EPIGRAM SCRATCHED WITH A DIAMOND-RING ON A WINDOW-PANE BY DEAN SWIFT.
So ends this curious diary. This is the last time that Swift is known to have visited England, and it has always been assumed, from the lack of evidence of his again touching these shores, that he never did return. But he was mentally active until 1736, and it was not until 1745 that he died, in madness and old age. Meanwhile, there still exists indisputable evidence of his travelling along the Holyhead Road in 1730; for an old diamond-shaped pane of glass, formerly in a window of the “Four Crosses” Inn at Willoughby, and deeply tinged with a greenish hue, as much old glass commonly is, may be found in private possession at Rugby, inscribed by him with a diamond ring. The handwriting compares exactly with that of his diary and other manuscripts still extant, and the ferocity of the humour in the lines is characteristic of him. Other windows, at Chester and elsewhere, are known to have been inscribed by him with epigrams and satirical verses, but they do not appear to have survived. The occasion of his offering this advice to the landlord of what was then the “Three Crosses” has always been said to have been the landlady’s disregard of his importance. Anxious to set off early in the morning, he could by no means hurry the good woman over the preparation of his breakfast. She told him; “he must wait, like other people.” He waited, of necessity, but employed the time in this manner.
John Wesley was of this varied company of horsemen, and in a long series of years rode into every nook and corner of England. His “Journal,” abounding with details of his adventures on these occasions, proves him to have been a hard rider and among the most robust and enduring of travellers in that age. He rode incredible distances in the day, very frequently from sixty to seventy miles. Once, in 1738, he travelled in this way from London to Shipston-on-Stour, a distance of 82¾ miles, and ended the long day, as usual with him, in religious counsel. “About eight,” he says, “it being rainy and very dark, we lost our way, but before nine came into Shipston, having rode over, I know not how, a narrow footbridge which lay across a deep ditch near the town. After supper I read prayers to the people of the inn, and explained the Second Lesson; I hope not in vain.” The next day this indefatigable traveller and missioner rode 59 miles, to Birmingham, Hednesford, and Stafford; and the next a further 53 miles, to Manchester, feeling faint (and no wonder!) on the way, at Altrincham. In November 1745, riding from Newcastle-on-Tyne to Wednesbury, he did not experience many difficulties until he came, in the dark, to Wednesbury Town-end, where he and his companion stuck fast. That is indeed a bad road in which a horse sticks. However, people coming with candles, Wesley himself got out of the quagmire and went off to preach, while the horses were disengaged from their awkward position by local experts. The spot where Wesley was bogged is now a broad and firm macadamised road through Wednesbury, part of the great Holyhead Road. Eighteen years before this happening, an Act of Parliament had been passed for repairing and turnpiking the road between Wednesbury and Birmingham; but, although the turnpike gates may have been in existence, the road itself certainly does not seem to have been repaired, and must have remained in the condition described in the preamble to that Act, when it was “so ruinous and bad that in the winter season many parts thereof are impassable for waggons and carriages, and very dangerous for travellers.” At the same time, the road on the other side of Wednesbury was “in a ruinous condition, and in some places very narrow and incommodious”; so it is evident that Wednesbury was in the unenviable but by no means unique position of being islanded amid execrable and scarcely practicable roads.
In his old age Wesley occasionally made use of coaches and chaises, which were then a great deal better and more numerous than they had been forty years earlier, when he commenced his labours; but he did not give up the saddle until very near the last. In 1779, being then in his seventy-seventh year, he was still so active that on one day he rode from Worcester to Brecon, sixty miles, and preached on his arrival there. In 1782, when eighty, he still travelled, according to his own computation, four or five thousand miles a year, rose early, preached, and possessed the faculty of sleeping, night or day, whenever he desired to do so. When he began to travel he rose at the most astonishing hours—hours unknown even to the early-rising, hard-riding, hard-living travellers of that time. Let us look at his record for February 1746, along the Great North Road:—
“16th February.—I rose soon after three. I was wondering the day before at the mildness of the weather, such as seldom attends me in my journeys; but my wonder now ceased. The wind was turned full north, and blew so exceeding hard and keen that when we came (from London) to Hatfield neither my companions nor I had much use of our hands or feet. After resting an hour, we bore up again through the wind and snow, which drove full in our faces; but this was only a squall. In Baldock field the storm began in earnest; the large hail drove so vehemently in our faces that we could not see, nor hardly breathe; however, before two o’clock we reached Baldock, where one met and conducted us safe to Potton. About six I preached to a serious congregation.
“17th.—We set out as soon as it was well light; but it was hard work to get forward, for the frost would not well break or bear; and, the untracked snow covering all the roads, we had much ado to keep our horses on their feet. Meantime the wind rose higher and higher, till it was ready to overturn both man and beast. However, after a short bait at Bugden, we pushed on, and were met in the middle of an open field with so violent a storm of rain and hail as we had not had before; it drove through our coats, great and small, boots, and everything, and yet froze as it fell, even upon our eyebrows, so that we had scarce either strength or motion left when we came into our inn at Stilton.
“We now gave up our hopes of reaching Grantham, the snow falling faster and faster. However, we took the advantage of a fair blast to set out, and made the best of our way to Stamford Heath; but here a new difficulty arose from the snow lying in large drifts. Sometimes horse and man were a well nigh swallowed up, yet in less than an hour we were brought safe to Stamford. Being willing to get as far as we could, we made but a short stop here; and about sunset came, cold and weary, but well, to a little town called Brig Casterton.
“18th.—Our servant came up and said, ‘Sir, there is no travelling to-day; such a quantity of snow has fallen in the night that the roads are quite filled up.’ I told him, ‘At least we can walk twenty miles a day, with our horses in our hands.’ So in the name of God we set out. The north-east wind was piercing as a sword, and had driven the snow into such uneven heaps that the main road was not passable. However, we kept on on foot or on horseback, till we came to the White Lion at Grantham”—from whence Mr. Wesley continued his journey to Epworth, his birthplace, in Lincolnshire.
Wesley’s economy of time and his methods when riding are indicated in an interesting way in his observations on horsemanship:—