Shakespeare's England (1895) (14761038194)

Identifier: shakespearesengl00wint (find matches)
Title: Shakespeare's England
Year: 1895 (1890s)
Authors: Winter, William, 1836-1917
Subjects: England -- Description and travel
Publisher: New York : Macmillan
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN



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ctor. Their renown hasmanaged to survive those terrific shafts; but at leastthis was a falcon who flew at eagles. Here the poetCampbell was married, — October 11, 1803. Such oldchurches as this — guarding so well their treasures ofhistory — are, in a special sense, the travellers bless-ings. At St. Giless, Cripplegate, the janitor is awoman; and she will point out to you the lettered stonethat formerly marked the grave of Milton. It is in thenave, but it has been moved to a place about twelvefeet from its original position, — the remains of the illus-trious poet being, in fact, beneath the floor of a pew, onthe left of the central aisle, about the middle of thechurch: albeit there is a story, possibly true, that, onan occasion when this church was repaired, in August,1790, the coflin of Milton suffered profanation, and hisbones were dispersed. Among the monuments hard byis a fine marble bust of Milton, placed against the wall,and it is said, by way of enhancing its value, that
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XIV OLD CHURCHES OF LONDON 181 George the Third came here to see it. Several of theneighbouring inscriptions are of astonishing quaintness.The adjacent churchyard — an eccentric, sequestered,lonesome bit of grassy ground, teeming with monuments,and hemmed in with houses, terminates, at one end, ina piece of the old Roman wall of London (a.d. 306), —an adamantine structure of cemented flints — which haslasted from the days of Constantine, and which bids fair tolast forever. I shall always remember that strange nookwith the golden light of a summer morning shining uponit, the birds twittering among its graves, and all aroundit such an atmosphere of solitude and rest as made itseem, though in the heart of the great city, a thousandmiles from any haunt of man. (It was formally openedas a garden for public recreation on July 8, 1891.) St. Helens, Bishopsgate, an ancient and venerabletemple, the church of the priory of the nuns of St.Helen, built in the thirteenth century, is full of