A Farmhouse near Rochester.
But their wishes were the only good luck we met with. We had not gone far from Sittingbourne, when we admitted that the pilgrim we had met just outside of Chatham was no false prophet after all; for the road now began to be heavy with sand and rough with flints. And oh, the hills! They were not very steep, but I was a novice in cycling. No sooner were we on up-grades than I exhausted myself by my vigorous back-pedalling. I have heard the uninitiated say that tricycling must besoeasy, just like working the velocipedes of our childhood.Larger ImageA Little River.But let them try! The country had lost none of its beauty. Fields were as green and golden, orchards as shady, and sheep as peaceful, as those we had seen before lunch. There were little churches on hilltops and pretty dingles by the wayside; handsome country-houses with well-kept lawns, and fields where cricketers wereplaying, and young girls in gay-coloured dresses were applauding; and there were old-fashioned farm-houses and quaint inn-yards. We passed through villages by which little quiet rivers ran, some with boats lying by the shore, and others, as at Ospringe, where horses and waggons were calmly driven through the water. But the heaviness had spread from the road to my heart, and all joyousness had gone from me.
The worst of it was, that as the road here wound little, we could see it miles ahead—a white perpendicular line on thepurple hill which bounded the horizon.Larger ImageWe knew this must be Boughton Hill, the fame of whose steepness has gone abroad in the cycling world. With the knowledge of what was to come ever before me, I began to pedal so badly that J. told me so very plainly, and said, moreover, that I was more of a hindrance than a help to him. For some time we rode on very silently. Earlier in the afternoon we had been passed by a man driving an empty carriage, of whom we had asked one or two questions. He had stopped to watch the cricket-match, but he now overtook us, and, to add to my misery, asked me if I would not like him to drive me into Canterbury. All this was hard to bear.
Finally, we came to Boughton, a small village with ivy-grown houses and a squirrel and a dolphin staring at each other amicably from rival inns. It is right at the foot of Boughton Hill. Now that we were near it, the white line we had seen for so long widened into a broad road, but itlooked no less perpendicular. It was here that Chaucer’s pilgrims
‘gan atakeA man that clothed was in clothes blake,And undernethe he wered a white surplis.’
There is no record that mine host and the Chanones Yeman dismounted and walked to rest their horses. But all the many waggons and carriages and cycles we saw above us on the modern road were being led, not driven. Halfway up was an old lumbering stage, with boxes piled on the top, and big baskets and bundles swinging underneath. The driver was walking; but a tramp, who had made believe to push when on level ground, now sat comfortably on the backseat, taking his ease. A little lower was the friendly driver with his empty carriage, for he had rested at the ‘Squirrel,’ and so we had caught up to him again. At the top we looked back to see that the West was a broad sea of shining light. A yellow mist hung over the plain, softening and blending its many colours. Far off to the north the river glittered and sparkled, and a warm glow spread over the green of the near hillsides. The way in front of us was grey and colourless by comparison. It was almost all down-hill after this. Did I want to be driven into Canterbury, indeed? My benevolentfriend might now have asked us to pull him in. The stage made a show of racing us, but we gave it only a minute’s chance. An officer in braided coat driving a drag passed us triumphantly while we were on our up-grade; but when we came again to a level we left him far behind.
‘Wete ye not wher stondeth a litel toun,Which that ycleped is Bob up-and-doun,Under the blee in Canterbury way?’
It is better known now as Harbledown. A little of our trouble here came back, for the road leading to that part of it ‘ycleped Bob-up,’ was steep and heavy, and we had to walk. To our right were the old red-brick almshouses and the little church of St. Michael, one of the many oldest churches in Kent, and of which all we could see was the ivy-covered tower. It was here that Henry, when on his way to the holy shrine, dismounted, that, as became his humble calling of pilgrim, he might walk into Canterbury. And it was here, too, that the Person began his long-winded discourse. But we, less reverent than King Henry, now mounted again; and, less phlegmatic than the Person, we held our peace. For as we rode further up we heard far-away chimes, just as Erasmus did when he went from Harbledown; and there gradually rosebefore us a tall, grey tower, then two more, and at last, as we reached the top of the hill, we saw in the plain below the great Cathedral itself, standing up far above the low red roofs of Canterbury. We were almost at our goal.
Larger Image
A little further on we passed a hop-field, where the picking had already begun. In one part the poles were stripped of their vines, so that it looked as if the farmer had reaped forhis sowing a crop of dead sticks. In the other the poles were still green, but the day’s work was just over. Women were packing up kettles and pans, jugs and bottles, and stowing babies and bundles into perambulators, while two or three men were going the rounds with bag and basket, measuring the day’s picking, and marking off the account of each picker by notching short, flat pieces of wood held up for the purpose. In the road beyond a large cart, packed with well-filled bags, was being drawn homewards by three horses, while a young man rode up and down the green aisles. ‘I beg your pardon, Sir,’ a farm hand said to J., who had been sketching, ‘but you’ve been takin’ some of our people, and now you hought to take our Guvnor on his ’oss;’ and he pointed to the young man. All the way into the town we passed groups of pickers: women with large families of children, small boys with jugs and coats hung over their shoulders, and young girls with garlands of hops twisted about their hats, and all were as merry as if they had been on a picnic. We saw them still before us, even after we had turned into Saint Dunstan’s Street, from which the gold of the afterglow was fast fading, and were riding between the quaint, gabled houses, through whosediamond-paned windows lights were beginning to appear. Before us was the old, grey-towered city gate, through which royal and ecclesiastical processions and knights and nobles once passed, but where we now saw only the tramps who had arrived at the eleventh hour sitting at its foot with their bags and baggage.
Westgate from without.Larger Image
We ‘toke’ our inn at the sign of the ‘Falstaff,’ without the gate. Honest Jack, in buff doublet and red hose, hanging between the projecting windows and far out over the pavement by a wonderful piece of wrought-iron work, gave us welcome, and within we found rest and good cheer for weary pilgrims. Then we ‘ordeyned’ our dinner wisely, but it was too late to go to the Cathedral that same evening, as we should have liked to have done, and we were forced to wait for the morrow. After we had come downstairs from our dimity-curtained bed-chamber, had dined, and were sitting over our tea in a little, low-ceilinged room, from whose window we looked into a pretty garden of roses and grapevines, a stranger sent us greeting, and asked if he might come and sit with us. He was a priest, also making pilgrimage, who had ridden from Rochester on a machine like ours; so that we became friendly forthwith, and, like the pilgrims whorested at the ‘Chequers of the Hope,’ every man of our party
‘in his wyse made hertly chere,Telling his felowe of sportys and of chere,And of other mirthis that fellen by the way,As custom is of pilgrims and hath been many a day.’
And just before we parted for the night we held counsel together and agreed that, in the morning, we would in company visit the holy shrine.
A Tale of the Verger.
Third Day
Werose early the next day, and, that we might be in all possible things like the men in whose steps we were walking, we ‘cast on fresher gowns’ before we started to walk through the town. Then, after we had breakfasted, we set out with our new friend for the Cathedral. Our way led through the gate, on which the sun shone brightly, and where tramps were still waiting to be hired; and then through the High Street, filled with other pilgrims, who spake divers tongues, who wore not sandal, but canvas shoon, and who had their ‘signys’ in their hands and upon their ‘capps,’ for many had puggarees about their hats, and still more carried red guide-books. The air was warm, but fresh and pure as if the sea-breeze had touched it; and the gables and carvings of the old houses were glowing with sunlight. The reflection of the red roofs and of geraniums and hollyhocks in gardens by the way made bright bits of colour in among the tall reeds of the little river Stour, andas we went slowly along we talked, as befitted the occasion, of bygone times, for at every step we were reminded of those earlier travellers whose humble followers we were. Here we came to the Hospital of St. Thomas, now an almshouse, of old the place where poor pilgrims found shelter; and here, in the ground-floor of a haberdasher’s shop, we saw afew arches of what was once the ‘Chequers of the Hope,’ where the rich were lodged; and so, when in Mercery Lane, where the houses almost met above in a friendly, confidential way, we saw a man in cocked-hat and knee-breeches and much gold lace, it seemed as if he, like everything else in Canterbury, must be a relic of the olden time.
Waiting to be Hired.
On the Stour.Larger Image
‘I must know who that fellow is!’ the priest exclaimed; and, without more ado, walked up to him and boldly addressed him thus: ‘Ahem!—I say now—who are you, any way?’
And the man, in his wonder, forgot to take offence, and answered, ‘Why I, Sir, am the town crier!’
Talk of Yankee cheek indeed!
Then we went on down the lane, past the round marketplace, where women were selling sweets, and under the stone gateway with its time-worn tracery, to the south porch of the Cathedral, where a tricycle was standing. As the pilgrims had to pray before they could approach the sacred tomb, so we, after we had entered the nave, had to wait and listen to morning service. Then we were told that no one could go to the shrine unless led thither by the verger. There was nothing to do but to fall into the ranks of a detachment of tourists on their way to it. With them we were marshalled through the iron gate, separating the choir from the chapels, bya grey-bearded, grey-haired man, who kept his eye sternly upon us as we deposited our sixpences, our modest offerings in place of ‘silver broch and ryngis.’
‘Where is the shrine?’ we asked, as soon as we were on the other side of the gate.
‘The shrine which it lies but a few steps further on,’ the verger answered; ‘and you will come to it in good time.’
Then he showed us the ‘horgan and its pipes, which they lie in the triforium,’ and the ‘Norman Chapel of Saint Hanselm, which it is the holdest part of the building,’ and about all of which he had much to say. But we interrupted him quickly. ‘Take us to the shrine,’ we commanded. But just then another tourist, eager for information, began to ask questions not only about the Cathedral, but about the whole city. Before we knew where we were, she had carried us all out to Harbledown, and then, without stopping, whisked us off to Saint Martin’s-on-the-Hill. This was too much. We started to find the shrine for ourselves, but our friend the priest ran after us.
‘You must wait for the verger,’ he said. ‘I hope you don’t mind my telling you; but then, you know, you’re Americans, and I thought you mightn’t understand.’
Canterbury, from the river.Larger Image
His interest by degrees extended from us to the rest of the party. By some peculiar method of reasoning he hadconcluded that, because we were Americans, all who were following the verger, except himself, must be so likewise. Every now and then he would dart from our side to ask each one in turn, in a gentle whisper, ‘You’re an American, are you not?’ The results were not always satisfactory. I saw one Englishman, with John Bull written in every feature, glare at him in suppressed rage; while a lady, after saying, rather savagely, ‘Well, is there any harm in being one?’ dismissed him abruptly, as if to remind him that not she, but the Cathedral, was the show.
The verger lingered on the broad stairway, ‘which the pilgrims they mounted it on their knees, as is seen by the two deep grooves in the stone steps.’ He stood long by the tomb of Prince Hedward, the Black Prince, and when we came to the stone chair used only when archbishops are consecrated, he deliberately stopped, to suggest that some lady might like to sit in it, ‘though which it won’t make her a harchbishop,’ he added. Then at last he led us to the chapel just beyond, and close to the choir. He waited until we had all followed and formed a semicircle around him, then he pointed to the pavement,—
‘Which now,’ he said, solemnly, ‘you have come to the shrine of the saintly Thomas.’
We had reached our goal. We stood in the holy place for which Monk and Knight, Nun and Wife of Bath, had left husbands and nunnery, castle and monastery, and for which we had braved the jests and jeers of London roughs, and had toiled over the hills and struggled through the sands of Kent. Even the verger seemed to sympathise with our feelings. For a few moments he was silent; presently he continued—
‘’Enery the Heighth, when he was in Canterbury, took the bones, which they was laid beneath, out on the green, and had them burned. With them he took the ’oly shrine, which it and bones is here no longer!’
Shrine and Tabard, Chapels and Inns by the way, all have gone with the pilgrims of yester-year.
FINIS.
London: Printed byStrangeways & Sons,Tower Street, Upper St. Martin’s Lane.