A Trip Abroad | Page 8

of benefit both to believers and
unbelievers. In a single year one million six hundred and eleven
thousand two hundred and sixty-six books and tracts were distributed
gratuitously. The fifth object is to board, clothe, and scientifically
educate destitute orphans. Mr. Muller belonged to that class of religious
people who call themselves Brethren, and are called by others
"Plymouth Brethren."
After leaving Bristol, I went to London, the metropolis of the world.
The first important place visited was Westminster Abbey, an old
church, founded in the seventh century, rebuilt in 1049, and restored to
its present form in the thirteenth century. Many eminent men and
women are buried here. Chaucer, the first poet to find a resting place in
the Abbey, was interred in 1400. The place where Major Andre is
buried is marked by a small piece of the pavement bearing his name.
On the wall close by is a monument to him. Here are the graves of
Isaac Newton, Charles Dickens, Alfred Tennyson, Charles Darwin, and
many others, including Kings and Queens of England for centuries. In
the Poets' Corner are monuments to Coleridge, Southey, Shakespeare,
Burns, Tennyson, Milton, Gray, Spencer, and others, and one bearing
the inscription "O Rare Ben Jonson." There is also a bust of Longfellow,
the only foreigner accorded a memorial in the Abbey. The grave of
David Livingstone, the African explorer and missionary, is covered
with a black stone of some kind, which forms a part of the floor or
pavement, and contains an inscription in brass letters, of which the
following quotation is a part: "All I can add in my solitude is, may
heaven's rich blessings come down on every one, American, English, or
Turk, who will help to heal this open sore of the world."
Concerning this interesting old place which is visited by more than fifty
thousand Americans annually, Jeremy Taylor wrote: "Where our Kings
are crowned, their ancestors lie interred, and they must walk over their

grandsires to take the crown. There is an acre sown with royal seed, the
copy of the greatest change, from rich to naked, from ceiled roofs to
arched coffins, from living like gods to die like men. There the warlike
and the peaceful, the fortunate and the miserable, the beloved and
despised princes mingle their dust and pay down their symbol of
mortality, and tell all the world that when we die our ashes shall be
equal to Kings, and our accounts easier, and our pains for our sins shall
be less." While walking about in the Abbey, I also found these lines
from Walter Scott:
"Here, where the end of earthly things Lays heroes, patriots, bards and
kings; Where stiff the hand and still the tongue Of those who fought,
and spoke, and sung; Here, where the fretted aisles prolong The distant
notes of holy song, As if some Angel spoke again 'All peace on earth,
good will to men'; If ever from an English heart, Here let prejudice
depart."
Bunhill Fields is an old cemetery where one hundred and twenty
thousand burials have taken place. Here lie the ashes of Isaac Watts, the
hymn writer; of Daniel De Foe, author of "Robinson Crusoe," and of
John Bunyan, who in Bedford jail wrote "Pilgrim's Progress." The
monuments are all plain. The one at the grave of De Foe was purchased
with the contributions of seventeen hundred people, who responded to
a call made by some paper. On the top of Bunyan's tomb rests the
figure of a man, perhaps a representation of him whose body was laid
in the grave below. On one of the monuments in this cemetery are the
following words concerning the deceased: "In sixty-seven months she
was tapped sixty-six times. Had taken away two hundred and forty
gallons of water without ever repining at her case or ever fearing the
operation."
Just across the street from Bunhill Fields stands the house once
occupied by John Wesley (now containing a museum) and a
meeting-house which was built in Wesley's day. The old pulpit from
which Mr. Wesley preached is still in use, but it has been lowered
somewhat. In front of the chapel is a statue of Wesley, and at the rear is
his grave, and close by is the last resting place of the remains of Adam

Clarke, the commentator.
A trip to Greenwich was quite interesting. I visited the museum and
saw much of interest, including the painted hall, the coat worn by
Nelson at the Battle of the Nile, and the clothing he wore when he was
mortally wounded at Trafalgar. I went up the hill to the Observatory,
and walked through an open door to the grounds where a gentleman
informed me that visitors are not admitted without a pass; but he kindly
gave me some