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As we sweep round the bend beneath the broad meadow and the wooded isle, "while we muse the fire burneth,"—the ardour of grateful love to Him who has shaped the destinies of our beloved land, and has never from that hour withdrawn the trust then committed to the nation, of being the guardians and pioneers of the world's freedom. A multitude of thoughts and questionings throng in upon us, but we must not lose the opportunity of impressing on our memory the outward features of the scene. There is not much to see: if there be time to land upon the island, it will be as well to do so, and enter the pretty modern cottage there erected, containing the very stone—if tradition is to be believed—on which the Charter was laid for the royal signature.

From Runnimede, it is but an easy climb to the brow of Cooper's Hill, with its far-famed view of the river, of Windsor, and its woods. Dr. Johnson speaks of Sir John Denham's poem, of which we have taken some lines as the motto to this chapter, as "the first English specimen of local poetry." Its subject, as well as its style, will preserve it from the oblivion to which the greater number of the poet's works have descended.

Another Coin falls into the river, to the left, a little farther on—suggestive, in its name, of the Roman occupation; the "street" to the west here crossing the Thames by a bridge. "London Stone," a few hundred yards lower down, marks the entrance into Middlesex; then clean and quiet Staines——"Stones," so termed, perhaps, from the piers of the old Roman bridge, or, it may be, from the London Stone itself, comes into view: but if the traveller has time to spare, he will rather pause at Laleham, so well known to every Christian educator as the earliest scene of Arnold's labours.

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"The first reception of the tidings of his election at Rugby," we are told by his biographer, "was overclouded with deep sorrow at leaving the scene of so much happiness. Years after he had left it, he still retained his early affection for it, and till he had purchased his house in Westmoreland, he entertained a lingering hope that he might return to it in his old age, when he should have retired from Rugby. Often he would revisit it, and delighted in renewing his acquaintance with all the families of the poor whom he had known during his residence; in showing to his children his former haunts; in looking once again on his favourite views of the great plain of Middlesex—the lonely walks along the quiet banks of the Thames—the retired garden with its 'Campus Martins,' and its 'wilderness of trees;' which lay behind the house, and which had been the scenes of so many sportive games and serious conversations." *