A Trip Abroad | Page 6

by the spring lock. This oaken chest was
received at Abbotsford a short time before Scott's death, and is now on
exhibition. Sir Walter, as the guide repeatedly called him, spent the last
years of his life under the burden of a heavy debt, but instead of making
use of the bankrupt law, he set to work heroically with his pen to clear
up the indebtedness. He wrote rapidly, and his books sold well, but he
was one day compelled to lay down his pen before the task was done.
The King of England gave him a trip to the Mediterranean, for the
benefit of his health, but it was of no avail. Sir Walter returned to his
home on the bank of the Tweed, and died September twenty-first, 1832.
In his last illness, this great author, who had produced so many
volumes that were being read then and are still being read, asked his
son-in-law to read to him. The son-in-law asked what book he should
read, to which Sir Walter replied: "Book? There is but one Book! Read
me the Bible." In Melrose I visited the ruins of the Abbey, and then
went on to Wigan.
After the annual meeting, I went to Birmingham and stayed a short
while. From here I made a little journey to the birth-place of
Shakespeare, at Stratford-on-Avon, a small, quiet town, where, to the
best of my recollection, I saw neither street cars nor omnibuses. After
being in several large cities, it was an agreeable change to spend a day
in this quiet place, where the greatest writer in the English tongue spent
his boyhood and the last days of his life on earth. The house where he
was born was first visited. A fee of sixpence (about twelve cents)
secures admission, but another sixpence is required if the library and
museum are visited. The house stands as it was in the poet's early days,

with a few exceptions. Since that time, however, part of it has been
used as a meat market and part as an inn. In 1847, the property was
announced for sale, and it fell into the hands of persons who restored it
as nearly as possible to its original condition.
It has two stories and an attic, with three gables in the roof facing the
street. At the left of the door by which the tourist is admitted, is a
portion of the house where the valuable documents of the corporation
are stored, while to the right are the rooms formerly used as the "Swan
and Maidenhead Inn," now converted into a library and museum. The
windows in the upstairs room where the poet was born are fully
occupied with the autographs of visitors who have scratched their
names there. I was told that the glass is now valuable simply as old
glass, and of course the autographs enhance the value. The names of
Scott and Carlyle are pointed out by the attendant in charge. From a
back window one can look down into the garden, where, as far as
possible, all the trees and flowers mentioned in Shakespeare's works
have been planted. For some years past the average number of visitors
to this house has been seven thousand a year. The poet's grave is in
Trinity Church, at Stratford, beneath a stone slab in the floor bearing
these lines:
"Good friend, for Jesus' sake, forbear To digg the dust enclosed here.
Blest be ye man y spares these stones, And curst be he ty moves my
bones."
On the wall, just at hand, is a bust made from a cast taken after his
death. Near by is a stained-glass window with the inscription,
"America's gift to Shakespeare's church," and not far away is a card
above a collection-box with an inscription which informs "visitors from
U.S.A." that there is yet due on the window more than three hundred
dollars. The original cost was about two thousand five hundred dollars.
The Shakespeare Memorial is a small theater by the side of the Avon,
with a library and picture gallery attached. The first stone was laid in
1877, and the building was opened in 1879 with a performance of
"Much Ado About Nothing." The old school once attended by the poet
still stands, and is in use, as is also the cottage of Anne Hathaway,

situated a short distance from Stratford. I returned to Birmingham, and
soon went on to Bristol and saw the orphans' homes founded by George
Muller.
These homes, capable of accommodating two thousand and fifty
orphans, are beautifully situated on Ashley Downs. Brother William
Kempster and I visited them together, and were shown through a
portion of one of the five large buildings by an elderly gentleman, neat,
clean, and humble, who was sent down by