. First impressions of Europe. decorated with vines andflowers, unshadowed by trees. Great red walls uprise,with broken Gothic windows, all surrounded by open,gently-sloping lawns. Time-ravaged and weather-moulded, strangely effective in coloring, it is now asmuch a work of nature as of man. A lack of ornamen-tal detail results from its long desertion. We observedno tablets, inscriptions or coats of arms on the totter-ing walls, although a few exist. Dungeons in the strictsense have, we believe, never been found in this castle;yet many rooms, now caves, are surely deep and darkenough for any d
. First impressions of Europe. decorated with vines andflowers, unshadowed by trees. Great red walls uprise,with broken Gothic windows, all surrounded by open,gently-sloping lawns. Time-ravaged and weather-moulded, strangely effective in coloring, it is now asmuch a work of nature as of man. A lack of ornamen-tal detail results from its long desertion. We observedno tablets, inscriptions or coats of arms on the totter-ing walls, although a few exist. Dungeons in the strictsense have, we believe, never been found in this castle;yet many rooms, now caves, are surely deep and darkenough for any doleful purpose. One great pit, per-haps twenty feet wide, and very deep, although in theheart of the ruin, is said to have been a cesspool. Whensuch crude ideas of sanitation prevailed the fell microbemust have increased prodigiously, and proved at timesan enemy within the bastions more deadly than anybesieging host outside. At Kenilworth, unlike Warwick and Hampton Court,we might, once through the entrance gate, roam at will. Stratford-on-Avon 35 and recline unmolested on the grassy lawns. Wouldthat time had permitted us to view its towers whenbathed in silvery moonlight, and to brave the flittingghosts of the ambitious Dudley, the famous John ofGaunt, and the noble Simon de Montfort. STRATFORD-ON-AVON The thorough harmony in the appearance and ar-rangement of streets and buildings in slumbering littleStratford appeals at once to the weary pilgrim. Wehad but one fault to find,—William Shakespeare wasborn there. If the Immortal Bard had arisen else-where, and his path across lifes stage, and so manyother stages, had but avoided this modern Mecca, howpleasure and profit might have combined as we inves-tigated the quaint old houses everywhere visible. Asit was, everything had been explored, rummaged, writ-ten and rewritten of in poetry and prose, pictured andpainted, until the veriest scintilla of novelty had be-come effectually erased. This difficulty, irksome tothe inquiring,
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookidfirstimpress, bookyear1908
