The Exeter Road

or which let me here apologise to the county town of Middlesex. Not that I

d, tedio

s and white-legg

5

vailable:

NTF

5

5

RD, TEDI

Cromwell Road at any time or under any conditions. Then you will have known tedium. At Brentford, however, all is life, movement, dirt, and balmy odours from a quarter of a mile of roadside gasworks. The bargees and lightermen of this riverside town are swearing picturesquely at one another all day, while the gasmen, the hands at the waterw

legged, and have changed, by process of evolution, into some less easily soiled variety. For the dirt of Brentford is always there. It only varies in kind. In times of drought it makes itself obvious in clouds of bl

h Brentford tow

sir, have you ever seen Brentford?’ Here was sarcasm indeed! Happily, however, the Glaswegian had not seen Brentford, and so was not in a position to appreciate the retort

nn,’ to testify as to the character of its inhabitants. ‘No persons,’ says he, ‘more solicitous about the preservation of rank than those who have n

TREET

he great stableyards and courtyards of other old coaching hostelries which themselves have disappeared. This was, in fact, the end of the first stage out of London in the coaching era, and the beginning of the last stage in; and in consequence, as befitted a town on the great highway to the West, had ample accommodation, both for man and beast. One of these old yards, indeed,—Red Lion Inn Yard—is historic, for it is traditionally the spot where Edmund Ironside, the king, was murdered by the Danes in 1016, aft

n Meadow,’ which is less a meadow than a slum? Then there are ‘The Butts,’ with some fine, dignified Queen Anne and Georgian red-

the so-called ‘New’ Brentford, itself old beyond compute. The tower dates back four hundred years or so, but the body of

I

atience, exclaiming, “Are we not yet in London, and so many miles of lamps?” At length, on reaching Hyde Park Corner, he was told they had arrived. His impatience increased from thence to Lad Lane. He became overwhelmed with astonishment, They entered the “Swan with Two Necks,” and my relative bade his companion remain in the coffee-room until he returned. On returning, he found the bird flown, and for six long weeks there were no tidings of him. At length it was discovered that he was in the custody of the constables at Sherborne in Dorsetshire, his mind alienated. He was conveyed home, came partially to his reas

have in this extraordinary fashion on coming to the in

reened from observation from the road by great clusters of forest trees. Through the ornamental classic stone screen and iron gateway, erected in the well-known ‘Adam style’ by John Adam about 1780, the

s was, belonged to the Order of St. Bridget. Their abbey, with its lands and great revenues, was suppressed and confiscated by Henry the Eighth in 1532. Nine years later his Queen, Katherine Howard, was imprisoned within the desecrated walls before being

ventually to Lisbon. The Abbey of Sion yet exists there, and the sisters are still solely Englishwomen. It is on record that they still cherish the hope of returning to their lost home by the banks of the Thames, and have to this day the keys of that abbey. Seventy years o