its modern innovations there is something about Heale
which suggests a house with a history. Whether it is its environment
of winding river and ancient cedar-trees, its venerable stables
and imposing entrance gate, or the fact that it is one of those
distinguished houses that have saved the life of an English king,
we will not undertake to fathom.

CHAPTER VIII

CAVALIER-HUNTING, ETC.

An old mansion in the precincts of the cathedral at Salisbury is
said to have been a favourite hiding-place for fugitive cavaliers
at the time of the Civil War. There is an inn immediately opposite
this house, just outside the close, where the landlord (formerly a
servant to the family who lived in the mansion) during the troublous
times acted as a secret agent for those who were concealed, and
proved invaluable by conveying messages and in other ways aiding
those Royalists whose lives were in danger.

[Illustration: SECRET PANEL AT SALISBURY]

There are still certain "priests' holes" in the house, but the most
interesting hiding-place is situated in the most innocent-looking
of summer-houses in the grounds. The interior of this little
structure is wainscoted round with large panels like most of
the summer-houses, pavilions, or music-rooms of the seventeenth
century, and nothing uncommon or mysterious was discovered until
some twenty-five years ago. By the merest accident one of the
panels was found to open, revealing what appeared to be an ordinary
cupboard with shelves. Further investigations, however, proved
its real object. By sliding one of the shelves out of the grooves
into which it is fixed, a very narrow, disguised door, a little
over a foot in width, in the side of the cupboard and in the
thickness of the wall can be opened. This again reveals a narrow
passage, or staircase, leading up to the joists above the ceiling,
and thence to a recess situated immediately behind the carved
ornamental facing over the entrance door of the summer-house.
In this there is a narrow chink or peep-hole, from which the
fugitive could keep on the look-out either for danger or for the
friendly Royalist agent of the "King's Arms."

When it was first discovered there were evidences of its last
occupant--_viz._ a Jacobean horn tumbler, a mattress, and a
handsomely worked velvet pillow; the last two articles, provided
no doubt for the comfort of some hunted cavalier, upon being
handled, fell to pieces. It may be mentioned that the inner d