l like those one sees in London, but very picturesque and clean
looking. In the olden times were to be seen in many villages little
courts of this kind; in the centre of them was usually a great tree,
round which the old people would sit on summer evenings, while the
children danced and played around. Gilbert White speaks of one at
Selborne, which he calls the "Plestor." The original name was
"Pleystow," which means a play place. We have noticed them in many parts
of the Cotswold country. Here, too, children are playing about under the
shade of some delightful trees in the centre of the miniature square,
whilst the variegated foliage sets off the gabled cottages which form
three sides of it.

I have often wondered, as I stood by these chestnut trees, whether there
is any architecture more perfect in its simplicity and grace than that
which lies around me here. Not a cottage is in sight that is not worthy
of the painter's brush; not a gable or a chimney that would not be
worthy of a place in the Royal Academy. The little square is bordered
for six months of the year with the prettiest of flowers. Even as late
as December you may see roses in bloom on the walls, and chrysanthemums
of varied shade in every garden. Then, as we passed onwards,

"On the stream's bank, and everywhere, appeared
Fair dwellings, single or in social knots;
Some scattered o'er the level, others perch'd
On the hill-sides--a cheerful, quiet scene."

WORDSWORTH.

There is a Gothic quaintness about all the buildings in the Cotswolds,
great and small alike, which is very charming. Bibury is indeed a pretty
village. As you walk along the main street which runs parallel with the
river, an angler is busy "swishing" his rod violently in the air to
"dry" the fly, ere he essays to drop it over the nose of one of the
speckled fario which abound; so be careful to step down off the path
which runs alongside the stream, in case you should put the fish "down"
and spoil the sport. And now on our left, beyond the green, may be seen
a line of gabled cottages called "Arlington Row," a picture of which by
G. Leslie was hung at the Royal Academy this year (1898).

A few hundred yards on you stop to inspect the spring which rises in the
garden of the Swan Hotel. It has been said that two million gallons a
day is the minimum amount of water poured out by this spring. It
consists of the rain, which, falling on a large area of the hill