Highways and byways in Surrey . oralteration whatsoever. We do not hear it in these days ofbattles without drums and colours; but we do not fight muchbetter, perhaps, without the drums. The old Wimbledon church was demolished; the newchurch was built in 1786. It has many monuments, but thegrave which fascinates is the tomb neither of a great statesmannor a good man. It is apart in a far corner; over it is laid ahuge slab of black stone, perhaps half a foot thick, and thestone tells you that under it lies the body of John Hopkins,Ksquire, familiarly known as Vulture Hopkins. Misers havehad hard
Highways and byways in Surrey . oralteration whatsoever. We do not hear it in these days ofbattles without drums and colours; but we do not fight muchbetter, perhaps, without the drums. The old Wimbledon church was demolished; the newchurch was built in 1786. It has many monuments, but thegrave which fascinates is the tomb neither of a great statesmannor a good man. It is apart in a far corner; over it is laid ahuge slab of black stone, perhaps half a foot thick, and thestone tells you that under it lies the body of John Hopkins,Ksquire, familiarly known as Vulture Hopkins. Misers havehad hard things said of them often enough; of Hopkins Pope DUELS ON THE COMMON 429 wrote that he Hved worthless, but died worth three hundredthousand pounds, and, reflecting on the Use of Riches, Popemade a couplet on his funeral:— When Hopkins dies, a thousand lights attendThe wretch who Hving saved a candles end. But those legends belong to paper and books. They are lesseasily destroyed than an epithet engraved on a stone ; but who. The Golf House and Wiitdtnill, Wimbledon Coinvion. of deliberation would carve an insult, as this is carved, fora dead man ? \\imbledon will never belong to the town so long as it keepsits common. It is the wildest thing near London. It isalmost as wild and lonely a place to-day as when in Georgianand early Victorian days statesmen and noblemen chose it as afashionable and convenient ground for duelling. The com-mon has seen more than one historic duel. The Duke ofYork and Colonel Lennox met there in 1789; the Dukereceived the Colonels fire, and the ball grazed his hair, but he 430 THE WINDMILL ch. xu (lid not fire in return. Pitt fought a duel with a member ofParliament on Putney Heath north of the common in 1798;each fired twice at twelve paces and hit nothing. Sir FrancisBurdett and Mr. John Paull fought in 1807, wounded eachother and went back together to London in the same and Castlereagh fought in 1809, and Grattan, twoyears after
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Keywords: ., bookauthorthomsonh, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, bookyear1921
