. Charles Dickens and Rochester. ightingwith the men in buckram suits, and on the other, Falstaff beingpitched into the Thames from a buck-basket, the merry wives ofWindsor looking on approvingly. In its long, sanded room therewas a copy of Shaksperes monument in Westminster Abbey, withthe inscription, The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces,and so forth. It is worth noting, that forty years ago, somethinglike ninety coaches passed this old hostelry every day ! The Railways have altered that, and although it is still true, as Mr. F s Aunt says, that, theres milestones on the Dover road,^ i
. Charles Dickens and Rochester. ightingwith the men in buckram suits, and on the other, Falstaff beingpitched into the Thames from a buck-basket, the merry wives ofWindsor looking on approvingly. In its long, sanded room therewas a copy of Shaksperes monument in Westminster Abbey, withthe inscription, The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces,and so forth. It is worth noting, that forty years ago, somethinglike ninety coaches passed this old hostelry every day ! The Railways have altered that, and although it is still true, as Mr. F s Aunt says, that, theres milestones on the Dover road,^ it is also true that, in some places there is very littleelse; for in parts of the road grass struggles successfully with thediminished traffic of these latter days. Dullborough Town is the title of another chapter of theUncommercial Traveller^ and is another name for Rochester. The following extracts show more clearly perhaps than anyother portion of the writings of Charles Dickens, how he clung to* Little Dorrit.—Chap. GATEHOUSE OF CATHEDRAL CLOSE, ROCHESTER. CHARLES DICKENS AND ROCHESTER. 13 the memories of his childhood, and how he still loved Rochesterwhen in the full-tide of his popularity, and in the prime of hislife. As the uncommercial saunters along a street, he at last recognisesa man he had known many years before, when a child. * * *It was he himself; he might formerly have been an old-lookingyoung man, or he might now be a young-looking old man, butthere he was. - - * Addressing the man (a greengrocer) hewishes to explain that he formerly as a boy had the honour of hisacquaintance, but he quite failed to excite the interest of hisformer acquaintance. >!^ ? * Nettled by his pliegmatic conduct, I informed him that I had left the townwhen I was a child. He slowly returned, quite unsoftened, and not without asarcastic kind of complacency, Had I ? Ah ! And did I find it had got ontolerably well without me? Such is the difference (I thought, when I had lefth
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