Chapter Eight.
Leamington and Warwick—A Lovely Drive—A Bit of Black Country—Ashby-de-la-Zouch.
”... Evening yields
The world to-night...
... A faint erroneous ray,
Glanced from th’ imperfect surfaces of things,
Flings half an image on the straining eye;
While wavering woods, and villages and streams,
And rocks and mountain-tops, that long retained
Th’ ascending gleam, are all one swimming scene,
Uncertain if beheld.”
Strange that for twelve long miles, ’twixt Warmington and the second milestone from Warwick, we never met a soul, unless rooks and rabbits have souls. We were in the woods in the wilds, among ferns and flowers.
When houses hove in sight at last, signs of civilisation began to appear. We met a man, then a swarm of boarding-school girls botanising, and we knew a city would soon be in sight. At Leamington, the livery stables to which we had been recommended proved too small as to yard accommodation, so we drove back and put up at the Regent Hotel. But there is too much civilisation for us here. Great towns were never meant for great caravans and gipsy-folk. We feel like a ship in harbour.
Rain, rain, rain! We all got wet to the skin, but are none the worse.
The old ostler at the Regent is a bit of a character, had been on the road driving four-in-hands for many a year. He was kindly-loquacious, yes, and kindly-musical as well, for he treated me to several performances on the coach-horn, which certainly did him great credit. He was full of information and anecdotes of the good old times, “when four-in-hands were four-in-hands, sir, and gentlemen were gentlemen.” He told us also about the road through Kenilworth to Coventry. It was the prettiest drive, he said, in all England.
Beautiful and all though Leamington be, we were not sorry to leave it and make once more for the cool green country.