The Practical Tourist, Or, Sketches of the State of the Useful Arts, and of Society, Scenery, &c. &c. in Great-Britain, France and Holland

tlemen from the United States, I left London in the coach for Dover. Our road lay over ranges of hills composed of chalk, covered by a thin, but well cultivaed soil. From the borders of the Thames, great quantities of this material have been removed, to serve as ballast for the vessels returning from the port of London to various quarters of the world, where this material is employed in scoring petty accounts, or for the rude diagrams of the youthful scholar. Applied to the cord in the hand of the carpenter, it serves to form the unerring straight line which guides his cutting implements. When diffused in water, the finest part subsides and forms the whiting used for putty and paint. Thus even these sterile chalk-cliffs are turned to account in favor of the manufactures and commerce of England.

One of the most favorable circumstances for the agriculture of Kent is stated to be the system adopted in this county for the distribution of the estates or farms, by equal partition among the children, or by Gavel-kind descent, as it is termed. In the other counties of England, the law

ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.

of primogeniture prevails; but here the estates are equally subdivided among the children, as in the United States, on the death of intestate parents. For the cultivation of hops, the county of Kent is particularly celebrated. The valleys among some of the chalk-hills bristle with forests of naked hop-poles, around which the plants cling in festoons. Three poles are set to each cluster of vines, which are arranged in rows about five feet asunder.

The cottages by the road-side are numerous, and the passing traveller cannot fail to admire some of them as models of rural neatness and economy. In the small gardens in front of them, the bright colors of the tulip and wall-flower predominate among the gay blossoms; whilst clusters of roses hang from the walls, upon which the plants are trained and intertwined with the honeysuckle, forming natural screens for the windows, and filling the air with fragrance.

CANTERBURY, fifty-six miles from London, derives its celebrity from its fine Cathedral, and from the well known incident of history, the murder of Thomas A. Becket, and the subsequent royal pilgrimage of King Henry to his shrine in the cathedral. On this occasion he exposed his bare back to be lashed by some of the religionists, who, it is related, availed themselves, with hearty good will, of this rare opportunity to inflict a royal flagellation.

The archbishop of Canterbury receives from his office the princely income of about 150,000 dollars per annumtruly a most ample remuneration for the scanty spiritual cares bestowed by the archbishop upon his flock, few of whom are probably known to him personally. This is a great sum for a follower of Him who was born in a manger to receive, for inculcating the precepts and example of his divine master.

There is apparently very little humility in the stately equipages and palaces of the high Church Dignitaries in

DOVER.-SHAKSPEARE'S CLIFF,

England. Even the most pious and devout might find themselves somewhat engrossed by the receipt and expenditure of so large an income, and tempted to enjoy the gratifications of this present life, rather than to anticipate the bliss of a life to come.

DOVER.

Before arriving at Dover we crossed numerous hills with bald rounded summits. The furze in some places abounds on the road-side, shading the ground with its prickly leaves, resembling those of the Canadian thistle, and displaying their gaudy yellow blossoms, "unprofitably gay." The cliffs of Dover have derived so much celebrity from the glowing descriptions of Shakspeare, that every traveller hurries forward to the brink of the lofty precipices to compare the actual prospects with the description, which has all the life with a little of the high coloring of a painting, His glowing sketch is celebrated, both as an illustration of the power of language, and of the genius of the writer. To one of the precipices the name of "Shakspeare's cliff," has been given. From the brink of this cliff you look down upon the humble beach beneath, lashed by the waves, and involuntarily recur to the description which he has given of its fearful prospects. It must be acknowledged that the magnificence of the actual scenery hardly corresponds to the poet's representation.

"There is a cliff, whose high and bending head
Looks fearfully on the the confined deep.

Bring me to the very brim of it;—

Come on sir; here's the place;-stand still;-how fearful
And dizzy 'tis to cast one's eyes so low!

The crows and choughs, that wing the midway air,
Show scarce so gross as beetles; half way down
Hangs one that gathers samphire; dreadful trade!
Methinks, he seems no bigger than his head:
The fishermen, that walk upon the beach,

DOVER CASTLE-BATHING CARTS.

Appear like mice, and yon tall anchoring bark
Diminished to her cock; her cock a buoy
Almost too small for sight, the murmuring surge
That on the unnumber'd idle pebbles chafes,
Cannot be heard so high:-I'll look no more;
Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight
Topple down headlong.

-Ten masts at each make not the altitude,
Which thou hast perpendicularly fell.

From the dread summit of this chalky bourn;

Look up,-a height,—the shrill gorg'd lark so far
Cannot be seen or heard: do but look up."

Dover Castle is situated on the very brink of this precipice, with its parapets in some places nearly leaning over it. Below the foundations of the castle, are subterraneous chambers, galleries, and even barracks for soldiers, hewed out of the solid mass of chalk, of which the cliffs are composed. On the top of the cliff the chimneys rise up from the green surface of the turf, forming vents to the viewless habitations beneath the ground. The wells for the supply of the garrison are four hundred feet deep, which is about the perpendicular height of the Dover-cliffs above the level of the sea. In one of these cliffs a remarkably large circular hole is dug perpendicularly from the top to a depth corresponding with the level of the beach, and a flight of winding steps is formed within it. A horizontal passage or gallery is excavated from the bottom of the perpendicular shaft, to the open beach of the sea shore.

Dover is an inconsiderable town, situated near the base of impending cliffs, where a rivulet has apparently broken through, and worn them away, forming a narrow vale for the site of a few straggling houses.

Along the shore, bathing carts are arranged, conveniently fitted up for sea-bathing. Each cart is covered with painted canvass, and the snug little apartment within is furnished with a dressing table, mirror, and other conveniences of the toilet. The bathers descend from the rear

« Previous Continue »

Books

The Practical Tourist, Or, Sketches of the State of the Useful ..., Volume 2