Visit To Stratford-On-Avon And Its, Vicinage.

melody of music in what may indeed be called the land of Shakspere . On our Avay up to the inn , Mr . Philips introduced me to the vicar , whom we met on the way , and we immediately recognised each other as having met on the preiious Monday , at the dinner of the Beeeher Club at

Stratford . Like ourselves , he was going to be one of the guests of the village club . Whilst the dinner is being placed on the table , our merchant-prince is carefully scrutinising the balance-sheet of the society , and his business habits soon enable him to suggest a better mode of preparing it for the future , so that it may be

simpler for the members to understand ; and as he tests every column , one feels that he could evidently detect any inaccuracy , even to the seventy-fifth fraction of a farthing . The only speakers were the patron and president , Mr . Philips ; the rev . vicar , whose name I forget ; the village surgeon ( to whom the president playfully

advised the company to send a cock now and then , by way of sacrificing to old iEsculapius ) ; and that somewhat hackneyed labourer for benefit societies , who now pens these notes of his tour . But decidedly the best thing which occurred during the day ivas Mr . Philips ' s undertaking to increase the funds of the society a

hundred pounds by his OAATQ donation—a mode of ¦ charitable distribution of wealth infinitely superior to that indiscriminate common alms-giving which does so much harm to the morals of the people of this and every other country on the globe . It is the boimden duty of the rich to help the deserving poor , for wealthy men are but stewards of all they possess ; and I was happy to hear the chairman beg of his neighbours that , -as he had no Avife to find out their wants , they would

make them known to him without scruple . It is one of the most hopeful signs of the times that the wealthy classes , despite our mad competition for wealth , are awakening to a sense of what is not only their duty , but their own security from terrors worse than those of France in the last century , by mixing more with , and exerting themselves for the elevation of the bulk of the

, people . I could have wished to have seen the members of the Snitterfield Benefit Club thoroughly grappling Avith their Avork , so that their society might be rather managed by than yew- them , as is the case with the Odd Fellows and Foresters .

As we left the meeting , the lads of the village beset us like a swarm of bees : it is really astonishing how many children a small village can produce . The people ¦ evidentl y , like myself , believe in the good old command *—notivithstanding Ifaltfots on Population— " Be ¦ fruitful , and multiply , and replenish the earth , and

subdue it ; and have dominion over the fish of the sea , and over the fowl of the air , and over every living thing that inoveth upon the earth . " I soon found out that the worthy chairman had been annually in the habit of giving the lads a treat , by buying them a quantity of orangesnutsand gingerbread

, , to run races for ; but he thought the day was too hot for running , so they were to have the prizes given them without the usual exertion . I thought of Monteigne and his cat as we walked along , and wondered AA'hether the spending of this croAA'n-piece ga \* e most pleasure to the lord of the manor or fche lads .

Taking me to an elevation in his OAVU grounds , my kind entertainer pointed out to me the famous Edgehill , where the Royalist troops Avere routed by the Parliamentarians , under the command of my indomitable

Visit To Stratford-On-Avon And Its, Vicinage.

ancestor , 01 iA * er Cromwell . Happy are we who live in peaceable times , when brother is not called upon to fi ght against brother , and nei ghbour against neighbour , as must ever be the case in civil wars . Next morning , as soon as we had breakfasted , my noble-hearted friend sent me in his gig to the gates of

Warwick Castle ; and after having seen over that princely residence , I walked on to the neighbouring castle of Kenihvorth , the noblest ruins of a fortressmansion which I have ever beheld . It would occupy too much space in the present paper to describe Warwick and Kenilworth , each of ivhich will furnish a paper of

itself to a little work AA'hich I have projected for years , under the title of Rural Rambles and Town Visits . It may be my good fortune again to visit that beautiful district which has been the subject of the present paper . For the present , suffice it to say , that ( thanks to railway travelling ) though I had to pay second-class fare all the way home again , after a peep at Coventry , I succeeded

in reaching Bury at midni ght of the Thursday , so as to keep my engagement for the Friday . And now , when I read of Stratford-upon-Avon and its vicinage , I do so with tenfold zest ; and Avhether it may be my fate again to visit ( as I hope ) the counties of Worcester and Warwick , and to see more of them than I could possibly

do in six days , yet I have hung up in the halls of Memory a few glorious English landscapes , which I can conjure up of a Aiinter ' s evening , and see as AdvicUy as I did in my Whitsuntide Out . And if this relation of my rambles has amused or interested one reader of the Masonic organ in this country ; if it has strengthened

one brother ' s love for the beautiful , the good , and the true ; if it should aid one human soul in "looking through nature up to nature ' s God , " it will not have been written altogether in vain . And so , reader , shaking hands with thee in spirit , I bid thee Good-bye ,- and thus I close my " Visit to Stratford-on-Avon and its Vicinage . " StoJeesleti , YorJcsltire .

Architecture And Archæology.

ARCHITECTURE AND ARCH ? OLOGY .

ON THE ARCHITECTURE OE THE ELEVENTH CENTURY . ( Continued from page 287 . ) Ifc is recorded in the Saxon chronicles thatin the

, year 1020 , "King Canute caused to be built , afcAssingdon , a minster of stone and lime , for the souls of the men . who ivere there slain , and gave ifc to one of his priests , ivhose name AA'as Sfcigand . " William of Malmesbury adds that " Canute repaired throughout England the minsters ivhich had been partly destroyed by the military incursions of himself and his

father . He built churches in all places where he had fought , and more particularly at Ascbendome , and appointed ministers to them , who through the unending revolutions of ages might pray to God for the souls of the persons there slain . " At the consecration of this church he himself was present , and the English and Danish nobility made their offerings . " It is now [ says Malmesbury , in 1125 ] an ordinary church ,

under the care of a parish priest" ( B . ii . c . 11 ) . This church has , unfortunately , not been identified by modern antiquaries . There are sei'eral places of the same name . A . D . 1032 , " Over the body of the most holy Edmund , whom , the Danes had killed , he builfc a church with princely magnificence , appointed to ifc an abbot and monks , and conferred on ifc many large estates , lhe greatness of his donation , yofc eniira ( in . 1125 ) , stands proudly eminent at the