“‘I used to drive the “Tantivy,”—a day and night coach,—which afterwards ran only by day. We drove from Portsmouth to Farnborough station, then put the coach on the train, and drove into town from the terminus at Nine Elms.
“‘Of course I remember the old “Coach and Horses,” at Hilsea. It was afterwards burnt down. There was formerly a guard-house and picket at Hilsea Bridge, where the soldiers’ passes were examined. Hilsea Green we used to reckon the coldest spot between Portsmouth and London. Once some body-snatchers started from the “Green Posts,” at Hilsea, with the officers in full cry after them, but the rascals had a famous mare, “Peg Hollis” (oh! she was a good ’un to go!), and got clear off.
“‘Yes, I knew Lord Adolphus Fitzclarence well; he was a good friend to me. Many’s the time he has sat beside me on the box, and at the end of the stage slipped a crown-piece into my hand.’”
XXII
BY-WAYS
At the “Seven Thorns” Inn the three counties of Sussex, Surrey, and Hants are supposed to meet; but, like so many of the picturesque legends of county and parish boundaries that make one house stand in three or four parishes, this particular legend is altogether unfounded, for the three counties meet in a dell about two miles southward of the road, in Hammer Bottom, where once stood a lonely beer-house called the “Sussex Bell.”
We will not turn aside to visit the site of the “Sussex Bell,” or the remains of the Hammer Ponds that tell of the old iron-foundries and furnaces that were wont to make the surrounding hills resound and despoiled the dense woods of their noblest trees for the smelting of iron ore. We have no present business so far from the road in a place that has harboured no notorious evil-doer, nor has ever been the home of any distinguished man.
But we may well turn aside after passing Cold Ash Hill to explore a singular relic of monkish days that still exists, built into a comparatively modern farm-house and forgotten by the world.
Some three miles south of the road, reached by a turning below the “Seven Thorns” Inn, lies the little-visited village of Lynchmere, a rural parish, embowered in foliage and picturesquely situated amid hills; and in the immediate neighbourhood stand the remains of Shulbrede Priory, now chiefly incorporated with farm-buildings. The place is well worthy a visit, for the farm-house contains a room, called the Prior’s Room, still decorated with monkish frescoes of a singular kind. These probably date almost as far back as the foundation of this Priory of Augustinian Canons, in the time of Henry III., and are unfortunately very much defaced. But sufficient can be discerned for the grasping of the idea, which seems to be a representation of the Nativity. The design introduces the inscription:—Ecce virgo concipiet et pariet filium; et vocabitur nomen Jesus; while a number of birds and animals, rudely drawn and crudely coloured, appear, with Latin legends issuing from their mouths. Uppermost stands the cock, as in the act of crowing, while from his beak proceeds the announcement, “Christus natus est.” Next follows a duck, from whose bill issues another label, inscribed “Quando, quando?” a query answered appropriately by a raven, “In hac nocte.” “Ubi, ubi?” asks a cow of a lamb, which rejoins, bleating “In Bethlems.”