no such stone fences as I
have been speaking of in Warwickshire, nor elsewhere in England, except
among the Lakes, or in Yorkshire, and the rough and hilly countries to
the north of it. Hedges there were along my road, however, and broad,
level fields, rustic hamlets, and cottages of ancient date,--from the
roof of one of which the occupant was tearing away the thatch, and
showing what an accumulation of dust, dirt, mouldiness, roots of weeds,
families of mice, swallows' nests, and hordes of insects, had been
deposited there since that old straw was new. Estimating its antiquity
from these tokens, Shakspeare himself, in one of his morning rambles out
of his native town, might have seen the thatch laid on; at all events,
the cottage-walls were old enough to have known him as a guest. A few
modern villas were also to be seen, and perhaps there were mansions of
old gentility at no great distance, but hidden among trees; for it is a
point of English pride that such houses seldom allow themselves to be
visible from the high-road. In short, I recollect nothing specially
remarkable along the way, nor in the immediate approach to Stratford;
and yet the picture of that June morning has a glory in my memory, owing
chiefly, I believe, to the charm of the English summer-weather, the
really good days of which are the most delightful that mortal man can
ever hope to be favored with. Such a genial warmth! A little too warm,
it might be, yet only to such a degree as to assure an American (a
certainty to which he seldom attains till attempered to the customary
austerity of an English summer-day) that he was quite warm enough. And
after all, there was an unconquerable freshness in the atmosphere, which
every little movement of a breeze shook over me like a dash of the
ocean-spray. Such days need bring us no other happiness than their
own light and temperature. No doubt, I could not have enjoyed it so
exquisitely, except that there must be still latent in us Western
wanderers (even after an absence of two centuries and more) an
adaptation to the English climate which makes us sensible of a motherly
kindness in its scantiest sunshine, and overflows us with delight at its
more lavish smiles.

The spire of Shakspeare's church--the Church of the Holy Trinity--begins
to show itself among the trees at a little distance from Stratford. Next
we see the shabby old dwellings, intermixed with mean-looking houses
of modern date, and the streets bein