far the largest of the English shires, a widely diversified
country, ranging from fertile farm land to broken hills and waste
moorland, while its river valleys and considerable coast line present
greatly varied but always picturesque scenery. The poet describes the
charms of Yorkshire as yielding

"Variety without end, sweet interchange
Of hill and valley, river, wood and plain."

Nor did we find this description at all inapt as we drove over its
excellent roads during the fine July weather. But the Yorkshire country
is doubly interesting, for if the landscape is of surpassing beauty, the
cities, the villages, the castles and abbeys, and the fields where some
of the fiercest battles in Britain have been fought, have intertwined
their associations with every hill and valley. Not only the size of the
shire, but its position--midway between London and the Scottish border,
and extending almost from coast to coast--made it a bulwark, as it were,
against the incursions of the Scots and their numerous sympathizers in
the extreme north of England. No part of England is more thickly strewn
with attractions for the American tourist and in no other section do
conditions for motor travel average better.

From London to York, the capital city of the shire, runs the Great North
Road, undoubtedly the finest highway in all Britain. It is laid out on a
liberal scale, magnificently surfaced and bordered much of the way by
wide and beautifully kept lawns and at times skirted with majestic
trees. We saw a facsimile of a broadside poster issued about a century
ago announcing that the new lightning coach service installed on this
road between London and York would carry passengers the distance of one
hundred and eighty-eight miles in the astonishingly short space of four
days. This coach, of course, traveled by relays, and at what was then
considered breakneck speed. Over this same highway it would now be an
easy feat for a powerful car to cover the distance in three or four
hours. The great North Road was originally constructed by the Romans to
maintain the quickest possible communication between London and
Eboracum, as York was styled during the Roman occupation.

The limitation of our time had become such that we could but feel that
our tour through Yorkshire must be of the most superficial kind. Not
less than two weeks of motoring might well be spent in the county and
every day be full of genuine enjoyment. The main roads are