by CHARLOTTE M. YONGE. [ second edition .] Winchester: warren and son , printers and publishers , high street . London: simpkin and co. , limited , stationers’ hall court . 1891...

Not many of us remember Otterbourne before the Railroad, the Church, or the Penny Post.  It may be pleasant to some of us to try to catch a few recollections before all those who can tell us anything about those times are quite gone. To begin with the first that is known about it, or rather that is guessed.  A part of a Roman road has been traced in Otterbourne Park, and near it was found a piece of a quern, one of the old stones of a hand mill, such as was used in ancient times for grinding cor

Some of us can still remember the old Church and the old Sunday habits prevailing before 1830.  The Churchyard was large and very pretty, though ill kept, surrounded with a very open railing, and with the banks sloping towards the water meadows clothed with fine elm trees—one with a large and curious excrescence on the bark.  There was a deep porch on the south side of the Church, with seats on each side.  Then, on red tiles, one entered between two blocks of pews of old brown unpainted oak (the

Bridges over river I remember, I remember,    Old times at Otterbourne, Before the building of the Church,    And when smock frocks were worn! I remember, I remember,    When railroads there were none, When by stage coach at early dawn    The journey was begun. And through the turnpike roads till eve    Trotted the horses four, With inside passengers and out    They carried near a score. “Red Rover” and the “Telegraph,”    We knew them all by name, And Mason’s and the Oxford coach,    Full thirt