London, on a gentle acclivity between the Cherwell and the Thames, here called the Isis. Oxford, as a city of towers and spires, of fine collegiate buildings, old and new, of gardens, groves, and avenues of trees, is unique in England.

Of the university buildings the most remarkable are Christ’s Church, the largest and grandest of all the colleges, with a fine quadrangle and other buildings, and a noble avenue of trees. It was founded by Wolsey in 1525, and its magnificent chapel is the cathedral church of the see of Oxford. The _hall_ is a noble room.

_Merton College_, founded about 1264, has a very beautiful chapel of the fifteenth century, and the library is the oldest in the kingdom.

_New College_, founded by William of Wykeham, in 1386, is one of the wealthiest of the colleges, and the chapel is very handsome.

The _gardens of St. John’s College_ are much admired and the grounds of Magdalen College (perhaps the most beautiful college in Oxford) are no less attractive. The latter include “Addison’s Walk,” a shaded avenue that was his favorite resort when a student here. The _Bodleian Library_ and _Picture Gallery_, the _Theatre_ (built by Wren), the _Ashmolean Museum_ (also by Wren), the _Radcliffe Library_ and _Observatory_, the _Divinity School_ (in the hall of which Cranmer, Latimer, and Ridley were tried in 1555), _St. Mary’s Church_, the _Taylor Institute_, the _University Galleries_ and _Museum_, the _Botanical Gardens_, and the _Martyr’s Memorial_ are also among the noteworthy things in Oxford. The _High Street_ is the subject of one of Wordsworth’s sonnets; and Hawthorne calls it “the noblest old street in England.” Oxford depends mostly on the university, and on its attractions as a place of residence.

=Stratford-on-Avon=, Shakespeare’s birthplace, is a pleasant town of Warwickshire, eight miles southwest of Warwick, twenty-two miles southeast of Birmingham, and one hundred and ten miles northeast of London. It stands on the right bank of the quiet Avon, which here is spanned by the “great and sumptuous bridge” of fourteen pointed arches, three hundred and seventy-six yards long, that was built by the Lord Mayor of London.

It is a quiet, old-fashioned place, with wide and well-kept streets, and many handsome mansions. The _Town Hall_ was dedicated to the memory of the poet. Here is a statue of Shakespeare, presented by Garrick, on the pedestal of which are the lines from _Hamlet_; “Take him for all in all, we shall not look upon his like again.” Very interesting is the _Shakespeare Memorial Building and Theater_, in a charming situation by the Avon, the outgrowth of the feeling that the poet should have a suitable monument in his native town.

SHAKESPEARE’S HOUSE, in Henley Street, became national property in 1847, and has been carefully restored. The room in which the poet is said to have been born seems to have undergone but little change since that day. In another room there is a small museum of Shakespearian curiosities.

STRATFORD CHURCH, in which Shakespeare is buried, is on the bank of the Avon. It is a large and elegant structure, with a graceful stone spire one hundred and sixty-three feet high, erected in 1764 to replace a wooden one that had been taken down. The building has been judiciously restored in recent years. There is an elegant window illustrating Shakespeare’s “Seven Ages,” the contribution of Americans.

The grave of Shakespeare is in the chancel, covered by a plain flagstone, while above, on the wall to the left, is the monumental bust which is the most trustworthy representation of the poet. His wife lies near him, with his favorite daughter, “good Mistris Hall,” and Dr. John Hall, her husband. In the chancel there is also an elegant marble monument to John Combe, the poet’s friend.

SHOTTERY, where Anne Hathaway lived before she became the wife of Shakespeare, is about a mile from Stratford, and may be reached by a footpath through the fields. The cottage that was Anne’s home has a timber and plaster front, and a thatched roof. The interior contains the oaken seat on which Shakespeare and Anne were wont to sit; many bits of venerable furniture; and, upstairs, a vast bed, on which many a Hathaway has drawn the last breath of life.

Stratford also possesses a memorial fountain, presented by George W. Childs of Philadelphia, and Harvard House, the birthplace of the mother of John Harvard, founder of Harvard University. It is still an important agricultural center; but its chief prosperity depends on the thirty thousand or so pilgrims who visit it yearly.

=Ayr=, forty miles from Glasgow, Scotland, by railway, is noted especially as the birthplace of Burns, the poet; as also the place where Wm. Wallace was imprisoned. The town is divided by the river Ayr, over which are the “twa brigs” of Burns. The Burns Cottage, or birthplace, the scene of his “Cotter’s Saturday Night,” is two miles south of the town, and is now used as a public memorial. It contains few articles associated with Burns.

ALLOWAY KIRK, mentioned in “Tam O’Shanter,” or what remains of it, is one-half mile south of the Cottage. Near the church are the Burns monument, a circular shaft sixty feet in height, erected 1820, and the Doon, immortalized in the “Banks and Braes of Bonny Doon.”

Burns died at Dumfries, where he had lived three years, and was buried in the churchyard there. Nineteen years later, upon the completion of the monument to his memory, his body was exhumed and placed within the Mausoleum at Dumfries.

=Melrose=, in the county of Roxburgh, thirty-one miles southeast of Edinburgh, is celebrated for the abbey founded by King David in 1136; destroyed by Edward II. in 1322; rebuilt by Bruce in 1326, and partly demolished by the English in 1545. Sir Walter Scott has given it an enduring description in his Lay of the Last Minstrel.

The material of which it is built is a very hard stone, and much of the carving is as perfect as when fresh from the sculptor’s hand. Within its walls are the graves of kings, and nobles and priests of the olden time; among them Alexander II. of Scotland, and more than one of the renowned Earls of Douglas. Before the high altar the heart of King Robert Bruce is said to have been deposited. Sir David Brewster’s grave is in the churchyard.

DRYBURGH ABBEY, four miles from Melrose, was founded about the same time as Melrose, and, like that, was destroyed in 1322 by Edward II. Robert I. restored it, at least in part; but it was again destroyed in 1544. St. Mary’s aisle, the most beautiful part of the ruins, contains the tomb of Scott, buried here September 26, 1832; also the graves of his wife and his eldest son, and of his son-in-law Lockhart.

ABBOTSFORD, two miles from Melrose, was long the home of the “Great Enchanter of the North.” The author’s study is the most interesting room. There the old writing-table, the plain leathern armchair, the reference books, seem to indicate that Sir Walter has but just left them. The _Library_ (twenty thousand volumes) contains a bust of Scott, by Chantrey, and many miniatures. The roof is of carved oak, designed from models taken from Roslin Chapel. The _Drawing-room_, where Sir Walter died, and the little octagonal dressing-room contain many precious relics. The _Armory_ has a fine collection of Scotch weapons.

=Windsor=, is in Berkshire, England, on the Thames, twenty-one and one-quarter miles from London. It contains a town hall, built by Sir Christopher Wren in 1686, the church of St. John the Baptist, with fine examples of Grinling Gibbon’s wood-carving, and a fine Jubilee statue of Queen Victoria.

Windsor owes its chief importance to its castle, which stands east of the town on a height overlooking the River Thames, and is the principal royal residence in the kingdom. It was begun, or at least enlarged, by Henry I., and has been altered and added to by almost every sovereign since. The castle stands in the Home Park or “Little Park,” which is four miles in circumference, and this again is connected with the Great Park, which is eighteen miles in circuit, and contains an avenue of trees three miles in length.

The chief features of interest in the castle are the old state apartments; St. George’s Chapel, where the Knights of the Garter are installed, and the vaults of which contain the remains of Henry VI., Edward IV., Henry VIII., Charles I., George III., George IV., and William IV.; the Round Tower or ancient keep; and the present state apartments.

ETON COLLEGE is one-half mile from Windsor across the river. The stone chapel, one hundred and seventy-five feet long, is very handsome. There is also a bronze statue of Henry VI. The college was founded in 1440.

STOKE POGIS, the scene of Gray’s _Elegy_, and the burial-place of the poet, is near Windsor.

There is a fine monument to Gray in _Stoke Park_.

=Cambridge=, fifty-six miles from London, and on the Cam, a narrow stream that rambles all over the town. Tradition gives 630 as the date of the foundation of the University; but the oldest college, _Peterhouse_ or _St. Peter’s_, can only be referred to 1257. The public buildings are the Shire Hall, Town Hall, University halls and library, and Fitzwilliam Museum.

There are seventeen colleges, inferior in architectural beauty to those of Oxford, though their associations are quite as interesting.

TRINITY, was founded by Henry VIII. in 1546, and has three fine quadrangles; a splendid hall in the Tudor style; gardens; and an important library, with busts of Newton and Bacon, Thorwaldsen’s statue of Byron, Newton’s telescope and some of John Milton’s manuscripts.

CHRIST’S COLLEGE, founded in 1442, was Milton’s college. In the gardens is _Milton’s Mulberry-Tree_. The quadrangle was rebuilt by Inigo Jones.

JESUS COLLEGE (1496) and _Chapel_ are very fine buildings, on the site of a Benedictine nunnery.

CAIUS (pronounced _Kees_) was founded in 1384, and enlarged in 1557 by Dr. Caius, physician to Queen Mary. Rebuilt lately, it is now one of the best.

CORPUS CHRISTI (1351) contains curious portraits, especially those of Sir Thomas More, Wolsey, Erasmus, and Foxe, the author of the _Book of Martyrs_.