Nothing can be done until the municipal Corporation obtains the powers now vested in several sets of virtually irresponsible Commissioners. When these wars of the Pots and Kettles are ended, the ratepayers will be able to turn their undivided attention to local reforms without having their minds distracted by those little legal squabbles, under cover of which business is neglected, and pockets are picked. It is to be hoped that the session of 1851 will settle this point.
The whole kingdom is interested in the good government and prosperity of its greatest inland town. [{113}]
WARWICK, LEAMINGTON, KENILWORTH, STRATFORD ON AVON.
Before leaving Birmingham, it will be convenient to say something about Warwick, Leamington, Kenilworth, and Stratford on Avon, of which the one is the assize town, another the watering place, and the third and fourth the antiquarian or rather romantic lions of the county in which Birmingham stands first, for wealth, population, manufacturing, and political importance. Warwick, in spite of its parliamentary, municipal, and assize honours, would soon be as much forgotten as a hundred other dull little country towns, without local trade or local attractions, if it were not for the castle, the church, and the river, which, in connection with striking epochs in England’s history, will ever render it a favourite pilgrimage.
After being destroyed by the Danes, Warwick was restored by Ethelfreda, the daughter of Alfred the Great, who built a fort there, A.D. 913. At Domesday Survey it was a borough, and contained 261 houses, of which 126 belonged to the king. Members were sent to Parliament in the time of Edward I., when also the paving of the town and the erection of a wall round it were commenced. In the time of Philip and Mary, the first charter of incorporation was granted.
The town stands on the west side of the river Avon,—Shakspeare’s Avon, from which it is separated by Warwick Castle and grounds. It was formerly a little county metropolis, many of the families of rank and fortune had winter residences there; the Warwick balls were frequented by a select and exclusive set; a small theatre was well supported, and few races assembled more distinguished company than used to throng the Warwick course once a year, in family coaches and four-in-hands. All this grandeur has departed, Leamington has absorbed the wealth and fashion of Warwick, the town mansions have fallen into plebeian hands, the theatre has ceased to be a training school for the London boards, the streets are silent except when a little temporary bustle is produced by an influx of Birmingham attorneys, their clients, and witnesses, at the assizes, of stout agriculturists and holiday labourers on “fair days,” or the annual “mop,” when an ox is roasted whole, and lads and lasses of rosy rural breed range themselves along the pavement to be hired, or at the races twice a year, when, although the four horses with postilions and outriders are seldom seen, railroads from a distance, and Leamington from close at hand, pour a variegated stream of sightseers and gamblers on one of the prettiest pieces of ground in England.
Warwick has no manufactures, but, being a borough very evenly balanced between the two contending political parties, its inhabitants have enjoyed a fuller share of the favours of Government than has fallen to the lot of towns of more commercial importance.
Warwick stands on solid rock, in which the cellars are excavated; and this circumstance, added to its position on the top of a hill, renders it particularly dry and clean.
There are several excellent inns, supported by the surrounding’ farmers, which are much to be preferred to more fashionable hotels. The roast geese to be found at the farmers’ ordinaries on market days about Michaelmas time, are worthy of commendation; and the farmers themselves, being of a jovial and hospitable turn of mind, render these dinners pleasanter to a stranger who can dine at an unfashionable hour, than the eternal “anything you please, sir; steak or chop, sir,” in a solitary box, which haunts us for our sins in the coffee-rooms of English hotels.
Warwick deserves a long journey, if it were only for the sake of the fine woodland scenery which surrounds it for ten miles, but the castle is the especial object of attraction,—a castle which realizes almost more than any other those romantic ideas of a feudal abode which were first put into circulation by the “Castle of Otranto,” and became part of the education of our youth under the influence of the genius of Sir Walter Scott.