history and of
architecture, and probably no man has ever so happily combined the
knowledge of both. Though his thoughts were always set upon principles
and upon the study of great subjects, he delighted in the details of
local history and local building. "I cannot conceive," he wrote, "how
either the study of the general sequence of architectural styles or the
study of the history of particular buildings can be unworthy of the
attention of any man. Besides their deep interest in themselves, such
studies are really no small part of history. The way in which any people
built, the form taken by their houses, their temples, their fortresses,
their public buildings, is a part of their national life fully on a
level with their language and their political institutions. And the
buildings speak to us of the times to which they belong in a more living
and, as it were, personal way than monuments or documents of almost any
other kind."[2]

And no less clearly and decisively did he write of the value of local
history: "There is no district, no town, no parish, whose history is not
worth working out in detail, if only it be borne in mind that the local
work is a contribution to a greater work."[3]

Thus the keenness of his interest in the architecture and the history
that could be studied and learnt in every little town made him to the
last the most untiring and enthusiastic of historical pilgrims. It is
impossible to read his letters, so fresh and natural yet so full of a
rare knowledge and insight, without seeing how thoroughly he had
succeeded in achieving in himself that union of the traveller and the
historian which adds so immeasurably to the powers of each. And that is
what makes his letters from foreign lands so delightful to read, and his
sketches (published and republished from time to time during the last
thirty years) so illuminative. No one, I think, who has seen the places
he writes of in his _Historical and Architectural Sketches_ or in his
_Sketches from French Travel_, with the books in his hand, will deny
that they have added tenfold to his pleasure. Mr. Freeman tells you what
to see and how to see it,--just what you want to know and what you ought
to know. It would be an impertinence in me to point out the breadth or
the accuracy of his knowledge as it appears in these sketches, which can
be read again and again with new pleasure. But I think it may be said
without exaggeration that in all the great work that