British Highways And Byways From A Motor Car | Page 8

through that town, and followed a narrow, forest-bordered byway with
a few steep hills until we came to Waltham Abbey, a small Essex
market town with an important history. The stately abbey church, a
portion of which is still standing and now used for services, was
founded by the Saxon king, Harold, in 1060. Six years later he was
defeated and slain at Hastings by William the Conqueror, and tradition
has it that his mother buried his body a short distance to the east of
Waltham Church. The abbey gate still stands as a massive archway at
one end of the river bridge. Near the town is one of the many crosses
erected by Edward I in memory of his wife, Eleanor of Castile,
wherever her body rested on the way from Lincoln to Westminster. A
little to the left of this cross, now a gateway to Theobald Park, stands
Temple Bar, stone for stone intact as it was in the days when traitors'
heads were raised above it in Fleet Street, although the original wooden
gates are missing. Waltham Abbey is situated on the River Lea, near
the point where King Alfred defeated the Danes in one of his battles.
They had penetrated far up the river when King Alfred diverted the
waters from beneath their vessels and left them stranded in a wilderness
of marsh and forest.
Another pleasant afternoon trip was to Monken Hadley, twenty-five

miles out on the Great North Road. Hadley Church is intimately
associated with a number of distinguished literary men, among them
Thackeray, whose grandfather preached there and is buried in the
churchyard. The sexton was soon found and he was delighted to point
out the interesting objects in the church and vicinity.
The church stands at the entrance of a royal park, which is leased to
private parties and is one of the quaintest and most picturesque of the
country churches we had seen. Over the doors, some old-fashioned
figures which we had to have translated indicated that the building had
been erected in 1494. It has a huge ivy-covered tower and its interior
gives every evidence of the age-lasting solidity of the English churches.
Hadley Church has a duplicate in the United States, one having been
built in some New York town precisely like the older structure. We
noticed that one of the stained-glass windows had been replaced by a
modern one, and were informed that the original had been presented to
the newer church in America--a courtesy that an American
congregation would hardly think of, and be still less likely to carry out.
An odd silver communion service which had been in use from three to
five hundred years was carefully taken out of a fire-proof safe and
shown us.
Hadley Church is a delight from every point of view, and it is a pity
that such lines of architecture are not oftener followed in America. Our
churches as a rule are shoddy and inharmonious affairs compared with
those in England. It is not always the matter of cost that makes them so,
since more artistic structures along the pleasing and substantial lines of
architecture followed in Britain would in many cases cost no more than
we pay for such churches as we now have.
[Illustration: HADLEY CHURCH, MONKEN HADLEY.]
Our friend the sexton garrulously assured us that Thackeray had spent
much of his time as a youth at the vicarage and insisted that a great part
of "Vanity Fair" was written there. He even pointed out the room in
which he alleged the famous book was produced, and assured us that
the great author had found the originals of many of his characters, such

as Becky Sharp and Col. Newcome, among the villagers of Hadley. All
of which we took for what it was worth. Thackeray himself told his
friend, Jas. T. Fields, that "Vanity Fair" was written in his London
house; still, he may have been a visitor at the Hadley vicarage and
might have found pleasure in writing in the snug little room whose
windows open on the flower garden, rich with dashes of color that
contrasted effectively with the dark green foliage of the hedges and
trees. The house still does duty as a vicarage; the small casement
windows peep out of the ivy that nearly envelops it, and an air of
coziness and quiet seems to surround it. Near at hand is the home
where Anthony Trollope, the novelist, lived for many years, and his
sister is buried in the churchyard.
A short distance from Hadley is the village of Edgeware, with
Whitchurch, famous for its association with the musician Handel. He
was organist here for several years, and on the small pipe-organ, still in
the church though not in use, composed his oratorio, "Esther," and a