BUBBENHALL
stroll along the bank beside it, and “fleet the time carelessly,” as they did in that golden world.
Too soon we reach the beautiful sandstone bridge, tinted by time and curtained with creepers, that divides the deer park from the home park; and soon, beside an old oak, the size of Avon is almost doubled by junction with the Sowe, a stream that comes winding past Stoneleigh village on our right, and brings for tribute the impurities of Coventry. The banks beside us are open no longer; but for recompense we have the birds—the whir-r-r of wood-pigeons in the nigh willow copse, the heron sailing high, the kingfisher sparkling before us, the green woodpecker condensing a whole day’s brilliance on his one small breast, the wild-duck, the splashing moor-hen, and water-fowl of rarer kinds—that tell us we are nearing Stoneleigh Abbey.
The abbey was founded in 1154 by Henry II. for a body of Cistercian monks, and endowed with privileges “very many and very great, to wit, free warren, infangthef, outfangthef, wayfs, strays, goods of felons and fugitives, tumbrel, pillory, sok, sak, tole, team, amercements, murders, assize of bread and beer; with a market and fair in the town of Stoneleigh”—a comprehensive list, as it seems. There were, says Dugdale, in the manor of Stoneleigh, at this time, “sixty-eight villains and two priests; as also four bondmen or servants, whereof each held one messuage, and one quatrone of land, by the services of making the gallows and hanging of thieves; every one of which bondmen was to wear a red clout betwixt his shoulders, upon his upper garment.” The original building was burnt in 1245, and what little old work now remains belongs to a later building. The abbey went the way of its fellows under Henry VIII.; was granted to Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk; changed hands once or twice; and was finally bought by Sir Thomas Leigh, alderman of London, in Queen Elizabeth’s reign. The present Ionic mansion, now the home of Lord Leigh, his descendant, was built towards the close of the last century. The river spreads into a lake before it, and then, after passing a weir, speeds briskly below a wooded bank, with tiny rapids, down which our canoe dances gayly. As twilight overtakes us we reach Ashow.
STONELEIGH ABBEY, OCT. 15, 1884
A little weather-stained church stands by Ashow shore—a church, a yew-tree, and a narrow graveyard. Close under it steals the gray river, whispers by cottage steps where a crazy punt lies rotting, by dim willow aits and eel bucks, and so passes down to silence and the mists. Seeing all
