A ROOM IN THE OLD GRAMMAR SCHOOL, AT STRATFORD-UPON-AVON
I could never forget the emotion with which my mind was thrilled when first I took the drive from Warwick to Stratford (1877), and alighted at the old Red Horse Hotel. The day had been one of exceptional beauty. The long twilight had faded, and the stars were shining when that night, for the first time, I stood at the door of the birthplace of Shakespeare, and looked on its quaint casements and gables, its antique porch, and the massive timbers that cross its front. I conjure up the vision now, as I saw it then. I stand there for a long while, and feel that I shall remember these sights forever. Then, with lingering steps, I turn away, and, passing through a narrow, crooked lane, I walk in the High Street, and note at the end of the prospect the illuminated clock in a dark church-tower. A few chance-directed steps bring me to what was New Place once, where Shakespeare died, and there again I pause and long remain in meditation, gazing into the inclosed garden, where, under screens of wire, are fragments of mortar and stone. These—although I do not know it—are the remains of the foundations of Shakespeare’s house. The night wanes, but still I walk in Stratford streets, and by and by I am standing on the bridge that spans the Avon, and looking down at the thick-clustered stars reflected in the dark and silent stream. At last, under the roof of the Red Horse, I sink into a troubled slumber, from which soon a strain of celestial music, strong, sweet, jubilant, and splendid, awakens me in an instant, and I start up in bed,—to find that all around me is as still as death; and then, drowsily, far off, the bell strikes three, in that weird, grim, lonesome church-tower which I have just seen.
NEW PLACE GARDENS STRATFORD-UPON-AVON
Where Shakespeare’s house stood
THE RED HORSE HOTEL
Many times since that first night at Stratford I have rested in the old Red Horse, and nowhere, in a large experience of travel, have I found a more homelike abode. It is a storied dwelling, too; for it was an inn when Shakespeare lived. It is believed to have been known to those old poets Michael Drayton and Ben Jonson; Betterton is said to have lodged in it when he visited Stratford, to glean information about the great dramatist of whose chief characters his age esteemed him the supremely best interpreter; Garrick knew the house when he was in Stratford in 1769 to conduct the Shakespeare Jubilee; and in later years it has harbored scores of renowned persons from every part of the world. Washington Irving, revered as the father of American literature, was a lodger there in 1817, and wrote about it in his companionable “Sketch Book,” and the parlor that he then occupied has ever since borne his name and been embellished with picture and relic commemorative of his visit. The pilgrim loses much benefit and pleasure by carelessly speeding through the Shakespeare Country, as many excursionists do. It is far better to repose in the Red Horse, or some other cozy retreat, and spend many days in rambling about the neighborhood. To the lover of the works of Shakespeare the experience is one of the most profitable that life affords.
NEW PLACE, STRATFORD-UPON-AVON
The last residence of Shakespeare. Only the site now remains
