Travelling homeward on the return to London, it may be desirable to break the journey at Slough—eighteen miles from Paddington—whence may be conveniently visited the rustic village and cemetery of Stoke Pogis, about a mile and a half northward from the station. The latter contains the tomb of the poet Gray, and is the scene of his famous “Elegy in a Country Churchyard.” It may be remembered that from this well-known poem Mr. Micawber’s Quotation was taken, as an appropriate conclusion to one of his many friendly but grandiloquent epistles, confirming an important appointment. In “David Copperfield,” at the end of chapter 49, we read of Micawber’s expressed determination to unmask his “foxey” employer, and to crush “to undiscoverable atoms that transcendent and immortal hypocrite and perjurer, Heep”; and we may recall his “most secret and confidential letter,” soon afterwards received by David, as containing the following reference:—
“The duty done, and act of reparation performed, which can alone enable me to contemplate my fellow mortal, I shall be known no more. I shall simply require to be deposited in that place of universal resort, where
‘Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.’With the plain Inscription,
Wilkins Micawber.”
So, as the evening shades prevail, “near and nearer drawn” through “the glimmering landscape,” we again approach the lights of London Town, with (it may be hoped) pleasant reminiscences of the foregoing excursions. Should the Rambler, like Mr. John Harmon on a similar occasion, be accompanied by a friend, who perchance may be “nearer and dearer than all other,” he may appropriately endorse John Harmon’s reflections as he made the same journey under blissful circumstances (see “Our Mutual Friend,” book 3, end of chapter 9)—
“O, boofer lady, fascinating boofer lady! If I were but legally executor of Johnny’s will. If I had but the right to pay your legacy and take your receipt! Something to this purpose surely mingled with the blast of the train as it cleared the stations, all knowingly shutting up their green eyes and opening their red ones when they prepared to let the boofer lady pass.”
RAMBLE IX
By Great Eastern Route from London to Yarmouth
Liverpool Street Station—Epping Forest—Buckhurst Hill—Chigwell Village—Chigwell Churchyard; Resting-Place of Barnaby Rudge and his Mother—“Grip” the Raven—The “King’s Head Inn”—“The Maypole”—Mr. Cattermole’s Frontispiece—The Bar—The Landlord, John Willett—Dolly Varden—The Visit of the Varden Family—The Warren; Residence of Mr. Haredale and his Niece—By Main Line to Ipswich—The Great White Horse Hotel in Tavern Street—The Apartment of the Middle-Aged Lady—Mr. Pickwick’s Misadventure—St. Clement’s Church—Job Trotter—The Green Gate, Residence of G. Nupkins, Esq.—Mary the Pretty Housemaid—Sam Weller’s First Love—Ipswich to Great Yarmouth—Mr. Peggotty’s Boat-house—Home of Little Emily—The Two London Coaches—The “Angel Hotel”—David’s Dinner in the Coffee-Room—The Friendly Waiter—The “Star Hotel”—Headquarters of Copperfield and Steerforth—Miss Mowcher’s First Introduction—Unlocalised Sites—Blundeston—Blunderstone Rookery—Early Childhood of Copperfield—Somerleyton Park.
A pleasant drive from London to Chigwell is described in chapter 19 of “Barnaby Rudge,” and may be still taken about twelve miles by road, starting from Whitechapel Church viâ Mile-End and Bow, thence crossing the River Lea, and proceeding, in the county of Essex, by way of Stratford, Leytonstone, Snaresbrook, and Wilcox Green. But time will be saved by adopting a convenient train, leaving Liverpool Street Station (Great Eastern Railway) for Buckhurst Hill—on the Ongar Branch Line—in the neighbourhood of Epping Forest, a district formerly preserved by the old monarchs of Merrie England for the enjoyment of field sports and the pleasures of the chase.
From this point a country walk (under two miles), turning eastward, and to the left after crossing the long intervening bridge, will lead in due course to the main road at Chigwell. Coming into the village we pass, at the corner on the right, Chigwell Church, surrounded by its quiet churchyard. This locality will be remembered as having afforded a resting-place to Barnaby and his mother after their visit to Mr. Haredale at The Warren (chapter 25). “In the churchyard they sat down to take their frugal dinner”—Grip, the raven, being one of the party—“walking up and down when he had dined with an air of elderly complacency, which was strongly suggestive of his having his hands under his coat tails, and appearing to read the tombstones with a very critical taste.” On the other side of the main road, a very little way onward (left), stands the old King’s Head Inn, the original “local habitation,” if not “the name,” of the ancient hostelry so intimately associated with the central and domestic interests of the aforesaid historical novel, and known to us therein as The Maypole, “an old building with more gable ends than a lazy man would care to count on a sunny day; its windows, old diamond pane lattices; its floors sunken and uneven; its ceilings blackened by the hand of time, and heavy with massive beams; with its overhanging storeys, drowsy little panes of glass, and front bulging out and projecting over the pathway.”
This description is appropriate to the house as it stands at present, a fine old specimen of the timbered architecture of bygone centuries; but it may be remarked that The Illustration drawn by Cattermole, which forms the frontispiece in the recent editions of “Barnaby Rudge,” is altogether beside the mark; for the designer has furnished therein, an elaborate and ornate picture of the old inn which does not correspond with fact, but rather remains in evidence of the beauty and exuberance of his artistic imagination. Here, then, we may recall the visit of Mr. and Mrs. Varden, accompanied by their daughter, the charming Dolly, “the very pink and pattern of good looks, in a smart little cherry-coloured mantle, with a hood of the same drawn over her head, and, upon the top of that hood, a little straw hat, trimmed with cherry-coloured ribbons, and worn the merest trifle on one side—just enough, in short, to make it the wickedest and most provoking head-dress that ever malicious milliner devised.”