LACOCK.
All that remains of the old Jacobean house of Spye is a subterranean passage beneath the terrace; but the Tudor entrance gate to the picturesque park stands on the left-hand side of the road to Lacock just before the road begins its winding precipitous descent. Evelyn saw the house soon after it was built, and likened it to a long barn. The view is superb, but, strangely enough, not a single window looked out upon the prospect! After dining and a game of bowls with Sir Edward Baynton, the Diarist took coach; but, says Evelyn, "in the meantime our coachmen were made so exceeding drunk, that in returning home we escaped great dangers. This, it seems, was by order of the knight, that all gentlemen's servants be so treated; but the custom is barbarous and much unbecoming a knight, still less a Christian."
LACOCK.
A mile or so to the east of the entrance gate of Spye is Sandy Lane, a tiny hamlet with trim thatched cottages and a sturdy seventeenth-century hostelry, the "George," looking down the street; and farther along in the direction of Devizes stands the "Bell," another ancient roadside inn, which, judging from its mullioned windows, knobbed gables, and rustic porch, must date back to the days of the first Charles.
In Bromham village also there are some pretty half-timber buildings, not forgetting the "lock-up" by the churchyard. The exterior of the church is richly sculptured; a fine example of the purest Gothic.
Sleepy old Lacock, with its numerous overhanging gables, is a typical unspoiled village. It was once upon a time a town, but by all appearances it never can have been a flourishing one; and let us hope it will remain in its dormant state now that there is nothing out of harmony, for the Lacock of to-day must look very much as it did two hundred years or more ago. It consists mainly of two wide streets, with a fine old church at the end of one and a lofty seventeenth-century inn at the other. Opposite the latter is a monastic barn with blocked-up arched doorway, and facing it a fine row of timbered houses. Wherever you go the pervading tone is grey, and one misses the little front gardens with bright flowers and creepers. By the school stands the village cross. Farther along a great wide porch projects into the street, and over it a charming traceried wooden window. Nearer the church the road narrows, and a group of timber cottages make a pleasing picture, one of them with a wide entrance of carved oak spandrels above an earlier stone doorway. The church, a noble edifice, has a very graceful spire and some good tombs, including two wooden mural monuments to Edward Baynard who lived in Elizabeth's reign, and to Lady Ursula Baynard in the reign of Charles I.