Chapter XVII

A decayed fane--Birds in church--An old manorial hall--Curious
creations of the carver’s brain--The grotesque _in excelsis_--The
old formal garden--Sketching from memory--The beauty of the
Wolds--Lovely Lincolnshire!--Advice heeded!--A great character--A
headless horseman--Extremes meet--“All’s well that ends well.”

From Somersby we drove to Bag Enderby. What is the meaning of the curious and distinguishing prefix “bag” it is difficult to divine; it cannot be from “bog,” for the hamlet is in the hills and there are no bogs about, nor are there likely to have been any even in the prehistoric times. It might perhaps, but doubtfully, be derived from the Anglo-Saxon “boc,” a beech, but this is merely unprofitable guessing. The old church here is very picturesque, externally at any rate, but somewhat dilapidated when we were there, and in want of repair. Like that of Somersby its tower is scarred and weather-worn and picturesque with the picturesqueness of strong decay; by this I mean that though the face of the soft sandstone of which it is built has crumbled away in places so as to give it a pathetic look of untold age, still the decay is merely on the surface, and the softer portions of the stone-work having suffered, the strongest and most enduring remain. The weathering is such as to cause a look rather than a reality of weakness, the walls are massive enough to stand for ages yet, the old builders were fortunately lavish of material; they built for time, if not eternity!

Within, the church shows such unmistakable signs of a regular restoration during the Churchwarden era and of having been untouched since, that it is very interesting as an object lesson of that period of ecclesiastical art,--so few churches being now left to us in this state. Here we noticed the long out-of-date high-backed pews, with a large square family one in the midst, presumably the squire’s. The woodwork of some of these pews was worm-eaten, and the cushions thereof mostly moth-holed. The pulpit is a two-decker affair of plain panelled deal, such as in a few more years one may expect to find only in a museum--if there.

We noticed on looking up that where the roof joined the tower, or rather failed to join it, we could clearly see the sky, and so on wet days the rain must have free entry to the nave; fortunately there are no pews immediately below! Still in spite of all, or shall I say because of all this, the poor old church appealed to us. It was so charmingly innocent of any attempt at “art” decoration, it happily boasted no pavement of garish tiles suggestive of the modern villa, no Birmingham bright brass-work, no crudely coloured stained-glass windows to offend the eye. Take the pews and pulpit away and it would at once have been delightfully picturesque, and even pews and pulpit sinned artistically and architecturally solely in form, for Time had carefully toned them down to a

[Sidenote: _THE CHURCHWARDEN ERA_]

perfectly harmless if not an actually pleasing tint. At any rate there was no irritating pretence at misunderstood art; no imitation--a long way off--of medievalism; no false note. The churchwarden was no artist; but then he did not pretend to be one, so far I respect him; and he has wrought infinitely less harm in our churches than the professional restorer, so far I positively bless him! for he did not, of set purpose, destroy old work to show how much better he could do it another way! Truly he was over-fond of whitewashing walls, but this did not destroy them, nor the ancient chiselling thereon. He was not enthusiastic about stained glass, perhaps because it was expensive, and so he preferred plain leaded lights through which one can see the blue sky, green trees, and sunlit country; and certainly, though for other reasons, I prefer, infinitely prefer, plain leaded lights to stained glass--unless the stained glass be very good indeed, much better than ever was obtainable in the churchwarden period. In fine, I consider that the old art-ignorant, much-abused churchwarden has done, comparatively, but small lasting harm to our old churches; his whitewash, that has often preserved interesting frescoes, can be easily removed without hurt, his pews and pulpits can almost as readily be removed. But the havoc a “clever” and proudly opinionated restorer is oftentimes allowed to do with impunity is beyond recall. However it may be I would much rather have the interior of Bag Enderby church, primitive as it is, with its ancient stone pavement in which the ancient brasses were set, than that of Somersby church with its prim and proper seats, and modern tiled floor, both of which remind me painfully of a recently erected suburban church raised by contract and at the lowest tender “To the glory of God!”

We found a lady in the church; who she was, or why she was there, I cannot tell. We judged that possibly she was the rector’s wife or his daughter; but this was pure conjecture, for we did not even know if the rector were married. Moreover, who she was, or why there, concerned us not. I am glad we met her, for she was most courteous in giving us all the information it was in her power to impart. Truly, we had become quite accustomed to such courtesies from utter strangers, but custom did not diminish their pleasantness. By way of introduction she remarked that “the church sadly needed some repairing.” We agreed, whether uttered purposely or by accident, we were delighted to hear the expression “repairing” employed instead of “restoring.” “We’re afraid,” continued she, “that some day the roof may fall down upon us during service.” We ventured to hope that it would fall down some other time. We tried to be sympathetic, and endeavoured to look properly concerned when we learnt that there were “bats in the belfry,” and that “birds make themselves quite at home in the nave, Sundays as well as week-days.” We were shocked to hear such bad behaviour of the Lincolnshire birds; but, as we remarked, “birds will be birds all the world over.”

Observing an ancient brass let into the pavement in the centre of the church, with an inscription

[Sidenote: _AN ANCIENT BRASS_]

thereon that looked interesting, we began to examine it; but the lettering was somewhat indistinct from wear, besides being in those puzzling straight up-and-down lines so much favoured in the fifteenth century, and we found considerable difficulty in deciphering it in its entirety, a difficulty enhanced by the dim light at the moment. The strange lady was unable to help us here, but promised, if we would give her our name and address, that she would send us a rubbing of the brass. The kindness of strangers never seemed to fail us, for on our return home we duly found a letter awaiting us with a careful rubbing of the brass enclosed therein. Provided with this, all at our leisure, we read the inscription thus:--_Orate p’ aīa Albini d’Enderby qui fecit fieri istam ecclesiam cum campanile qui obiit in Vigilia s[=c]i Mathie [=ap]o Āº D[=n]i MCCCCVII._, which we roughly did into English: “Pray for the soul of Albinus of Enderby, who caused to be made this church, with bell-tower, who died in the vigil of St. Mathius the apostle, 1407.”

The ancient font here is decorated with some curious devices carved in shields; the chief of these we made out--rightly or wrongly, for I should not like to be considered authoritative on the point--to be the Virgin holding the dead Christ; a man, possibly David, playing on a harp; a hart with a tree (query “the tree of life”) growing out of his back, which tree the hart is licking with his tongue; a cross surrounded by a crown of thorns, and others. This font was raised above the pavement by a stone slab, a slab that, I regret to add, as is all too plainly manifest, once formed a notable tombstone, for it is finely incised with a figure and inscription, in great part now covered over by the font! This fine slab, originally oblong in shape, has at some time been deliberately broken in half in order to make it into a square, and further than this, the four corners of the square thus constructed have their ends chiselled away so as to form an octagonal base, more for the saving of space and convenience than ornament, we imagined. This plundering the dead in such a barefaced fashion, even when done for religious purposes, is not a pleasant thing to contemplate.

In one of the windows of the church is preserved a fragment of ancient stained glass that possibly possesses a history, as it represents the armorial bearings of Crowland Abbey, namely, three knives and three scourges, and may have come from there. Amongst the tombs we noticed a mural monument in the chancel to Andrew Gendney, Esquire, who is represented in armour, with his wife and children. This monument, bearing date of 1591, still shows traces of its original colouring though over three centuries old.

Near the church stands a fine elm tree with a long low projecting branch close to the ground. This branch, we were told, was long enough to seat all the inhabitants of the parish, which shows how extraordinarily long the branch is, or how few the inhabitants of this remote hamlet are--we understood the latter was the case.

We next drove to “the old manorial hall” of Harrington, our road being bordered by fine old branching oaks and leafy elms, the shade of which was very grateful; for though September, the sun shone down in a manner worthy of the dog-days. Reaching our destination, and armed with our introduction, we at once made our way to the rectory. Here we readily obtained the keys both of the church and the Hall, and were provided, moreover, with a servant to act as guide.

Externally Harrington Hall is a bright, sunny-looking, red-brick building, mostly of the Jacobean period, but much modernised, even to the extent of sash-windows. Over the entrance is a stone slab let into the brick-work, and carved with a coat-of-arms. By the side of this is a sun-dial, with the date 1681 engraved thereon. On either side of the doorway are mounting-blocks with steps, very convenient for horse-riders, so much so that I often wonder why they have so generally disappeared.

[Sidenote: _A DESERTED HALL_]

The old house was tenantless and empty, and wore a sadly forsaken look. In one respect it was the very reverse of Somersby Grange, for while as cheerful in outward appearance as the latter was sombre, within the deserted hall was gloomy and ghost-like, with dismal, if large, bed-chambers leading one into the other in an uncomfortable sort of way, and huge cupboards like little windowless rooms, and rambling passages--a house that had manifestly been altered from time to time with much confusion to its geography. “A sense of mystery” hung over all, and suggested to us that the place must be haunted. But here again, though the very house for a ghost to disport himself in, or to be the home of a weird legend, it was unblest with either as far as we could make out. A promise of romance there was to the eye, but no fulfilment!

One old chamber, called “the oak room,” interested us greatly on account of its exceedingly curious carvings. This chamber was panelled from floor to ceiling. For about three-quarters of the height upwards the panelling was adorned with “linen-pattern” work; above this, round the top of the room, forming a sort of frieze, ran a series of most grotesque carvings, the continuity of the frieze being only broken just above the fireplace, which space was given over to the heraldic pride of various coats-of-arms. Each panel that went to form the frieze had some separate, quaint, or grotesque subject carved thereon; some of the designs, indeed, were so outrageous as to suggest the work of a craftsman fresh from Bedlam! There is a quaintness that overruns its bounds and becomes mere eccentricity.

The grotesque creations of the old monks, though highly improbable and undesirable beings, still looked as though they might have actually lived, and struggled, and breathed. The grotesque creations of the carver of the panels in this room failed in this respect. One could hardly, in the most romantically poetic mood, have given the latter credit for ever existing in this or any other planet where things might be ordered differently; they are all, or nearly all, distinctly impossible. On one of these panels is shown a creature with the head and neck of a swan, the body of a fish (from which body proceed scaled wings of the prehistoric reptile kind),

[Sidenote: _ECCENTRICITIES IN CARVING_]

and a spreading feathered tail, somewhat like a peacock’s; the creature had one human foot and one claw!--a very nightmare in carving, and a bad nightmare to boot! Another nondescript animal, leaning to a dragon, was provided with two heads, one in the usual place, and one in the tail with a big eye, each head regarding the other wonderingly. Another creature looked for all the world like a gigantic mouse with a long curling tail, but his head was that of a man. Space will not allow me to enumerate all these strange carvings in detail. It was the very room, after a late and heavy supper such as they had in the olden times, to make a fêted guest dream bad dreams.

The gardens at Harrington Hall, though modest in extent, make delightful wandering, with their ample walks and old-fashioned flower-beds, formal and colourful, the colours being enhanced by a background of ivy-covered wall and deep-green yew hedge. But what charmed us most here was a raised terrace with a very wide walk on the top. From this we could look down on the gardens on one hand and over the park-like meadows on the other, the terrace doing duty as a boundary wall as well as a raised promenade--an excellent idea. Why, I wonder, do we not plan such terraces nowadays? they form such delightful promenades and are so picturesque besides, with a picturesqueness that recalls many an old-world love story and historical episode. What would the gardens of Haddon Hall be without the famous terrace, so beloved by artists, and so often painted and photographed? With the coming of the landscape gardener, alas! the restful past-time garden of our ancestors went out of fashion, and with it the old garden architecture also. Formerly the artificialness of the garden was acknowledged. The garden is still an artificial production--Nature more or less tamed--but instead of glorying in the fact we try to disguise it. The architect’s work now stops at the house, so we find no longer in our gardens the quaint sun-dial, the stone terrace, the built summer-house--a real house, though tiny, and structurally decorative--the recessed and roomy seat-ways that Marcus Stone so delights to paint, the fountains, and the like; yet what pleasant and picturesque features they all are! Now we have the uncomfortable rustic seat and ugly rustic summer-house of wood, generally deal, and varnished, because they look more rural! Still there are some people who think the old way best!

The small church at Harrington is apparently a modern building, containing, however, in strange contrast to its new-looking walls, a series of ancient and very interesting tombs. I say the church is apparently modern, for I have seen ancient churches so thoroughly restored as to seem only just finished. But the restorer, or rebuilder, here deserves a word of praise for the careful manner in which the monuments of armoured warriors and others, ages ago dust and ashes, have been cared for. These monuments are to the Harrington and Coppledike families, and range from the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries, supplying a good example of almost every style of sepulchral memorial to the dead, beginning with the stone effigy, in full armour, of Sir Iohn de Harrington, who is represented with his legs crossed; then passing through incised slabs and brasses to the more elaborate altar-tomb; and from this to the mural monument, where the figures are shown as kneeling, not recumbent; and lastly, to the period when the sculptured figures disappear altogether, and the portraits of the underlying dead give place to mere lettering setting forth the many virtues of the departed worthies.

[Sidenote: _A VAIN SEARCH_]

Harrington Hall is another of the places that people, in a vain search after the original of Locksley Hall, have imagined might have stood for the poet’s picture, presumably because of its proximity to Somersby, for, as far as the building goes, it affords no clue that “one can catch hold of.” It is an old hall, and there the likeness appears to begin and end! In spite of Tennyson’s disclaimer, I cannot but feel that, though no particular spot suggested Locksley Hall to him, it is quite possible, if not probable, that he may, consciously or unconsciously, have taken a bit from one place, and a bit from another, and have pieced them together so as to form a whole--a vague whole truly, but still a tangible whole.

To show how unknowingly such a thing may be done, I may mention that I once remember painting a mountain-and-river-scape that I fondly imagined I had evolved from my own brain. As I was at work on this an artist friend (with whom I had often painted in North Wales, our favourite sketching ground) chanced to look in for a smoke and a chat. “Hullo!” exclaimed he, “what have you got there? Why, it’s Moel Siabod and the Llugwy, though I don’t know the exact point of view.” For the moment I deemed he was joking, as was his wont; but on looking again at the canvas with fresh eyes I saw that, quite unwittingly, I had repeated the general outline of that mountain, with even some details of the landscape of the valley below--not by any means an accurate representation of the scene, but sufficiently like to show how much I was unconsciously indebted to the original for my composition. I have still the painting by me, and on showing it to a friend well acquainted with the district, and after so far enlightening him as to say it was a Welsh view, he declared he knew the very spot I had painted it from! So powerful oftentimes are impressions; for it was solely a forgotten impression I had painted!

Now, it happened that later on our journey we mentioned to a stranger (with whom we gossiped, as we always do with interesting strangers we come across, if they will) the fact that so struck us about Harrington Church, its looking so new, whilst the tombs inside were so old. He exclaimed in reply, “Well, you see the old church was pulled down and entirely rebuilt. It was a pity, but it had to be. Its foundations had given way so that the building was slowly sinking into the ground.” This remark brought to our mind one of the few possible clues of subject detail, as showing some distinct local colouring, for in “Locksley Hall Sixty Years After,” we read:--

[Sidenote: _COINCIDENCES_]

Yonder in that chapel, slowly sinking now into the ground,
Lies the warrior, my forefather, with his feet upon the hound.

Cross’d! for once he sail’d the sea to crush the Moslem in his pride;
Dead the warrior, dead his glory, dead the cause in which he died.

There truly in Harrington Church is the warrior with his legs crossed, and Harrington is within an easy ramble of Somersby, so doubtless the old church, then possibly “sinking into the ground,” with its tombs and ancient hall, were well known to Tennyson in his youth, and doubtless were lastingly impressed upon his romantic mind. It is just the spot that would impress any one of a poetic temperament even now, but more so then than now, when the church was in pathetic decay, broken down with the burden of centuries! It will not escape notice that Tennyson clings to the old tradition that a cross-legged effigy necessarily represents a crusader. Perhaps it is too much to expect a poet to do otherwise, in spite of the dictum of Dr. Cox (before mentioned) and that of other learned authorities who can find it in their hard hearts to destroy a pleasant bit of picturesque and purely harmless fiction.

From Harrington we returned to Horncastle by a roundabout route, passing through South Ormsby and Tetford, a route that led us through the heart of the wild Wolds, and gave us a good insight into its varied and characteristic scenery. A very enjoyable drive it proved, down dale and over hill, past many-tinted woods, gorgeous in their autumn colouring, through sleepy hamlets, and across one little ford, with a foot-bridge at the side for pedestrians, with the rounded hills bounding our prospect on every hand. Now the hills would be a wonderful purple-gray in cloud shadow, anon a brilliant golden green as the great gleams of sunshine raked their sloping sides, lighting them up with a warm glory that hardly seemed of this world, so ethereal did they make the solid landscape look.

There is a charm of form, and there is also a charm of colour, less seldom looked for or understood; but when one can have the two at their best combined, as in this instance, then the beauty of a scene is a thing to be remembered, to make a mental painting of, to be recalled with a sense of refreshment on a dreary winter’s day when the dark fog hangs thick and heavy like a pall over smoky London. P. G. Hamerton, who, if a poor painter, was an excellent critic, and a clever writer upon art (for, like Ruskin, he had a message to give), remarks, “In the Highlands of Scotland we have mountains, but no architecture; in Lincolnshire architecture, but no mountains.” Well, I feel inclined to retort, Lincolnshire _has_ the architecture--and the Wolds. Truly, the Wolds are not mountains, but picturesquely they will do as a background to architecture even better than mountains. Mountains resent being turned into a mere background to architecture; they are too big, too important, far too assertive; the Wolds are dreamy and distant,--so the very thing.

Many years ago, when they were less known, and little thought of or admired, I spoke of the Norfolk Broads as a land of beauty, worthy of the

[Sidenote: _PICTURESQUE LINCOLNSHIRE_]

attention of tourists and artists. I was smiled at for my pains. Now the painter revels in the Broads, and the tourist has discovered them. To-day I say that Lincolnshire is a land of lovely landscapes, and that its scenery is most paintable and picturesque to those who have eyes to see, and this I have endeavoured to show in some of my sketches. Still I expect to be smiled at for the assertion. “Whoever heard of Lincolnshire being picturesque?” I can fancy people saying. The very remark was made to me when I proclaimed the beauty of the Broads. I bide my time, and wonder when artists will discover Lincolnshire. To be honest, however, I have heard of one artist who has discovered it, but he is very reticent about his “find.” Wise man he! If a landscape painter feels he is getting “groovy,” and I fear a good many are, let him come to Lincolnshire! Some centres in the county truly are better for his purpose than others, but I will not particularise. I dread even the remote chance of bringing down the cheap tripper. Once I innocently wrote, and in enthusiastic terms, of the charms of a certain beauty-spot that I thought was strangely overlooked and neglected. Well, I have cause to repent my rashness, and accept the well-intentioned hint thrown out to me by the _Saturday Review_ some few years ago, thus: “Let Mr. Hissey ponder, and in his topography particularise less in the future. Our appeal, we know, places him in an awkward dilemma; but he can still go on the road and write his impressions without luring the speculative builder, etc. ... if he deals delicately with his favourite beauty-spots, and forbears now and then to give local habitation and name.” Most excellent advice! That I have followed it to some extent is, I think, shown by the later remarks of the same critic, who writes of a more recent work of mine: “We are relieved to note that Mr. Hissey does not wax eloquent concerning one of the most beautiful and unspoilt towns in Sussex. He passes through it with commendable reticence.” It is a pleasant experience for a critic and an author to be of one mind; for an author to profit by a critic’s criticisms!

Returning, in due course, to our comfortable quarters at Horncastle, on dismounting from our dog-cart there we noticed an old man standing expectantly in the yard. He was oddly dressed in that shabby-genteel manner that reminded us very much of the out-at-elbows nobleman of the melodrama stage, for in spite of his dress his bearing impressed us; it was dignified. He at once came up to us and exclaimed, “I’ve got something to show you, that I’m sure you would like to see.” I am afraid that we were just a little heated and tired with our long drive and day’s explorations; moreover, we were looking eagerly forward to a refreshing cup of afternoon tea, so that we rather abruptly rejected the advances made; but the stranger looked so disappointed that we at once repented our brusqueness, and said we should be pleased to see what he had to show us. Whereupon he beamed again, and pulling an envelope out of his pocket he extracted therefrom a piece of paper, which he handed to us for our inspection, with a smile. On this we read--

[Sidenote: _A MAN OF MANY ACCOMPLISHMENTS_]

Marie Corelli,
with best wishes.
September 12th, 1897.
Horncastle.

“There now,” he exclaimed, “Miss Corelli, the famous novelist, wrote that for me the other day when she was in Horncastle. I thought you would like to see her handwriting. I’ve lots of interesting things I could show you at my house if you like. I’ve got letters from other great people. I’ve got Robert Burns’s--Bobbie Burns I calls him--snuffbox, for which I have been offered £200 and refused it. I’m a poet, too, and have composed a lot of original poems. I can sing a song with any man. I’m a ventriloquist also, and have given entertainments lasting two hours. I’m the oldest cricketer in England; but I won’t detain you longer now. I could go on for an hour or more all about myself, but I daresay you are tired with driving. Here is my name and address,” handing us at the same time a rather dirty card. “Now, if you would allow me, I should be pleased to show you round our town at any time, and point out all the interesting things therein, for it is a very interesting old place.”

Manifestly we had come upon a character, curious above the general run of characters; the man interested us, we felt glad to have met him, and thereupon arranged that he should show us over the town in half an hour’s time. So he departed with a smile promising to meet us in the hotel yard in half an hour. Then we sought the ostler and asked him about the stranger. We were informed that he was a Mr. Baker, who kept a small sweetmeat-shop in the place, and was a great antiquary. “He always goes after strangers who come here. I expect he saw you come in yesterday; he’s been hanging about the yard all the afternoon expecting you back. He’s a regular character.” So we had concluded; still, antiquarianism and selling sweetmeats did seem an odd mixture!

It so happened that a day or two after this, chance threw us unexpectedly in the company of the famous novelist, who was staying at the same hotel in a Lincolnshire village that we stopped at, and during the course of a conversation about many things, we told her the amusing incident of our being shown her autograph at Horncastle. It appeared that out of pure good-nature Miss Marie Corelli had given Mr. Baker her signature, as he had boldly come to her and asked for it! Possibly had he not been such a manifest character he would not have obtained it so readily, for the autograph-hunter has become a nuisance in the land! Somehow it has always been our fate when taking our driving expeditions to become acquainted with at least one or more notable persons. This tour proved no exception to the rule.

We found Mr. Baker duly awaiting us at the time and place mentioned. First he took us to the church, wherein he pointed out to us thirteen scytheheads hanging on the north wall, three of which were mounted at the end of poles so as to make rough but effective spears; these, he told us, were relics of

[Sidenote: _A WORTHY KNIGHT_]

the battle of Winceby Hill, and it was with these primitive but at the period formidable weapons that the Lincolnshire rustics were armed who helped materially to overthrow the King’s forces. The rusting relics of the never-returning past interested us, and as we looked upon them the centuries gone seemed somehow to narrow down to years; the mind is beyond time and space! Then our guide pointed out to us the tomb of Sir Ingram Hopton, who was slain at the fight, having previously unseated Cromwell during the struggle. His epitaph, inscribed upon a mural tablet, runs as follows:--

Here Lyeth ye worthy
And Honorable Kt. Sr Ingram
Hopton who paid his debt
To Nature and Duty to his King
And Country in the Attempt
Of seising ye Arch-Rebel
In the Bloody skirmish near
Winceby: Octr ye 6th. A.D.
1643.

“There is a tradition,” said Mr. Baker, “that Sir Hopton was killed by having his head struck off at a blow, whereupon his horse rushed away with his headless body, and did not stop till he came to the knight’s front door at Horncastle. But I cannot answer for the truth of the story, so you can form your own conclusions in the matter,” which we did. Now our self-appointed guide led us to one of the side aisles, and began to lift the matting up from the pavement, in search of a tombstone he wished to show us, but for some inexplicable reason he could not readily find it. “It can’t surely have run away?” we exclaimed, amused at the perplexity of the searcher; “tombstones don’t often do that.” But the light was rapidly fading; already it was too dim to read inscriptions on the dusky flooring, darkened further by the shadows of the pews, so we left the tomb unseen. If I remember aright it was to the memory of Tennyson’s parents-in-law.

Mr. Baker then invited us to his house, an invitation we accepted; we were taken there by what appeared to be a very roundabout way, in order, we imagined, that our guide might point out to us one or two things of interest. First we were shown the square red-brick house near the church which was formerly the home of Mr. Sellwood, whose eldest daughter Tennyson married. Except for this second-hand kind of fame the house is not notable in any way; it is of a comfortable old-fashioned type, without any architectural pretensions whatever--a type that possesses the negative virtue of neither attracting nor offending the eye. As Mr. Baker was a very old man (he told us he was born on 1st November 1814), we ventured to ask him if by any chance he remembered seeing Tennyson as a youth when living at Somersby. He told us that when he was a boy he distinctly remembered Tennyson as a young man. “We did not think much of him then; he used to go rambling miles away from home without his hat; we used to think him a little strange. I have been told as how when he was a boy he was a bit wild like, and would get on a mule and make him go by rattling a tin box, with marbles in it, right over the animal’s ears. He used to be very fond of going into the fields all alone, and lying on his back on the grass smoking a pipe. He was very reserved, and did not talk to people much; and that’s about all I know or have heard about him. You see, sir, ‘a prophet hath no honour in his own country,’ that’s Scripture, so it must be true.” We nodded assent.

[Sidenote: _IN STRANGE QUARTERS_]

Then Mr. Baker showed us Sir Ingram Hopton’s old home in the main street, and going down a narrow lane pointed out some bits of rough and ruined masonry, now built into walls and cottages; these crumbling bits of masonry, we were told, formed portions of the old castle. I must, however, confess that when castles come to this state of decay, they fail to arouse my sympathies, for their history in stone is over, and all their picturesqueness gone. After this we came to Mr. Baker’s little sweetmeat-shop, situated in a by-street; we were ushered through the shop into a tiny and somewhat stuffy sitting-room. Here we were bidden to take a chair, and imagine ourselves at home; we did the former, the latter was beyond our power, the surroundings were so unfamiliar! Then Mr. Baker produced a parcel of letters written direct to him from sundry more or less notable people; three of these, we observed, to our surprise, were stamped at the top with the well-known name of an English royal palace. They were all addressed to “Dear Mr. Baker,” and bore the signature below of a royal personage! As we looked round the tiny humble parlour at the back of the sweetmeat-shop immediately after glancing at the letters, a certain sense of the incongruity of things struck us forcibly. Then we were handed another letter from the famous cricketer, Mr. W. G. Grace, complimenting Mr. Baker on his old round-arm bowling! “Maybe you would hardly think it,” remarked our host, “to look at me now, a gray old man, but I was a great cricketer once. Why, I bowled out at the very first ball the late Roger Iddison, when he was captain of the All-England Eleven.” We felt inclined just then to say that we could believe anything! So we accepted the statement as a matter of course that the French (which one we were not told) Ambassador had been to see Mr. Baker. After this we were allowed to gaze upon and even handle his treasure of treasures, namely, the snuff-box of “Bobbie Burns, the great Scotch poet,” in the shape of a small horn with a silver lid. This, we were assured, had once belonged to Burns. It may have done; anyway, on the lid is inscribed “R. B., 1768,” and it looks that age.

Mr. Baker informed us that though he kept only a very small and unpretending sweet-shop, his mother’s ancestors were titled, “but really the deed makes the nobleman and I make excellent sweets. I send them everywhere,” he said; “you must try them,” whereupon he presented us with a tin box full of his “Noted Bull’s-Eyes.” Let me here state that the bull’s-eyes proved to be most excellent. I make this statement on the best authority, having given them to my children, and children should be the best judges of such luxuries, and they pronounced

[Sidenote: _PARDONABLE IGNORANCE_]

them “most delicious.” Then Mr. Baker insisted upon singing to us an old English song; he would have added some ventriloquism, but we said that we really could not trespass upon his valuable time and hospitality any longer, so we took our departure, and sought the ease of our inn. We have come upon a goodly number of characters during our many driving tours, but I do not think that we have ever come upon a greater one than Mr. Baker; long may he live yet! That I had never heard of him before I arrived in Horncastle seemed genuinely to surprise him! Well, I had not, “there are so many famous people in the world,” as I explained in excuse, “nowadays you cannot really know of them all!” “That’s quite true, sir,” replied he, and we parted the best of friends. I am sure I was forgiven for my ignorance, for a little later that evening a parcel came for me to my hotel, and I found it to contain a quantity of gingerbread, “With Mr. Baker’s compliments!”