WINCHESTER.
CARDINAL BEAUFORT'S GATE AND ANCIENT BREWERY.
About sixteen miles south-west of Selborne is the chief city of Hampshire and one of the great historical cities of the realm—Winchester—built on the side of a chalk-hill rising from the valley of the Itchen, a stream that was Izaak Walton's favorite fishing-ground. This was the Roman Venta Belgarum, and was made an episcopal see in the seventh century. Nothing remains of the earlier cathedral, which was replaced by the present structure, begun in the eleventh century, but not finished until the fifteenth. Winchester Cathedral is five hundred and sixty feet long, and its nave is in the highest degree impressive, being the longest in England, extending two hundred and sixty-five feet. The western front has recently been restored. Within the cathedral are many noted tombs, including that of William Rufus, and above the altar is West's painting of the "Raising of Lazarus." In the presbytery are six mortuary chests containing the remains of kings and bishops of the ancient Saxon kingdom of Wessex. St. Swithin's shrine was the treasure of Winchester: he was bishop in the ninth century and the especial patron of the city and cathedral. Originally interred in the churchyard, his remains were removed to the golden shrine given by King Edgar, though tradition says this was delayed by forty days of rain, which is the foundation of the popular belief in the continuance of wet weather after St. Swithin's Day, July 15. In the Lady Chapel, Queen Mary was married to Philip of Spain in 1554, and the chair on which she sat is still preserved there. The cathedral close is extremely picturesque, surrounded by houses of considerable antiquity. Among the prelates of Winchester were William of Wykeham and Cardinal Beaufort: the former founded St. Mary's College there in the fourteenth century—a fine structure, with the picturesque ruins of the old palace of the bishops, Wolvesey Castle, near by; the latter, in the fifteenth century, built Cardinal Beaufort's Tower and Gateway in the southern suburbs, on the Southampton road, when he revived the foundation of St. Cross. This noble gateway, when approached from the city, is seen through the foliage, with a background of quaint high chimneys, church, and green leaves. The river Itchen flows alongside the road, half hidden among the trees. The St. Cross Hospital, with the thirteen brethren still living there in their black gowns and silver crosses, gives a vivid picture of ancient England. Adjoining the gateway on the left hand is the brewery, formerly known as the "Hundred Men's Hall," because a hundred of the poorest men in Winchester were daily entertained there at dinner, and, as the repast was provided on a bountiful scale, the guests always had ample provisions to carry home to their families. The tower and surrounding buildings are excellent examples of the domestic architecture of the fifteenth century. In this hospital the custom still prevails of giving the wayfarer a horn of ale and dole of bread, the ale being brewed on the premises and of the same kind made there centuries ago. The old West Gate of Winchester, the only survivor of the city's four gates, is a well-preserved specimen of the military architecture of the time of Henry III. Winchester Castle was originally built by William the Norman, and continued a residence of the kings until Henry III., but of it little remains beyond the hall and some subterranean fragments. Here hangs on the wall what is said to be the top of King Arthur's round table. There is a beautiful cross in Winchester, recently restored, and originally erected on the High Street by Cardinal Beaufort, who seems to have spent much of his vast and ill-gotten wealth in splendid architectural works. Shakespeare introduces him in Henry VI., and in the scene that closes his career truthfully depicts him:
"If thou be'st death, I'll give thee England's treasure,
Enough to purchase such another island.
So thou wilt let me live and feel no pain."
THE NEW FOREST.
The Itchen flows into the estuary of Southampton Water, and from its western shores spreads far away the domain of the New Forest, stretching down into the south-western part of Hampshire. This is a remnant of the forests that once covered the greater part of the island, and is the most extensive left in the English lowlands. It was made a royal forest by William the Norman, and thus continues to the present time, the largest tract of uncultivated land and one of the finest examples of woodland scenery in the kingdom. It covers almost the whole surface between Southampton Water and the Avon, which is the western border of Hampshire, but in recent years its area has been gradually curtailed, though its extent has never been accurately measured. Stretching about fifteen miles from east to west and twenty miles from north-west to south-east, it includes about ninety-one thousand acres, of which twenty-six thousand belong to private landowners, two thousand are the absolute property of the Crown, and the remaining sixty-three thousand acres have common and other rights due to a large number of tenants, though the title is in the Crown. About twenty-five thousand acres are covered with timber, but only five thousand acres of this is old timber, the remainder having been planted with trees within the last two hundred years. The surface is gently undulating, becoming hilly in the northern parts; the soil is usually arid, and the scenery discloses wide expanses of heathery moor, often marshy in the lower grounds, with here and there copses that gradually thicken into woodland as the true forest district is approached. The chief trees are oak and beech, which attain to noble proportions, while there are occasional tufts of holly and undergrowth.
