Glastonbury—Wells—The Jubilee.

I found in the ruins of the abbey at Glastonbury a full reward for my efforts to pay them a visit. The architecture of these ruins is of a character widely different from that of Tintern; and the surrounding scenery, though marked by one bold eminence called the Tor, is that of a fat agricultural region, wholly unlike the romantic valley of the Wye. Yet the old wattled church of the early Britons which once stood here; the tradition that Joseph of Arimathea proclaimed the gospel on this spot; the legendary interest that attaches to the memory of St. Dunstan, and the superb remains of what was once the richest monastery in the kingdom, invest the now silent precincts of the Abbey with peculiar charms. The chapel called St. Joseph’s is still an exquisite specimen of art, and in its crypt is a spring reputed to derive extraordinary virtues from some association with his visit. A huge stone coffin, lying empty and dishonoured in the aisle of the Abbey Church, was shown to me as having once contained the corpse of King Arthur. Here again was the figure of an old abbot; and as I strode over the clovered floor of the holy place, amid broken corbels and shattered columns, I found an artist seated among them, at his task, sketching the beautiful remnant of an old turret, which rises amid the surrounding wreck, almost the only uninjured memorial of the former glory of the pile. At a distance, which gives one an idea of the great extent of the old establishment, stands the kitchen of the monastery still entire. It is an octagon, of vast circumference, and contains several curious relics of the Abbey. I next visited St. Benedict’s Church, which disputes with several others the claim of being the oldest in the kingdom; and so, taking a post-chaise, drove back to Wells, after a due reverence to the celebrated thorn which is said to be the lineal successor of St. Joseph’s walking-stick, and which blooms every year, at Christmas as well as in the early summer. Of its blossoming at Christmas, or Epiphany, I suppose there can be no doubt. I was assured, on the spot, that such was the case. King Charles used to make merry with the papists by calling their attention to the fact that it refused to observe the Gregorian Calendar; and when, in 1752, New Style was introduced into England, some two thousand of the neighbouring peasantry assembled to watch this thorn on Christmas-eve, who, when they found it stubbornly postponing its homage, but punctually putting forth blossoms at Old Christmas, as usual, refused to recognize the novelty, and kept their holidays accordingly. It must be supposed, therefore, that Twelfth day is the real festival which it honours with its strange efflorescence.

The cathedral of Wells struck me as surpassing all that I had yet seen, in its way. The exterior view is fine, and the front is enriched with the most lavish display of sculpture, kings, queens, and saints, each in an embellished niche, and all together conveying a most gorgeous impression to the beholder. But the interior was far more impressive. Its nave was fitted with a pulpit and benches, and had the appearance of being used and frequented. But the choir and Lady-chapel were in process of restoration, on a magnificent scale, and appeared, indeed, quite new. Here was a modern work, not inferior to the old: and when I observed the rich effect of the creamy Caen stone, contrasted with the dark and polished pillars of Purbeck marble, and marked the effective introduction of colours and gilding, amid the delicate foliations and tracery of stalls and tombs, then, first, I understood what must have been the magnificence of these cathedrals, when new and entire! It was pleasing to see such proof that the Church is still instinct with all the spirit of mediæval taste, under the influences of restored purity of religion; and that all the cunning of Bezaleel can be still employed by our reformed ritual, though the craft of Demetrius, in making shrines for idolatrous services, is no longer required.

I will not weary my reader with the numerous details of this glorious pile, nor with those of the Bishop’s palace, its moat and drawbridge; nor yet with memories of the blessed Bishop Ken, which still linger in fragrance about these holy places: but I must observe, that the present Bishop has done a good work in restoring to his cathedral the important feature of a theological school. In his palace is their chapel, a most appropriate one; and as I went through the cathedral, it was pleasant to see several students in their gowns, lingering here and there in the aisles, and vanishing and re-appearing amid the columns.

A romantic drive from Wells, full of interesting views, brought me to Bath. Here, too, was much to see; but its Abbey is a poor object after Wells, and the town of Beau Nash need not long detain an ecclesiastic. I left, in the night, for Berkshire; and next day, which was Sunday, was present at an Ordination, held at Bradfield Church, by the Bishop of Oxford. The Church, and neighbouring College, at which I was a guest, are well worthy of description; but I have only space to add, that the ceremonial of Ordination differed from our own only in the minute particulars of the oath of supremacy, and in the Bishop’s sitting in his chair while administering the imposition of hands. Thirteen priests, and a larger number of deacons, were admitted to Orders. The preacher was the estimable Sir George Prevost; and at Evening Prayer, I had the great satisfaction of addressing the newly ordained clergy, by appointment of the Bishop, and afterwards of dining with him, and them, at the College, where I am happy to testify that all things were done unto edifying, until the close of the day. I was charmed with the Bishop’s manner in private intercourse with his younger clergy; and not less gratified to learn that the Ordination had been preceded by his personal conference with each individual, in which the awful responsibilities of the ministry had been freely enforced, and fully recognized. Those whom I had seen ordained, had come to that solemnity, therefore, with the fullest sense of its unspeakable consequences to their souls; and, so far as could be ascertained, with holy resolutions to be faithful unto death.

The solemnities of the Jubilee of the Venerable S. P. G., now called me back to London, and to a renewal of its social pleasures. On the morning of the 16th of June, I attended, at Westminster Abbey, with a large number of the clergy, the opening services. It was a memorable occasion; the choir of the Abbey being filled with a dense crowd of worshippers, among whom, to judge by their looks and complexions, were men “out of every nation under heaven.” The Bishop of London was the preacher, and gave us an appropriate sermon, characterized by the finish for which his performances are noted, and not deficient in feeling or fervour. It contained gratifying allusions to the American Church, one of whose prelates, Bishop Otey, was present, in the sanctuary, and assisting in the services. A large number of communicants knelt at the altar; and while several of my English friends made an effort to receive at the hands of the Bishop of Tennessee, in gratifying their feelings of Catholic intercommunion, I found an equal satisfaction in receiving the Holy Sacrament from the Archbishop of Canterbury. During the whole solemnity, which filled up several hours, my mind was powerfully impressed with the historical spirit of the place; and while I listened to the sermon, glancing occasionally upward to the vaulted roof, or allowing my eye to wander away among the columns of the nave or choir, it was impossible to divest myself of associations the most sublime, that seemed to swarm around me, like “a cloud of witnesses,” blending the interminable past with the momentary present. Here we were, in our turn, upon the stage, the great actors of past centuries lying all around us! Through yonder gate, beneath the great rose-window, pomp and procession have entered this holy place, age after age; and here, one after another, each as real in its time as that which occupies us now, have the great solemnities of the nation been celebrated. These arches and aisles looked just as they look this minute on the day when Laud ushered in King Charles to receive his crown, and when, just here, he was presented, to the Lords and Commons assisting at that pregnant moment, as their anointed Sovereign. The thought of all that has since passed on the same spot, seemed to compress into the mere drama of an hour, the mighty history of which such was the opening scene. Then the thought of the entire ignorance of futurity, by which such a pageant was made real in its time! Imagination places us back among the men of a by-gone age; but we cannot strip our individuality of its historic knowledge, and we behold their doings with the eyes of a seer. I seemed to be listening to the shout of “Long live King Charles”—and at the same moment foreseeing the scaffold at Whitehall. I seemed to wonder that others could be ignorant of what was coming: and to feel compelled to forewarn the King of the dreadful future. Just so the jubilant coronation of Charles the Second, and the melancholy inauguration of his successor, flitted before me, with the events of years condensed into a moment: and then again I found myself going back to the days of Elizabeth and her hateful sire; and so mounting to the Plantagenets and Normans. It is said that we cannot think of two things at once: but certainly, while I was absorbed in the sermon, I was yet occupied with such thoughts as these, and, in fact, was giving the preacher the full benefit of all this as a background, while I looked on him as the prominent figure of the picture. The psalms for the day had been exceedingly suggestive and appropriate; they were the Deus venerunt, the Qui regis Israel, and the Exultate Deo; and all the while I was mentally contrasting 1851 with 1651, and saying, “What hath God wrought!” That day, two hundred years ago, the Puritans were in the Abbey, making havoc of its holy things, and exulting over the annihilation of the Church of England. They supposed her exterminated, “root and branch:” it was a felony to read one of her ancient Collects in the poorest cottage of the land. And now! I was surrounded by representatives of her communion, who had come up to keep her one hundred and fiftieth missionary festival from the uttermost parts of the earth. Beside the Primate of all England, stood before me the Bishops of Argyle, of Jamaica, and of Tennessee. Around me were kneeling Africans, Asiatics, and Americans, with the islanders of the South Seas, all partakers of her holy fellowship: and passing from such a past to such a present—what a leap my spirit took into the future. Another jubilee—and another! Who shall set a limit to the ingathering of nations; to the latter-day triumphs of the Gospel!

When the services were over, it took some time to emancipate myself from the spell of the place, and I wandered to and fro in the Abbey. A dear friend, a fellow of Oriel College, caught me by the hand, and pointed to the slab beneath my feet. It covered Samuel Johnson. “Surely old Samuel’s bones must have been stirred to-day by the Church’s Jubilee,” said I, “but don’t think you have shown me his grave for the first time; I already know all the choice spots in this floor, and have knelt on that very slab, and given God thanks for his servant Samuel.”

I dined that day with a party of zealous Churchmen, and supporters of the S. P. G.; and, in the evening, went to an ecclesiastical conversazione at Willis’ Rooms. We drove, in a private carriage, through Hyde Park and St. James’s, and were set down at “Almack’s” as superbly as if we had come on as gay an errand as is the more usual one of its visitors. But those brilliant rooms were now thronged with a graver company, the object of the festivity being to do honour to foreign ecclesiastics and pastors, who might be in London on occasion of the Jubilee and the Crystal Palace. I was presented to the Primate, who conversed with a simplicity of manner the most impressive, and invited me to Lambeth with a sort of cordiality, the very reverse of that stateliness and etiquette which it was not unnatural to expect in the address of one so exalted in station. I was much pleased with his venerable appearance, and accepted the kind appointment of an hour, which he named, for my visit to the Archiepiscopal palace, with peculiar pleasure. His Grace was surrounded by his brother Bishops, among whom I saw, for the first time, the Archbishop of Dublin; a prelate of acknowledged talent, but whose gifts would have better fitted the Academy than the throne of a Primate. An Oriental Archimandrite completed the group in this quarter; and other parts of the rooms swarmed with solemn looking men, talking German and French with their English entertainers, or vainly essaying civilities in Low Dutch and Danish. One of these personages, who looked as if he might have figured, with credit to himself, at the Synod of Dort, attacked me in the dialect of the Flemings, to my utter consternation. I could only stammer out a little gibberish, as a reply, and precipitately sounded a retreat, in utter distrust of my ability to sustain a further conversation with my unknown colloquist to mutual satisfaction. I soon afterward made the acquaintance of the Chevalier Bunsen, with whom, as one of the curiosities of the age, I was not sorry to have this opportunity of exchanging a few words. The Chevalier is at home on every subject, and I found him communicative on the favourite topic which I ventured to start, by referring to a common friend, whom he had known very well in Rome. One after another I encountered, during the evening, many eminent and agreeable personages, among whom were officers of the army, dignitaries of the Church, several Bishops, and the Earl of Harrowby. The company was altogether a brilliant one, in spite of the polemical figures who constituted so important a part of it; and the stars and decorations of the nobility, and of foreign officials, were quite conspicuous, among the white neckerchiefs and black broadcloth of the ecclesiastics and pastors.

I breakfasted, next morning, with the Rector of St. Martin’s in the Fields, and then accompanied him, on a visiting tour, about his parish. First, I went to the parish-school, which had lately been rebuilt, and was deemed a model. Prince Albert, who interests himself in such things, was to visit it that very day, and I was kindly asked by the Rector to be of the company, but was otherwise engaged. One of the peculiarities of this building was its ingenious contrivance of a play-ground—if that may be so called, which was some fifty or sixty feet above the earth. Land being costly in the parish of St. Martin’s, the building was planned with a double roof, the lower one being flat, and surrounded with a high fence, affording a safe and ample space for the recreation of the children; while the roof above them served as an awning against the sun, or as a shelter from the rain. A fine view, and as pure an atmosphere as London can afford, were additional advantages of the arrangement. Next, we visited the parochial baths and wash-houses, in which the poor have the best opportunity for washing and drying clothes, and also of keeping their persons in a neat and wholesome condition, at the cost of a few pennies. The benevolence and utility of the establishment must be obvious. Next the Rector took me to see Coleman, one of his parishioners, who was then in his 102d year, and a fine and healthy-looking man at that. What is better, he is unfeignedly pious, and joined devoutly in the prayers which were offered by his pastor, responding with fervour, and saying, in reply to one of his questions—“I know that my Redeemer liveth.” This aged Christian owes his serene and consoling faith, under God, to his early training in the charity school, established in this parish by Archbishop Tennison. He was a pupil in that school when George the Second died, and remembers the tolling of the great bell of St. Paul’s, to announce the event. He also remembers the Coronation of George the Third, and the procession, which he saw as it went to the Abbey, on that occasion. Think of his living to see, as he did, the procession of Victoria to the Crystal Palace, with the same pair of eyes! It was gratifying to hear his testimony to the vast improvement in manners which has been going on in London since he was a boy. He remembers the nights and days which Hogarth has so frightfully depicted; and he says, too truly, that to be a gentleman, was to be a rake, almost universally, when he was a boy. “It was as much as one’s life was worth,” he says, “to walk the streets, at night, in those days.” The same day, I heard Mr. Sydney Herbert remark, in his speech at St. Martin’s Hall, that this age is reputed better than its antecessors, chiefly because, while it cares not what a man may be at heart, it compels him to be decent.

This meeting at St. Martin’s Hall, by the way, must not be forgotten. It was part of the Jubilee. Prince Albert presided, and did so, I must allow, in a very princely style, so far as his personal bearing was concerned. As he entered, which he did with great dignity, the whole assembly rose, and sang God Save the Queen. This struck me as exceedingly handsome and appropriate: but I was not so well pleased with the fulsome adulation with which some of the speakers, afterwards, seemed to think it necessary to bedaub him. He was himself guilty of a flagrant breach of propriety, as it struck me, in alluding to William of Orange, who happened to be on the throne when the Charter of the S. P. G. was signed and sealed, as “the greatest sovereign who ever reigned in Great Britain.” To this ill-judged compliment to one of the foreign adventurers who have succeeded in planting themselves in British palaces, a few gaping mouths in the auditory ejaculated the response, “hear, hear”—for which the sentence was evidently a studied catch: but I am glad to say that the greater part of the assembly was not such as to be so entrapped. It was a failure, absolutely, though the Times reported “great applause,” as a matter of course. When a prince condescends to set up for a critic upon royalty, he deserves no better success: and the ill taste of this particular attempt, on such an occasion, seemed to me offensive in the extreme. It is plain that the prince has learned his historical alphabet from Macaulay, and has studied no further: but I considered this straw as indicative of a coming wind, with which the founder of the House of Coburg should not have threatened the Church so soon. He may yet reap the whirlwind himself, or bequeath it to his children: for it is evident, to me, that amiable and estimable as he is, in many respects, and beloved as he is by a loyal people as the consort of their Queen, he is an alien to true British feeling, and an enemy to the Anglican Church. He would Germanize the nation if possible; above all, he longs to Bunsenize the national religion.

On the whole, I found myself too much of an American Churchman to relish this meeting. It was humiliating to see the venerable Archbishop paying such deference to one who, though so nearly allied to the throne, is in no wise entitled to especial homage from so august a personage as the Primate of all England: and I considered it insufferable that such official personages as Lord John Russell, and Earl Grey, should be chief speakers, merely because of their position, although flagrant enemies of the Church’s holiest principles. A more turgid piece of bombast than the former delivered, I have never chanced to hear, and his whole appearance was, to me, ludicrously revolting. It must not be supposed, however, that the meeting went off without effect. It was nobly redeemed by admirable speeches from Sydney Herbert, the Duke of Newcastle, Sir Robert Inglis, and the Earl of Harrowby, as well as from the Bishops of Oxford and London. Lord Harrowby, in particular, reflecting on the Walpoles and the Graftons of former ministerial epochs with just severity, gave Lord John some wise counsels, while apparently congratulating him on his widely different policy, in patronizing Missions! Mr. Sydney Herbert was truly eloquent, and threw out several sparkling abstractions, which greatly raised my estimate of his mental power; but the natural orator, among them all, was the Bishop of Oxford, whose delightful voice, pleading for the creation of a staff of native Missionaries in Africa, India, and China, infused a thrill of feeling through every heart, as he wound up with the scriptural example of those whose first transports, in receiving the Gospel, found vent in the expression—“We do hear them speak, in our tongues, the wonderful works of God.”

As duly appointed, I waited on the Archbishop at Lambeth, and was received with very little ceremony, into his study,—a spacious apartment, plainly furnished, and overlooking the garden of the Palace. His manner was, as before, extremely simple and affable; and he conversed upon divers ecclesiastical subjects with an appearance of zeal, and with a general tone of elevated churchmanship, for which he is certainly not celebrated as a Primate. It was with the profoundest reverence that I listened to the successor of Augustine and of Cranmer; and not without deference did I venture to express myself, in his presence, even on American subjects. As I rose to depart, he followed me to the door of the room, with something exceedingly winning and paternal in his farewell; and kindly invited me to dine with him, on a day which he named, as the only one when he expected to be at home for some time. This pleasure I was forced to deny myself, owing to a previous engagement; and I accordingly concluded my visit to Lambeth, at this time, by going the usual rounds in company with an official, to whom His Grace committed me. My readers may well imagine my emotions in surveying the Lollard’s Tower, the gallery of historic portraits, the library, and other apartments, of this most interesting pile; but perhaps they might not wholly appreciate the feelings with which I knelt in the chapel, and returned thanks for our American Episcopacy, on the spot where it was imparted to the saintly White. I lingered, for a long time, in the gardens, thinking of Laud, of Juxon, and of Sancroft; and dwelling, with peculiar gratification in my imagination, upon the scenes between Laud and “Mr. Hyde,” of which these gardens were the witness, as mentioned in the pictured pages of Clarendon.

The solemn octave of the Jubilee included Sunday the 22d of June, on which day special sermons were preached in many pulpits, in London, and collections made in behalf of the Society. I received an appointment to preach at Bow Church, and accordingly did so, taking as a text Genesis ix. 27, and endeavouring to show that the existence of our own Church, in the Western World, is a fulfilment of the prophecy, “God shall enlarge Japhet, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem.” But a greater privilege awaited me in the evening of the same day, when it was my happy lot to perform a similar duty, in the Temple Church, standing in Hooker’s pulpit, and preaching to a congregation of the highest intelligence and character, upon the spread of the Church in America. It was a fine afternoon, and that glorious Church was filled with such an assembly as I had never before seen gathered together on an occasion of ordinary worship. Besides the Bishops of Winchester and Edinburgh, who happened to be present, with the Master of the Temple, and other clergy, the benchers were numerously represented, and the finest legal talent of the empire was undoubtedly there collected. To judge by the large attendance of ladies, (some of them of the highest rank,) the Templars were also accompanied by their families: to whom, I suppose, the music furnishes a powerful attraction, as it is justly celebrated; and the organ, though selected two hundred years ago, by the critical ear of the bloody Judge Jeffreys, is of a tone proverbially sweet. The attendance of strangers, drawn together by the same attraction, was also very large, the round church as well as the choir, being apparently filled. I was much moved by the anthem—“Tell it out among the heathen that the Lord is King”—and when it was time for me to ascend the pulpit, and to preach to such an Areopagus, it may be imagined that it was not without feelings of emotion, such as I had never before experienced in the performance of my official duties. That old historic spot, where Hooker had struggled to preserve the falling Church of a single kingdom, was now occupied by my pilgrim feet; and coming from a new world, I was to attest, before such an assembly, and in the presence of God, the blessings which that noble struggle had secured, not to England only, but through her to the wilds of America, and to the unborn generations of a new and mighty people in another hemisphere. The text was the prophecy of David, (Psalm xlv. 17,) “Instead of thy fathers thou shalt have children, whom thou mayest make princes in all lands:” and it was my effort, (as I trust I may say, without too free a personal confession) to improve so interesting an opportunity, in commending my country to the respect of those who heard me, while confessing the just claims upon her gratitude, of the Mother land, from which she is proud to derive the blessings of the Gospel, and the institutions of enlightened freedom, guarded by the supremacy of law. After service, the Master of the Temple, taking me into his adjoining residence, showed me a table which once belonged to his great predecessor, Hooker, and allowed me to sit down in Hooker’s chair. He also showed me some memorials of Bishop Heber, whose missionary labours in India he had assisted, as his chaplain. The evening was passed under the domestic roof of Dr. Warren, the eminent bencher, whose remarkable production, “Ten thousand a-year,” has added to his other distinctions, that of reforming the romance literature of the age, and of introducing a tone of high Christian morality, in place of that fashionable depravity which Bulwer had caught from Byron, and substituted for the decent propriety of Scott. To his polite hospitalities I was indebted for some of my happiest hours in London: and the conclusion of this Holy Day was rendered memorable by many warm expressions of regard for my country and her Church, inspired by his conversation, in the genial society of his family and friends.

Lord Mayor’s Banquet—Eton College—Hampton.

The Jubilee festival at Westminster Abbey was not allowed to supersede the annual sermon at St. Paul’s; and accordingly, on the 18th of June, I attended the service in the cathedral, and heard the Bishop of St. Asaph. The service was performed with the aid of “all the choicest music of the kingdom,” for the choirs of the royal palaces of Windsor and St. James’s were added, on this occasion, to the ordinary musical force of the cathedral, with very great effect. The clergy, with the Bishops, entered in procession through the nave, and the Lord Mayor in robes, and with the civic sword borne before him, figured in the pageant, and occupied his stall. The sermon was scarcely audible where I sat, within the rails of the sanctuary, but it seemed to be earnestly delivered. Then came the Hallelujah Chorus—which I certainly never before heard so impressively performed. “And He shall reign for ever and ever—King of kings, and Lord of lords!” The reverberations of the dome, and the long resounding echoes of those noble aisles prolonged the strain, and made it like the voice of many waters in the new Jerusalem.

and when, as one lifted his arm to drink, it was deemed a necessary precaution that one should stand up to guard him from a fifth-rib. With less ceremony, the custom still obtains in the halls of Oxford; but where the ladies take a part in it, it is certainly a most graceful embellishment of feasting.

Instead of the usual grace after meat, a party of male and female singers appeared at the foot of the hall, and reverently sang a little hymn, all the company rising. His Lordship then informed the company that “on occasion of receiving his friends at the Mansion-house, it was his privilege to dispense with all rules save those which governed the ancient entertainments of the city of London, one of which enabled him to request the ladies to remain at the table, and to hope for the continued honour of their company during the evening.” After this velvety preface, he pronounced the first toast, with a similar softness, and then the toast-master shouted—“My lords, ladies and gentlemen, the Lord Mayor has given the Queen.” All rose, and drank loyally, and then came “God save the Queen,” which was heartily sung. “Please to charge your glasses for the next toast,” was the perpetual cry of the toast-master for the next hour, and always the toast was announced with like formality, the speeches and the music, that followed, being all that could be desired. The venerable Archbishop, whose wig gave him a reverend air of the last century, was peculiarly happy in replying to the usual compliments to their right reverend lordships, who all stood while he spoke in their name. The Bishop of Winchester, his younger brother, who wore his jewel as prelate of the order of the Garter, made a very fine appearance. The Bishop of Oxford also wore his decoration as chancellor of that order; and I observed that, on such occasions, he always wore it with the rosette face displayed, while, in divine service, over his Episcopal costume, the other face was exhibited; and very appropriately, as it consists of a pearl ground, with a simple cross, as in an armorial shield. A trifling fact! and yet where one is closely observing the peculiarities of a Church, thus intimately working in with all the civil and social institutions of a mighty empire, the man is a fool who would not be willing to note it. It is with a view to a just delineation of these workings, as they are, that I often refer to incidents, of little account in themselves. This dinner at the Mansion-house was especially noteworthy, as contrasted with the spirit of a civic banquet in our own great towns; and I must own, that if it be desirable that the genius of Christianity should interpenetrate, and transfuse all the forms of civilized life, the contrast is not in our favour.

The entertainment concluded at a comparatively early hour; and then I drove to another, at the residence of the estimable Miss Burdett Coutts, in Piccadilly. Here, among other celebrated men, in the most brilliant party I ever saw, I first met Lord Nelson; and yet again next morning, I met him, before breakfast, attending the daily service at Curzon chapel. The week passed delightfully, in frequent social festivities; and I cannot but particularize a pleasant breakfast party at Mr. Beresford Hope’s—and one of those admirably contrived ones, at Sir Robert Inglis’, in which everybody is so sure to meet with everybody and every thing that is agreeable. On another occasion, at his table, I sat next to Lord Glenelg, and ventured to engage him in conversation on the subject of the hymns of his brother, the late Sir Robert Grant, which are so prominent in our Church Collection, alike for their scholarly and refined taste, and their devotional fervor. He seemed pleased to learn of the value set upon them in America; and soon after, on returning to my lodgings, I found upon my table, as a present from his lordship, a beautiful copy of his brother’s poems, which I shall always highly value.

During the week, I went up to Eton—the place of places, which I had longed to see, and where I was now invited to visit an enthusiastic Etonian. This excursion involved, of course, a visit to Windsor, whose imperial towers so magnificently over-shadow the nest of the choicest progeny of England. Never did I receive such ideas of the moral grandeur of the British Constitution, as comprehending Church, State and Society, as, when, from the fields of Eton College, I surveyed the unparalleled abode of the British sovereign; and then, from the terrace of the castle, looked back upon that nursery of British youth; its studious halls, its venerable chapel, its ample fields for sport, and the crystal waters of the Thames, flowing between; fit emblem of joyous youth, passing on to the burthen of the world and the ocean of eternity.

When Gray looked from that terrace, over the same scene, and conceived his incomparable Ode, he said all that one ought to say, and I will attempt no more. One question, however, which he could only ask, it is reserved for us to answer.

Among the boys whom he then saw running and swimming, and driving hoop and playing cricket, in the old familiar scene, was he who afterwards conquered Napoleon. I saw the name of Wellesley, with those of Fox and others as celebrated, carved in the college oak. There, too, were the busts of Hammond and Pearson, and of Gray himself. The famous men of Eton seemed to be around me in legions. Who could not catch manliness and might amid such associations? All day I loitered about those meads, and towards evening went upon the Thames with a merry party, to see a juvenile boat race, in the Oxford fashion. Oh, the sport of those happy boys! One boat swamped, but the little fellows swam lustily to shore, and ran home laughing. It was the fragrant hay-time. Every prospect—every breeze was pleasing. As the boats hurried by, and those patrician lads pulled away at their oars, like day-labourers, I saw how the mind and muscles are alike developed at Eton. How can the body be feeble, that is reared with such lusty exercise: how can the mind but conceive high thoughts, that pursues its very sports with “those antique towers” on one hand, and that stupendous castle, lifting its gigantic bulk, and stretching its majestic walls, upon the other? The boys look upon the right, and there sages, patriots, heroes, priests and princes have been bred: they turn to the left, and there their Sovereign lives in august retirement; her imperial banner waves above the keep; and beneath that solemn chapel sleeps the Royal Martyr, and the dust of mighty kings, whose names are the material of history.

I made the usual circuit of the castle; but with the details which every guide-book furnishes, I would not fatigue my readers. For the mere show of royal furniture, my mind could find little room; and mere State-apartments, as such, were even a distasteful sight. But the noble architecture, and unrivalled site of the castle; its histories, and the charm which association gives to every tower and window, and to the whole scene with which it fills the eye—these are the sublime elements with which Windsor inspires the soul, and impregns the imagination. Hoc fecit Wykeham—is the inscription one catches, deep cut in the wall of one of the towers: an equivoque which the ambitious architect is said to have interpreted, as implying that the work was the making of him, when asked by his royal patron how he dared to claim the castle as a creation, and turn it into a memorial of himself. But who can appropriate Windsor? The humble poet, by a single song, has taken its terrace to himself; and every stone, and every timber, might bear some appropriate and speaking legend. I thought chiefly of Charles the First. How he loved this castle! How he would have adorned it, and what a home of worth and genius he would have made it, had he not fallen on evil times! That truly English heart beat warmly here, a few weeks before it ceased to beat forever; and along this esplanade was borne his bleeding body, (on which fell the symbolic snow of a passing cloud,) to its last sublime repose. “So went the white king to his rest,” says a quaint historian: and when, at Evening Prayer in St. George’s chapel, I reflected that his solemn relics were underneath, I felt a reviving affection for his memory, almost like that of personal love. The dying sunbeams gilded the carvings of the sanctuary and the banners of the knights; I sat in one of the stalls near the altar, and observed near me the motto—cœlum non animum mutant qui trans mare currunt. When at length the anthem swelled through the gorgeous chapel—Awake up my glory—I could not but respond, inwardly, that it was meet that the glory of God should be thus perpetually uplifted in the palace of a Sovereign, whom he has so magnified in the earth. And to which of her Sovereigns does England owe it, that she is not now either a cracked Commonwealth, without God and without government, or else an iron despotism, in the grasp of successful usurper? He who sleeps under that chapel said that he died “a martyr for the people:” and so he did. On the principle by which Macaulay attributes the liberties of England to her Cromwells, we might attribute salvation to Judas and Pontius Pilate.

In the twilight I returned to Eton, and went and mused in the chapel, after searching out the slab that covers Sir Henry Wotton. Then to one of the Dames’ houses, (a tasteful abode,) where several oppidans were domiciled, with whom I attended family prayers. These oppidans are the day-scholars of Eton: having no rooms in the college, and sharing none of its funds. They are the greater part of the Etonians, the sons of gentlemen and of the nobility, who, of course, do not require the scholarships. After a sweet sleep, interrupted by hearing the clock strike and the chimes playing at Windsor, I rose to another delightful day, and soon after breakfast attended the service in the chapel. Five hundred and fifty boys were here gathered as worshippers. The service was an hour long, it being the Anniversary of the Queen’s Accession. Yet, for the whole time, did those youths maintain the decorum of gentlemen, and worship with the fervor of Christians. This reverence in worship is said to have greatly increased during late years among the Eton boys, many of whom are communicants. It speaks well for their homes, as well as for their college. What promise for the future of the Empire!

In short, the boys of Eton seem to study well, to play well, to fare well, to sleep well, to pray well. It was a holiday, and I went into the grounds to see the cricket match: I visited the library, the boys’ rooms, and the halls. It is a literal fact, that they still revere their “Henry’s holy shade;” for pictures of “the meek usurper,” are to be found in almost every chamber. Last of all, I went to the river with an Etonian friend, stripped, and plunged in. I could not leave that spot without a swim; and accordingly, after a struggle with father Thames, I emerged, and soon after left Eton in a glow of genial warmth and lively enthusiasm. If “manners maketh man,” Eton cannot fail to be the nursery of great men, so long as it is true to itself and to the Church of God.

My next visit was to Hampton Court, for which I found a day quite insufficient, when reduced to the actual hours which one is permitted to devote to the survey of such a wilderness of natural and artificial charms, and to the enjoyment of their historical interest. In the grounds of the palace, and in Bushy Park, I found a formal grandeur, so entirely becoming a past age, and so unusual in this, that it impressed me with feelings of melancholy the most profound. Those avenues of chestnuts and thorns, those massive colonnades and dreamy vistas, wear a desolate and dreary aspect of by-gone glory, in view of which my spirits could not rise. They seemed only a fit haunt for airy echoes, repeating an eternal Where? Nothing later than the days of Queen Anne seems to belong to the spot. You pass from scenes in which you cannot but imagine Pope conceiving, for the first time, his “Rape of the Lock,” into a more trim and formal spot, where William of Orange seems likely to appear before you, with Bishop Burnet buzzing about him, and a Dutch guard following in the rear. Then again, James the Second, with the Pope’s nuncio at his elbow, and a coarse mistress flaunting at his side, might seem to promise an immediate apparition; when once more the scene changes, and the brutal Cromwell is the only character who can be imagined in the forlorn area, with a file of musketeers in the back-ground, descried through a shadowy archway. Here is a lordly chamber where the meditative Charles may be conceived as startled by the echo of their tread; and here another, where he embraces, for the last time, his beloved children. There, at last, is Wolsey’s Hall, and here one seems to behold old Blue-beard leading forth Anne Boleyn to a dance. It still retains its ancient appearance, and is hung with mouldering tapestry and faded banners, although its gilding and colors have been lately renewed. The ancient devices of the Tudors are seen here and there, in windows and tracery, and the cardinal’s hat of the proud churchman, who projected the splendors of the place, still survives, in glass, whose brittle beauty has thus proved less perishable than his worldly glory.

Yet let no one suppose the magnificence of Hampton Court to consist in its architecture. One half is the mere copy of St. James’s, and the other is the stupid novelty of Dutch William. The whole together, with its parks, and with its history, is what one feels and admires. I am not sure but Royal Jamie, with his Bishops and his Puritans on either side was as often before me, when traversing the pile, as anything else: and for him and his Conference the place seems fit enough, having something of Holyrood about it, and something Scholastic, or collegiate, also. Queen Victoria should give it to the Church, as a college for the poor, and so add dignity to her benevolence, which has already turned it into a show for the darling “lower classes.” I honour the Queen for this condescension to the people; and yet, as I followed troops of John Gilpins through the old apartments, and observed their inanimate stare, and booby admiration, it did strike me that a nobler and a larger benefit might be conferred upon them, in a less incongruous way. Perhaps the happiest thought would be to make it for the clergy just what Chelsea is to the army, and Greenwich to the naval service.

On my way to Winchester, I was led to stop for an hour at Basing-stoke, by an idle curiosity to behold a place in which some of my forefathers once resided. It gave me an opportunity of visiting the tomb of the elder Warton, close by the altar of the parish Church. From Winchester I went by post, in the twilight, over downs, and through dingles and dales, to Hursley, where I entered the Church, and found Mr. Keble and his curate celebrating Evening Prayers. I had brought with me, from Hampton Court, a feeling of overpowering depression, and having seen the admired poet in circumstances so fitting to his character as a Christian priest, I was about to turn away, and drive back to Winchester, when another impulse suddenly prevailed, and I ventured to present myself. I had a preconception of his piety and unworldliness, that affected me with awe, and embarrassed me, in approaching him; nor did anything in his cordiality divest him of something that restrained me in his presence. Nothing could be more simple and unaffected than his manner; and yet, in a word, it was as if George Herbert had risen from his grave, and were talking with me, in a familiar way. He would not hear of my departure, but instantly made me his guest; and thenceforth I was in a dream, from the time that I first saw him till I bade him farewell. Nothing could be more kind than his hospitality; nothing more delightful than the vision on which I opened my eyes, in the morning, and looked out on his Church, and the little hamlet contiguous. Hursley is a true poet’s home. It is as secluded as can well be imagined. England might ring with alarms, and Hursley would not hear it: and it seems all the more lonely, when one learns that Richard Cromwell retired hither, from a throne, and after waxing old in a quiet contentment, died here in peace, and now sleeps beneath the tower of the Church, just under the vicar’s windows, with all the cousinry of the Cromwells around him. A wise fool was Richard! But to think of a Cromwell lying still, in such a Church as Mr. Keble has made this of Hursley! It has been lately rebuilt, from the foundation, all but the tower, and its symbolism and decoration are very rich, though far from being overdone. The taste that has enshrined itself in “the Christian Year,” has here taken shape in stones. One of the windows, the gift of friends, is an epitome of that delightful work, and displays the chief festivals, beginning with the Circumcision. In the minute adornment of the corbels, my attention was called to a beautiful idea, which runs through the whole series, and which is said to furnish the hint for interpreting the ornaments of older churches. Entering the south porch, you observe the sculptured heads of the reigning sovereign and the present bishop of the See; and then, at the door, those of St. Helena, and St. Augustine of Canterbury. At the chancel arch are St. Peter and St. Paul; and over the altar, beneath the arch of the East window, are the figures of our Lord, and of His Virgin Mother. Thus, from the present, the mind is carried on to the past; and from pastors and rulers, through doctors and apostles, up to Christ. The north porch exhibits the heads of Ken and Andrewes, of Wykeham and Fox; while the corbels of the exterior arch of the east window, bear those of Ambrose and Athanasius. The tower of the Church is finished by a graceful spire, and the gilded cock surmounts the pile—