| 286 | 287 | 288 | 289 | 290 |
| 1 | 314 | 629 | 943 | 1257 |
|
For the present we shall remain in this queer old walled town, with
its crooked, narrow lanes, that tell us of their old day that knew no
wheeled vehicles; its plaster-and-timber dwellings, with upper stories
far overhanging the street, and thus marking their date, say three
hundred years ago; the stately city walls, the castellated gates, the
ivy-grown, foliage-sheltered, most noble and picturesque ruin of St.
Mary's Abbey, suggesting their date, say five hundred years ago, in the
heart of Crusading times and the glory of English chivalry and romance;
the vast Cathedral of York, with its worn carvings and quaintly pictured
windows, preaching of still remoter days; the outlandish names of
streets and courts and byways that stand as a record and a memorial,
all these centuries, of Danish dominion here in still earlier times;
the hint here and there of King Arthur and his knights and their
bloody fights with Saxon oppressors round about this old city more than
thirteen hundred years gone by; and, last of all, the melancholy old
stone coffins and sculptured inscriptions, a venerable arch and a hoary
tower of stone that still remain and are kissed by the sun and caressed
by the shadows every day, just as the sun and the shadows have kissed
and caressed them every lagging day since the Roman Emperor's soldiers
placed them here in the times when Jesus the Son of Mary walked
the streets of Nazareth a youth, with no more name or fame than the
Yorkshire boy who is loitering down this street this moment.
Their destination was Edinburgh, where they remained a month. Mrs.
Clemens's health gave way on their arrival there, and her husband,
288
Page
Quick Jump
|