When they had gone, it was as hopeless to call for a draught of ale as I imagine it would have been to ask the hostess for that old-time Kentish delicacy, the "pudding-pie," that was once to be had for the asking at any inn during Easter week. The "puddingpie" has almost entirely vanished from Kent, but, "once upon a time," not to have tasted one was regarded as unlucky, and it was the usual thing for ale-house customers to ask for a "pudding-pie" as a right. "Neow, missus," the Kentish yokel would say, "let uz tëaste one o' them 'ere puddeners o' yourn," and the "missus" would hand him a flat circular tart, about the size of a saucer, and filled with custard sprinkled thinly with currants.

Downs extend all the way from here to Lydden, three miles away, and Lydden itself lies enfolded in a chalky bottom through which the road runs steeply. Downs stretch on either side of the tiny village and frown down upon it, making its insignificance more marked and its little cottages and little church look like toys. On the left hand, at the distance of half a mile, goes the railway, past that old village of Sibertswould, which railway directors in a conspiracy with Kentish rustics have agreed to call "Shepherdswell," and it continues in a deep, precipitous cutting through the chalk to Kearsney Station, another three miles ahead; and so presently into Dover. And now the road leads uphill to Ewell, where the springs of the little river Dour burst forth and gem all the valley hence to Dover with gracious foliage. Let us hope the good people of Ewell will succeed in recovering the long-lost prefix of their village, for as Temple

ST. RADIGUND'S ABBEY

335

Ewell it was known for many generations, and Temple Ewell it ought to be again, although the Preceptory of the Knights Templars that gave the place its distinctive name has long since disappeared. At any rate, the Ewell people have memorialized the Kent County Council to reinstate the "Temple" prefix, and perhaps that august body will lend a complaisant ear to their prayer. Perhaps, too, the railway Olympians will presently change the name of their station here from the misleading

then all will be well.

Kearsney," and

The road now grows suburban to Dover, and the valley commences to open out toward the sea. Where the Dour flows, all the vegetation is luxuriant, and there are lovely ponds decked with water-lilies beside the Crabble meadows, below the highway to the right and near the prettily named village of River; but as the hills rise on either hand they grow barren again and stretch for miles right and left. One green spot amid these eternal chalky undulations lies off to the right. This is Saint Radigund's Abbey, sometimes called by two aliases, either "Kearsney" or "Bradsole" Abbey. The first is the legitimate name, the others are given by its neighbourhood and by the wide (or "broad") pond (or "sole") that stood beside the ruins. Little is left of the old abbey but a gatehouse and some beautiful stone-andflint diapered walls, built into an old farmstead; but, although so little remains, what there is left deserves a visit from either architect or artist. Through this valley came King John on that shameful day when, having previously made an informal submission to

Pandulf the Papal Legate in the Templars' house at Ewell, he proceeded to formally ratify the gift of himself and his kingdom in the Templars' Church on Dover Heights.

Where the Dour crosses the road at Buckland the open highway ends. Henceforward are streets, first suburban, but presently continuous and crowded, for

the two miles that remain. Dover is reached, and

the road is done.

I

XLII

It will be expected of me that I should say something of Dover, and I do not intend to disappoint so very reasonable an expectation, although the Dover Road having been traversed, the object of this book is accomplished; and, therefore, any remarks may have to offer must be informed, not with the prolixity of the local history, nor with the stodgy statistics of the Guide Book, but with conciseness and something of the sympathy which shows that to which but few Guide Books ever attain-the true inwardness of the place. It is quite easy to be contemptuous of Dover, from the visitor's point of view; from other vantage-grounds it is a great deal more easy to acquire a certain enthusiasm for the old Cinque Port, its streets, its piers, its Castle, and the more modern fortifications which cross the Western Heights. "Thy cliffs, dear Dover! harbour, and hotel,' sang Byron, and if the Harbour was not worthy of so reputable a songster in those days, certainly when the new arm of the great Harbour of Refuge is completed that is even now in the making, there will be no poet in the land lyric sufficiently

"Thy cliffs, dear Dover! harbour and hotel;

Thy custom-house, with all its delicate duties;
Thy waiters running mucks at every bell;
Thy packets, all whose passengers are booties

To those who upon land or water dwell;

And last, not least, to strangers uninstructed,
Thy long, long bills, whence nothing is deducted."

Ꮓ

to do it the barest justice. Turning, however, to a consideration of the two other objects of Byron's outburst in Don Juan, the hotel and the cliffs, whether Shakespeare's Cliff or those that form so grand a rampart away towards the North Foreland, Byron, we find, was justified in his choice of Dovorian features for due commemoration. For the cliffs, all that is to be said of the white walls of old Albion has been long ago committed to print, and I do not propose to attempt the saying of anything new about them. As for the hotel of which the poet speaks, it was probably the "Ship." The "Ship," alas! is gone, retired, as many of its landlords were enabled to do, into private life, and the "long, long bills" by which they earned rather more than a modest competency are now produced elsewhere. The "Lord Warden," which was not, unfortunately, built in Byron's time, could probably have afforded him material for another stanza or two, for that huge and supremely hideous building was celebrated at one time for the monumental properties of the bills presented to affrighted guests. Magnificent as were the charges made by rapacious hosts elsewhere, they all paled their ineffectual items before the sublime heights attained by the account rendered to Louis Napoleon when he stayed here.

There are limits even to Princely-Presidential purses and patiences, and few people cared to incur liabilities at the "Lord Warden," which would have brought the shadow of the Bankruptcy Court looming upon the horizon. As for that most doughty of Lord Wardens of the Cinque Ports, from whose