From Nottingham I made an afternoon walk to Mansfield. The weather was splendid and the country in all the glory of harvest. On reaching Newstead Abbey, I found, to my regret, that the entree to the public had been closed by the new proprietor, one, I was told, of the manufacturing gentry of the Manchester school. Not that he was less liberal and accommodating to sight-seers than his predecessors, but because he was making very extensive and costly improvements in the buildings and grounds. I have seen nothing yet in England to compare, for ornate carving, with the new gate-way he is making to the park. It is of the finest kind of arabesque work done in stone that much resembles the Caen. This prevention barred me from even a distant view of the once famous residence of Lord Byron, as it could not be seen from the public road.
Within about three miles of Mansfield, I came to a turnpike gate,—a neat, cozy, comfortable cottage, got up in the Gothic order. I stopped to rest a moment, and noticing the good woman setting her tea-table, I invited myself to a seat at it, on the inn basis, and had a pleasant meal and chat with her and an under-gamekeeper of the Duke of Portland, who had come in a little before me. The stories he told me about the extent of the Duke’s possessions were marvellous, more especially in reference to his game preserves. I should think there must be a larger number of hares, rabbits and partridges on his estate than in the whole of New England. As I sat engaged in conversation with the woman of the house and this accidental guest, an unmistakable American face met my eyes, as I raised them to the opposite wall. It was the familiar face of a Bristol clock, made in the Connecticut village adjoining the one in which I was born. It wore the same honest expression, which a great many ill-natured people, especially in our Southern States, have regarded as covering a dishonest and untruthful mind, or a bad memory of the hours. Still it is the most ubiquitous Americanism in the world, and it is pleasant to see its face in so many cottages of laboring men from Land’s End to John O’Groat’s.
Mansfield is a very substantial and venerable town, bearing a name which one distinguished man has rendered illustrious by wearing it through a brilliant life. It is situated near the celebrated Sherwood Forest, and is marked by many features of peculiar interest. One of its noticeable celebrities is the house in which Lord Chesterfield resided. It is now occupied by a Wesleyan minister, who elaborates his sermons in the very room, I believe, in which that fashionable nobleman penned his polite literature for youthful candidates for the uppermost circles of society. In the centre of the market place there is a magnificent monument erected to the memory of the late Lord George Bentinck, who was held in high esteem by the people of the town and vicinity. The manufactures are pretty much the same as in Nottingham. They turn out a great production of raw material in red sandstone, very much resembling our Portland, quite as fine, hard and durable. Immense blocks of it are quarried and conveyed to London and to all parts of the kingdom. The town also supplies a vast amount of moulding sand, of nearly the same color and consistency as that we procure from Albany. I stopped on my way into the town to take a turn through the cemetery, which was very beautifully laid out, and looked like a great garden lawn belted with shrubbery, and illuminated with the variegated lamps of flowers of every hue and breath. The meandering walks were all laid with asphalte, which presented a new and striking contrast to the gorgeous borders and the vivid green of the cleanly shaven grass. Many of the little graves were made in nests of geraniums and other modest and sweet-eyed stars of hope.
Next day I had a very enjoyable walk in a north-westerly direction to Chesterfield. On the way, called in at a blacksmith’s shop, and had a long talk with the smith-in-chief on matters connected with his trade. The “custom-work” of such shops in country villages in England is like that in ours fifty years ago—embracing the greatest variety of jobs. Articles now made with us in large manufacturing establishments at a price which would starve a master and his apprentice to compete with, are hammered out in these English shops on a single anvil. On comparing notes with this knight of the hammer, I learned a fact I had not known before. His price for horse-shoeing varied according to the size of the hoof, just as our leather-shoemakers charge according to the foot. On taking leave of him he intimated, in the most frank and natural way in the world, that, in our exchange of information, the balance was in his favor, and that I could not but think it fair to pay him the difference. I looked at him first inquiringly and doubtingly, embarrassed with the idea that I had not understood him, or that he was a journeyman and not the master of the establishment. But he was as free and easy and natural as possible. An American tobacco-chewer, of fifty years’ standing, would not have asked a cut from a neighbor’s “lady’s twist,” or “pig-tail” in more perfect good faith. That good, round, English face would have blushed crimson if the man suspected that I misunderstood him. Nay, more, he would quite likely have thrown the pennies at my head if I had offered them to him to buy bread or bacon with for himself and family. I had no reason for a moment’s doubt. It all meant beer, “only that and nothing more;” a mere pour boire souvenir to celebrate our mutual acquaintance. So I gave him a couple of pennies, just as I would have given him a bite of tobacco if we had both been in that line. I feared to give him more, lest he might think I meant bread and bacon and thought him a beggar. But I ventured to tell him, however, that I did not use that beverage myself, and hoped he would wish me health in some better enjoyment.
I saw, for the first time, a number of Spanish cattle feeding in a pasture. They were large, variously colored animals with the widely-branching horns that distinguish them. A man must have a long range of buildings to stable a score of creatures with such horns, and for that reason they will only be kept as curiosities in these northern latitudes. And they are curiosities of animal life, heightened to a wonderment when placed side by side with the black Galloways, or those British breeds of cattle which have no horns at all. I should not wonder, however, if this large, cream-colored stock from Spain should be introduced here to cross with the Durhams, Devons, and Herefords.
When about half-way from Mansfield to Chesterfield, a remarkable change came over the face of the landscape. The mosaic work of the hill-sides and valleys showed more green squares than before. Three-fourths of the fields were meadow or pasture, or in mangel or turnips. There was but one here and there in wheat or other grain. The road beneath and the sky above began to blacken, and the chimneys of coal-pits to thicken. Sooty-faced men, horses and donkeys passed with loaded carts; and all the premonitory aspects of the “black country” multiplied as I proceeded. I do not recollect ever seeing a landscape change so suddenly in England.
Chesterfield is an intelligent looking town, evidently growing in population and prosperity. It has its own unique speciality; almost as strikingly distinctive as that of Strasburg or Pisa. This is the most ambiguous and mysterious church spire in the world. It would be very difficult to convey any idea of it by any description from an unaided pen; and there is nothing extant that would avail as an illustration. The church is very old and large, and stands upon a commanding eminence. The massive tower supports a tall but suddenly tapering spire of the most puzzling construction to the eye. It must have been designed by a monk of the olden time, with a Chinese turn of ingenuity. There is no order known to architecture to furnish a term or likeness for it. A ridgy, spiral spire are the three most descriptive words, but these are not half enough for stating the shape, style and posture of this strange steeple. It is difficult even to assist the imagination to form an idea of it. I will essay a few words in that direction. Suppose, then, a plain spire, 100 feet high, in the form of an attenuated cone, planted upon a heavy church tower. Now, in imagination, plough this cone all around into deep ridges from top to bottom. Then mount to the top, and, with a great iron wrench, give it an even twist clear down to the base, so that each ridge shall wind entirely around the spire between the bottom and the top. Then, in giving it this screw-looking twist, bend over the top, with a gentle incline all the way down, so that it shall be “out of perpendicular” by about three feet. Then come down and look at your work, and you will be astonished at it, standing far or near. The tall, ridgy, curved, conical screw puzzles you with all sorts of optical illusions. As the eyes in a front-face portrait follow you around the room in which it is hung, so this strange spire seems to lean over upon you at every point, as you walk round the church. Indeed, I believe it was only found out several centuries after its erection, that it absolutely leaned more in one direction than another. It is a remarkable sight from the railway as you approach the town from a distance. If it may be said reverently, the church, standing on comparatively a hill, not only lifts its horn on high, but one like that of a rhinoceros, considerably curved. Just outside the town stands the house in which George Stephenson lived his last days, and ended his great life of benefaction to mankind; leaving upon that haloed spot a biograph which the ages of time to come shall not wash out.
From Chesterfield I diverged westward to see Chatsworth and Haddon Hall. Whoever makes this walk or ride, let him be sure to stop at Watch Hill on the way, and look at the view eastward. It is grander than that of Belvoir Vale, if not so beautiful.
It was a pleasure quite equal to my anticipation to visit Chatsworth for the first time, after a sojourn in England, off and on, for sixteen years. It is the lion number three, according to the American ranking of the historical edifices and localities of England. Stratford-upon-Avon, Westminster Abbey and Chatsworth are the three representative celebrities which our travellers think they must visit, if they would see the life of England’s ages from the best stand-points. And this is the order in which they rank them. Chatsworth and Haddon Hall should be seen the same day if possible; so that you may carry the impressions of the one fresh and active into the other. They are the two most representative buildings in the kingdom. Haddon is old English feudalism edificed. It represents the rough grandeur, hospitality, wassail and rude romance of the English nobility five hundred years ago. It was all in its glory about the time when Thomas-a-Becket the Magnificent used to entertain great companies of belted knights of the realm in a manner that exceeded regal munificence in those days,—even directing fresh straw to be laid for them on his ample mansion floor, that they might not soil the bravery of their dresses when they bunked down for the night. The building is brimful of the character and history of that period. Indeed, there are no two milestones of English history so near together, and yet measuring such a space of the nation’s life and manners between them, as this hall and that of Chatsworth. It was built, of course, in the bow-and-arrow times, when the sun had to use the same missiles in shooting its barbed rays into the narrow apertures of old castles—or the stone coffins of fear-hunted knights and ladies, as they might be called. What a monument this to the dispositions and habits of the world, outside and inside, of that early time! Here is the porter’s or warder’s lodge just inside the huge gate. To think of a living being with a human soul in him burrowing in such a place!—a big, black sarcophagus without a lid to it, set deep in the solid wall. Then there is the chapel. Compare it with that of Chatsworth, and you may count almost on your fingers the centuries that have intervened between them. It was new-roofed soon after the discovery of America, and perhaps done up to some show of decency and comfort. But how small and rude the pulpit and pews—looking like rough-boarded potato-bins! Here is the great banquet-hall, full to overflowing with the tracks and cross-tracks of that wild, strange life of old. There is a fire-place for you, and a mark in the chimney-back of five hundred Christmas logs. Doubtless this great stone pavement of a floor was carpeted with straw at these banquets, after the illustrious Becket’s pattern. Here is a memento of the feast hanging up at the top of the kitchenward door;—a pair of roughly-forged, rusty handcuffs amalgamated into one pair of jaws, like a musk-rat trap. What was the use of that thing, conductor? “That, sir, they put the ’ands in of them as shirked and didn’t drink up all the wine as was poured into their cups, and there they made them stand on tiptoe up against that door, sir, before all the company, sir, until they was ashamed of theirselves.” Descend into the kitchen, all scarred with the tremendous cookery of ages. Here they roasted bullocks whole, and just back in that dark vault with a slit or two in it for the light, they killed and dressed them. There are the relics of the shambles. And here is the great form on which they cut them up into manageable pieces. It would do you good, you Young America, to see that form, and the cross-gashes of the meat-axe in it. It is the half of a gigantic English oak, which was growing in Julius Caesar’s time, sawed through lengthwise, making a top surface several feet wide, black and smooth as ebony. Some of the bark still clings to the under side. The dancing hall is the great room of the building. All that the taste, art and wealth of that day could do, was done to make it a splendid apartment, and it would pass muster still as a comfortable and respectable salon. As we pass out, you may decipher the short prayer cut in the wasting stone of a side portal, “GOD SAVE THE VERNONS!” I hope this prayer has been favorably answered; for history records much virtue in the family, mingled with some romantic escapades, which have contributed, I believe, to the entertainment of many novel readers.
Just what Haddon Hall was to the baronial life and society of England five hundred years ago, is Chatsworth to the full stature of modern civilization and aristocratic wealth, taste and position. Of this it is probably the best measure and representative in the kingdom; and as such it possesses a special value and interest to the world at large. Were it not for here and there such an establishment, we should lack waymarks in the progress of the arts, sciences and tastes of advancing civilization. Governments and joint-stock companies may erect and fill, with a world of utilities and curiosities of ancient and modern times, British Museums, National Galleries, Crystal Palaces and Polytechnic Institutions; but not one of these, nor the Louvre, nor Versailles, nor the Tuileries can compete with one private mind, taste and will concentrated upon one great work for a lifetime, when endowed with the requisite perceptions and means competent to carry that work to the highest perfection of science, genius and art. Museums, galleries and public institutions of art are exclusively visiting places. The elegancies of home life are all shut out of their attractions. You see in them the work and presence of a committee, or corporation, often in discrepant layers of taste and plan. One mind does not stand out or above the whole, fashioning the tout-ensemble to the symmetrical lines of one governing, all-pervading and shaping thought. You see no exquisite artistry of drawing-room or boudoir elegance and luxury running through living apartments of home, out into the conservatories, lawns, gardens, park and all its surroundings and embellishments, making the whole like a great illuminated volume of family life, which you may peruse page by page, and trace the same pen and the same story from beginning to end. Even the grandest royal residences lack, in this quality, what you will find at Chatsworth. They all show the sharp-edged strata of unaffiliated tastes and styles of different ages and artists. They lack the oneness of a single individuality, of one great symmetrical conception.