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There is one walk in the island which no tolerable pedestrian should omit—that from Newport to Freshwater, or Alum Bay. Leaving the main road at Carisbrooke, a footpath leads upwards through fields richly cultivated and gay with wild flowers. The open down which forms the backbone of the island is soon reached. Keeping along the ridge the tourist will for some miles enjoy a scene almost unique in its beauty. The soft delicate curves and undulations which characterise the chalk downs, and which the unobservant traveller so often overlooks, may be seen in perfection. Nestling in many a sheltered nook are farm-houses, hamlets, and churches, embosomed in trees. Patches of fern, gorse, and heather diversify the landscape. And far below, on either side, is the sea—on the right hand the Solent, on the left the English Channel. After a while Freshwater comes into view, with its | line of cliffs rising sheer from the waves, and about half-a-mile inland the sheltered nook which has been made a classic spot as the home of the Poet Laureate. His description of it will be familiar to many readers.
"Where, far from smoke and noise of town,
I watch the twilight falling brown
All round a careless ordered garden.
Close to the ridge of a noble down.
You'll have no scandal while you dine,
But honest talk and wholesome wine,
And only hear the magpie gossip
Garrulous under a roof of pine.
For groves of pine on either hand,
To break the blast of winter, stand;
And further on, the hoary Channel
Tumbles a breaker on chalk and sand."
A couple of miles more and we reach Alum Bay and the Needles, spoken of on a preceding page.
