31 chapters
14 hour read
Selected Chapters
31 chapters
Preface.
Preface.
I need, I believe, do little more herein, than state that the following pages were written on the road, on the coupé of my caravan, and from day to day. First impressions, it must be admitted, are not always infallible, but they are ever fresh. I have written from my heart, as I saw and thought; and I shall consider myself most fortunate and happy if I succeed in making the reader think in a measure as I thought, and feel as I felt. It is but right to state that many of the chapters have appeare
4 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter One.
Chapter One.
It is, however, my impression at the present moment that the kind of life I trust to lead for many months to come, might be followed by hundreds who are fond of a quiet and somewhat romantic existence, and especially by those whose health requires bracing up, having sunk below par from overwork, overworry, or over much pleasure-seeking, in the reckless way it is the fashion to seek it. Only as yet I can say nothing from actual experience. I have to go on, the reader has to read on, ere the riddl
15 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Two.
Chapter Two.
This was good advice. So I got a few sheets of foolscap and made a few rough sketches, and thought and planned for a night or two, and thus the Wanderer came into existence—on paper. Now that the caravan is built and fitted she is so generally admired by friends and visitors, that I may be forgiven for believing that a short description of her may prove not uninteresting to the general reader. Let us walk round her first and foremost and view the exterior. A glance will show you (see illustratio
28 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Three.
Chapter Three.
The morning was very bright and sunny, the road hard and good, but dusty. This latter was certainly a derivative from our pleasure, but then gipsies do not have it all their own way in this world any more than other people. The wind was with us, and was somewhat uncertain, both in force and direction, veering a little every now and then, and soon coming round again. But a select assortment of juvenile whirlwinds had been let loose from their cave, and these did not add to our delight. Matilda ha
25 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Four.
Chapter Four.
Twyford the Great is not a large place, its population is barely a thousand; there is a new town and an old. The new town is like all mushroom villages within a hundred miles of the city—a mere tasteless conglomeration of bricks and mortar, with only two pretty houses in it. But old Twyford is quaint and pretty from end to end—from the lofty poplars that bound my orchard out Ruscombe way, to the drowsy and romantic old mill on the Loddon. This last is worth a visit; only, if you lean over the br
22 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Five.
Chapter Five.
The town of Reading is too well-known to need description; its abbey ruins are, however, the best part of it, to my way of thinking. The day was as fine as day could be, the sky overcast with grey clouds that moderated the sun’s heat. Our chosen route lay past Calcot Park, with its splendid trees, its fine old solid-looking, redbrick mansion, and park of deer. This field of deer, I remember, broke loose one winter. It scattered in all directions; some of the poor creatures made for the town, and
17 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Six.
Chapter Six.
They are good in the feet, too, and good “doers,” to use stable phraseology. Corn-flower is the best “doer,” however. The rascal eats all day, and would deprive himself of sleep to eat. Nothing comes wrong to Corn-flower. Even when harnessed he will have a pull at anything within reach of his neck. If a clovery lea be beneath his feet, so much the better; if not, a “rive” at a blackthorn hedge, a bush of laurels, a bracken bank, or even a thistle, will please him. I’m not sure, indeed, that he w
25 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Seven.
Chapter Seven.
Left about nine o’clock on June 19th. It had been raining just enough to lay the dust and give a brighter colouring to the foliage. Ivy leaves, when young, are, as my country readers know, of a very bright green. There are on a well-kept lawn by the riverside, and just outside Pangbourne, a coach-house and a boathouse. Both are well-built and prettily shaped. They are thatched, and the walls are completely covered in close-cropped ivy, giving them the look of houses built of green leaves. Two mi
28 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Eight.
Chapter Eight.
The horses were fresh this morning, even as the morning itself was fresh and clear. We passed through bush-clad banks, where furze and yellow-tasselled broom were growing, and trees in abundance. Before we knew where we were we had trotted into Kenilworth. We stabled here and dined, and waited long enough to have a peep at the castle. This grand old pile is historical; no need, therefore, for me to say a word about it. After rounding the corner in our exit from Kenilworth, and standing straight
23 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Nine.
Chapter Nine.
It was kindly, and I couldn’t refuse the gift, though gooseberry pies form no part of the Wanderer’s menu . Ten o’clock pm.—The full moon has just risen over the dark oak woods; a strangely white dense fog has filled all the hollows—a fog you can almost stretch out your hands and touch. The knolls in the fields all appear over it, looking like little islands in the midst of an inland sea. The corncrake is sounding his rattle in the hayfields—a veritable voice of the night is he—and not another s
18 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Ten.
Chapter Ten.
At the little cosy town of Askern, with its capital hotels and civilised-looking lodging-houses, on stopping to shop, we were surprised at being surrounded by hosts of white-haired cripples—well, say lame people, for every one had a staff or a crutch. But I soon found out that Askern is a watering-place, a kind of a second-class Harrogate, and these people with the locks of snow had come to bathe and drink the waters; they are sulphureous. There is here a little lake, with a promenade and toy st
16 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Eleven.
Chapter Eleven.
Do not imagine that I carry an immense tin-ware bath in the Wanderer. No, a gipsy’s bath is a very simple arrangement, but it is very delightful. This is the modus operandi . I have a great sponge and a bucket of cold water, newly drawn from the nearest well. This morning the water is actually ice-cold, but I am hungry before I have finished sponging, so benefit must result from so bracing an ablution. Foley has laid the cloth. The kettle is boiling, the eggs and rashers are ready to put in the
21 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twelve.
Chapter Twelve.
Miners going home from their work in the evening passed us in scores. I cannot say they look picturesque, but they are blithe and active, and would make capital soldiers. Their legs were bare from their knees downwards, their hats were skull-caps, and all visible flesh was as black almost as a nigger’s. Many of these miners, washed and dressed, returned to this public-house, drank and gambled till eleven, then went outside and fought cruelly. The long rows of grey-slab houses one passes on leavi
20 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Thirteen.
Chapter Thirteen.
When John returned that forenoon to Mapledurham he was engaged. If John could speak Latin, he might have said,— “Veni, vidi, vici.” But, with all his other good qualities, John cannot talk Latin. I was naturally most concerned to know whether my coachman was temperate or not, and I asked him. “I likes my drop o’ beer,” was John’s reply, “but I know when I’ve enough.” John and myself are about ages, ie, we were both born in her Majesty’s reign. John, like myself, is a married man with young bairn
31 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Fourteen.
Chapter Fourteen.
“On the whole, though, I have not much to complain of at present; my master is very kind and my coachman is very careful, and never loses his temper except when I take the bit in my teeth and have my own way for a mile. “When we start of a morning we never know a bit where we are going to, or what is before us; sometimes it is wet or rainy, and even cold; but bless you, my dear, we are always hungry, that is the best of it, and really I would not change places with any carriage-horse ever I knew
37 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Fifteen.
Chapter Fifteen.
Another on strange names. A third on trees. A fourth on water—lakes, brooklets, rivers, cataracts, and mill-streams. A fifth upon faces. And so on, ad libitum . As to signs, many are curious enough, but there is a considerable amount of sameness about many. You meet Red Lions, White Harts, Kings’ Arms, Dukes’ Arms, Cricketers’ Arms, and arms of all sorts everywhere, and Woolpacks, and Eagles, and Rising Suns, ad nauseam . The sign of a five-barred gate hung out is not uncommon in the Midland Cou
28 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Sixteen.
Chapter Sixteen.
“Let go?” he cried; “your fingers are made of iron fencing; my arm isn’t.” “Can you for one moment imagine,” I said, “what the condition of this England of yours would be were all the Scotchmen to be suddenly taken out of it; suddenly to disappear from great cities like Manchester and Liverpool, from posts of highest duty in London itself, from the Navy, from the Army, from the Volunteers? Is the bare idea not calculated to induce a more dreadful nightmare than even a lobster salad?” “I think,”
21 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Seventeen.
Chapter Seventeen.
Ten minutes afterwards the great caravan lay comfortably in a pork-curer’s yard, and the horses were knee-deep in straw in a neighbouring stable. A German it is who owns the place. Taking an afternoon walk through his premises, I was quite astonished at the amount of cleanliness everywhere displayed. Those pigs are positively lapped in luxury; of all sorts and sizes are they, of all ages, of all colours, and of all breeds, from the long-snouted Berkshire to the pug-nosed Yorker, huddled together
19 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Eighteen.
Chapter Eighteen.
“Inverness?” he ejaculates, with eyes as big as florins. “Man! it’s a far cry to Inverness.” On again, passing for miles through a pretty country, but nowhere is there an extensive view, for the hills are close around us, and the road is a very winding one. It winds and it “wimples” through among green knolls and bosky glens; it dips into deep, deep dells, and rises over tree-clad steeps. This may read romantic enough, but, truth to tell, we like neither the dips nor the rises. But look at this
24 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Nineteen.
Chapter Nineteen.
A Day at Pressmannan. I would have preferred going alone on my cycle with a book and my fishing-rod, but Hurricane Bob unfortunately—unlike the infant Jumbo—is no cyclist, and a twenty-miles’ run on a warm summer’s day would have been too much for the noble fellow. Nor could he be left, in the caravan to be frightened out of his poor wits with thundering cannon and bursting shells. Hence Pea-blossom and a light elegant phaeton, with Bob at my feet on his rugs. We left about ten am, just before t
26 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty.
Chapter Twenty.
Another long walk. I showed them old Edinburgh, some of the scenes in which shocked their nerves considerably. Then on and up the Calton Hill, signs of fag and lag now painfully apparent. And when I proposed a run up to the top of Nelson’s monument, my Jehu fairly struck, and laughingly reminded me that there could be even too much of a good thing. So we went and dined instead. I was subjected to a piece of red-tapeism at the post-office here which I cannot refrain from chronicling as a warning
24 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty One.
Chapter Twenty One.
But here comes Hurricane Bob. Bob says, as plainly as you please, “Come, master, and give me my dinner.” Whether it be on account of the intense heat, or that Hurricane Bob is, like a good Mohammedan, keeping the feast of the Ramadan, I know not, but one thing is certain—he eats nothing ’twixt sunrise and sunset. Glasgow: Glasgow and grief. I now feel the full force of the cruelty that kept my letters back. My cousins, Dr McLennan and his wife, came by train to Chryston this Saturday forenoon, a
37 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Two.
Chapter Twenty Two.
By-the-bye, at Saint Ninian’s to-day, we stabled at the “Scots wha hae,” and my horses had to walk through the house, in at the hall door and out at the back. (Travellers will do well to ask prices here before accepting accommodation.) But nothing now would surprise or startle those animals. I often wonder what they think of it all. We were early on the road this morning of August 14th, feeling, and probably looking, as fresh as daisies. Too early to meet anything or anyone except farmers’ carts
37 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Three.
Chapter Twenty Three.
We must now be far over a thousand feet above the sea-level, and for the first time we catch sight of snow-posts, sometimes singly, sometimes in pairs. The English tourist would in all probability imagine that these were dilapidated telegraph poles. They serve a far different purpose, for were it not for them in winter, when the ground is covered with snow, and the hollows, and even the ravines, are filled up,—were it not for these guiding posts, the traveller, whether on foot or horseback, migh
27 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Four.
Chapter Twenty Four.
Especially if you knew that a great kindly lump of a heart was beating under a probably not over-fashionable corset, and a real living soul peeping out through a pair of merry laughing eyes. But rough-looking men, ay, even miners, also brought me flowers. And children never failed me. Their wee bits of bouquets were oft-times sadly untidy, but their wee bits of hearts were warm, so I never refused them. Some bairnies were too shy to come right round to the back door of the Wanderer with their fl
29 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Five.
Chapter Twenty Five.
“Harmless, happy little treasures, Full of truth, and trust, and mirth; Richest wealth and purest pleasures In this mean and guilty earth. “But yours is the sunny dimple, Radiant with untutored smiles; Yours the heart, sincere and simple, Innocent of selfish wiles. “Yours the natural curling tresses, Prattling tongues and shyness coy; Tottering steps and kind caresses, Pure with health, and warm with joy.” Look at that little innocent yonder in that cottage doorway. There
26 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Six.
Chapter Twenty Six.
Men and horses went on before, and the caravan followed by goods. In due time I myself arrived in town, and by the aid of a coachmaker and a gang of hands the great caravan was unloaded, and carefully bolted once more on her fore and aft carriages. Her beautiful polished mahogany sides and gilding were black with grime and smoke, but a wash all over put them to rights. I then unlocked the back door to see how matters stood there. Something lay behind the door, but by dint of steady pushing it op
41 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Seven.
Chapter Twenty Seven.
It is a muggy, rainy morning, with a strong head wind. The sea is grey and misty and all flecked with foam, and the country through which we drive is possessed of little interest. Before starting, however, we must needs pay a farewell visit to the shore, and enjoy five minutes’ digging in the sand. Then we said,— “Good-bye, old sea; we will be sure to come back again when summer days are fine. Good-bye! Ta, ta!” Shoreham is a quaint and curious, but very far from cleanly little town. We heard he
51 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Eight.
Chapter Twenty Eight.
Will that scale suit you to measure your health against? Nay, but to be more serious, let me quote the words of that prince of medical writers, the late lamented Sir Thomas Watson, Bart:— “Health is represented in the natural or standard condition of the living body. It is not easy to express that condition in a few words, nor is it necessary. My wish is to be intelligible rather than scholastic, and I should puzzle myself as well as you, were I to attempt to lay down a strict and scientific def
28 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Twenty Nine.
Chapter Twenty Nine.
But really, without a cycle, one would sometimes feel lost in caravan travelling. The Wanderer is so large that she cannot turn on narrow roads, so that on approaching a village, where I wish to stay all night, I find it judicious to stop her about a quarter of a mile out and tool on, mounted on the Marlborough, to find out convenient quarters. Then a signal brings the Wanderer on. Another advantage of having a tender is this. In narrow lanes your valet rides on ahead, and if there really be no
20 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
Chapter Thirty.
Chapter Thirty.
I would as soon buy an old feather-bed in the east end of London as an old caravan. Get your car then from a really good maker, one who could not afford to put a bad article out of hand. I have neither object nor desire to advertise the Bristol Waggon Company, but it is due to them to say that having paid a fair price, I got from them a splendid article. But of course there may be other makers as good or better. I do not know. You may copy the Wanderer if so minded. I do not think that I myself,
13 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter